What It’s Like To Do A Year-Long Silent Meditation Retreat—By Yourself | Cara Lai

Virginia Military Institute, a military college in Lexington, Virginia, was another stop on the cross-country meditation tour, where our host Dan Harris and meditation teacher Jeff Warren spoke to Profs. Holly Richardson and Matt Jarman, as well as a few cadets who have taken their classes. Jarman, a psychology professor who leads a "Modern Warriorship" course with meditation, and Richardson, a physical education professor who teaches a mindfulness class, both talk about how they teach cadets in a military environment that meditation can help them be more mentally efficient.

15 Maalis 201743min

During their cross-county meditation bus tour in January, our host Dan Harris and meditation teacher Jeff Warren stopped in Tempe, Arizona, to talk with Sylvia Moir, who has been the head of the Tempe Police Department for the past year. Chief Moir says her mindfulness practice has not only helped her during high-stress police calls but also in how she engages with and leads her fellow officers.

8 Maalis 201746min

Shinzen Young first became fascinated with Asian culture as a Jewish teenager growing up in Los Angeles in the 1950s. Now a renowned meditation teacher, Shinzen is deeply involved in scientific research into what meditation does for the brain and has a new book out called "The Science of Enlightenment."

1 Maalis 20171h 34min

We're offering a special pre-Oscars edition of the podcast this week with actor Billy Crudup. Best known for his role as 70s rock star Russell Hammond in "Almost Famous," Crudup stars in two Oscar-nominated films this year, "Jackie" and "20th Century Women." A Broadway star as well as a movie actor, Crudup said he began practicing mindfulness as a way to help "triage" anxiety and panic attacks he experienced, including at three separate times while performing on stage.

24 Helmi 201755min

Hannah Hart is best known for her bubbly personality and boozy cooking mishaps on her mega-popular YouTube series, "My Drunk Kitchen," so many fans were surprised to learn about her life-long private struggle of dealing with her family's mental health issues, as detailed in her memoir, "Buffering: Unshared Tales of a Life Fully Loaded." Hart said she turned to meditation while she was fighting to get conservatorship of her mother, who suffers from psychosis. (( Links and more info below... ))

22 Helmi 201745min

Psychiatrist and addiction expert Judson Brewer was researching better treatment options for alcohol and cocaine addiction patients and found, through clinical studies, that meditation could significantly help break these behaviors or "habit loops" and prevent relapses. Brewer, who is now the director of research at the University of Massachusetts School of Medicine's Center for Mindfulness, founded a company called Claritas MindSciences, which uses neurofeedback techniques combined with mindfulness exercises for several conditions, from eating disorders to smoking addiction.

15 Helmi 20171h 22min

Tibetan Buddhist monk Matthieu Ricard, who is originally from France, earned the moniker "world's happiest man" after brain scans taken during a neurological study on meditation (led by Dr. Richie Davidson) showed excessive activity in his brain as he meditated on compassion. A staunch vegetarian, Ricard talks about the importance of extending compassion to all beings, including animals, which he lays out in his new book, "A Plea for the Animals: The Moral, Philosophical, and Evolutionary Imperative to Treat All Beings with Compassion."

8 Helmi 20171h 5min

Mary Karr has shared many dark pieces of her past in her memoirs, from a painful childhood, to a long struggle with alcoholism and depression, to living her entire life as an agnostic before becoming a Roman Catholic. It was when she said she found herself "sober in a mental institution" that she first began to pray and meditate, both of which are practices she continues today to stay centered.

1 Helmi 20171h 1min