Dan Harris, author of 10% Happier - How I Tamed the Voice in My Head, Reduced Stress Without Losing My Edge, and Found Self-Help that Actually Works (whew, now that's a mouthful) acknowledges that he's not a new-agey spiritual kind of guy who you'd naturally find wandering in the tranquil waters of meditation. And across the phone line, when talking to him for my latest 1:2:1 podcast, I can tell. It's clear he's an Alpha Male who's risen to the top in broadcast network news (co-anchor of Nightline and the weekend editions of Good Morning America) by not being laid back. So he might just be the right guy to take the world of meditation out of the "om" and bring it to a new audience. When I told him I thought he might be doing for mediation what Richard Nixon did for China - normalizing it - he laughed and said, "I love the analogy. It's probably more flattering than I deserve, but it's cool nonetheless."
The success of 10% Happier is not something Harris envisioned. As he was writing it he kept telling his wife it was never going to find an audience: "No one is going to read it." Yet he's managed to spin out a wonderful tale about the life of a mega-skeptical agnostic journalist finding peace, happiness and yes, fulfillment, in the land of self-help and meditation. Well, maybe not total serenity. He did have that little spat with a New York City taxi driver last week that caused his wife to remind him that he still has more steps to climb to reach the Zen state of Fudoshin. Nonetheless, Harris is happier no matter what the percentage; you get the distinct impression that he sees a lot more sunshine out there than rain. And who wouldn't want that?
Harris thinks his worrier gene was inherited from his father, Dr. Jay Harris who he calls "a gifted wringer of hands and gnasher of teeth." His mother, Dr. Nancy Lee Harris, was much more in the Zen mode: "…slightly mellower about her equally demanding medical career." (Both his parents are alums of the Stanford School of Medicine.)
Interestingly, Harris tells me he believes that emerging science linking the practice of meditation to a wide range of physical and psychological advantages may lead to the next big public-health revolution. "Say that again," I asked. "You think that meditation will lead to a revolution?" With no lack of uncertainty he replied:
Yeah, I do. As I've said, the science is really still in its early phases, but the science is really compelling. It shows… that this whole, almost laughably long list of benefits from lower blood pressure to boosted immune system to reduced release of the stress hormone cortisol, and then the neuroscience is just truly sci-fi.
When we wrapped up the podcast, Harris spoke highly about the groundbreaking work being done here at Stanford by neurologist James R Doty, MD. Doty is leading his own revolution in neurology and created the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE), to stimulate a rigorous multi-disciplinary scientific effort at understanding the neural, mental, and social bases of compassion and altruism.
Previously: Research brings meditation’s health benefits into focus, How being compassionate can influence your health, Study shows meditation may alter areas of the brain associated with psychiatric disorders and Ommmmm… Mindfulness therapy appears to help prevent depression relapse
Photo in featured entry box by J E Theriot
