Allison Williams On: Perfectionism, Defensiveness, and the Horror Movies We All Make in Our Minds

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- Today’s episode looks at one of the hardest Buddhist principles to grasp— the notion that the self is an illusion. Many people get stuck on the misunderstanding that they don’t exist. They look in the mirror and say, “Of course I exist. I’m right there.” And that’s true, you do exist, but just not in the way you think you do.  Today’s guest, Jay Garfield explores this notion by arguing that you are indeed a person just not a self— a principle that can simultaneously feel both imponderable and liberating.  Jay Garfield is the Doris Silbert Professor in the Humanities and Professor of Philosophy, Logic, and Buddhist Studies at Smith College and a visiting professor of Buddhist philosophy at Harvard Divinity School. He is the Author of multiple books, including his latest, which is called, Losing Ourselves: Learning to Live without a Self. In this episode we talk about:  The difference between a person and a self The problems with being taken by the illusion of selfhood Why he believes the illusion of self is not an evolutionary design flaw The many benefits of “losing ourselves” How to actually lose ourselves The concept of Interconnection His definition of real happiness The difference between pain and suffering and how to have the former without the latter Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/jay-garfield-487

10 Aug 202259min

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- The idea of loving people no matter what— no matter how obnoxious or unacceptable their behavior is can sound simultaneously treacly and downright impossible.  But today's guest Father Gregory Boyle talks about the practicality of this idea by showing how the concept of loving no matter what can be used as a tool— not to condone bad behavior but to help see people as doing their best, no matter how unskillfully.  Father Gregory Boyle is a Jesuit priest who founded a remarkable organization called Homeboy Industries, which is the largest gang intervention, rehabilitation, and reentry program in the world. He has a new book out called, The Whole Language: The Power of Extravagant Tenderness.  In this episode we talk about: How Homeboy Industries began 34 years ago Boyle’s practices for working with stress  What he means when he says you have to put death in its place Motivating people through joy rather than admonition How to catch yourself when you’re about to demonize or be judgmental How to set boundaries How to dole out consequences without closing the doors to anybody And we talk about Father Boyle’s quite expansive and inclusive notion of God Content warnings: There are mentions of sensitive topics including, sexual trauma, violence, drug abuse and domestic abuse.  Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/father-gregory-boyle-486

8 Aug 20221h 6min

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- Oftentimes Buddhism can take a tough love, no nonsense approach to happiness by saying, if you want to be happier, sometimes you need to face hard truths.  In today's episode we’re going to talk about a Buddhist list called The Three Characteristics. These are the three non-negotiable truths about reality, which you have to see and understand in order to be happy. Granted, when looked at from a certain angle, these truths, or characteristics of reality can suck at times. But do you want to see the truth of things or not? Do you want to be happier or not? Our guide through these three characteristics is the mighty Mushim Patricia Ikeda. Mushim has a background in both monastic and lay Buddhist practice and is a core teacher and community director at the East Bay Meditation Center in Oakland, California. This is her second appearance on the show.  Content Warning: This episode briefly mentions child loss. In this episode we talk about:  The three characteristics, alternatively known as the three Dharma seals Our conflicted relationship to change  Our brain’s tendency to focus on the negative Practices that can help with handling change more effectively How not taking your thoughts so personally can build your resilience And why Mushim believes that universal non-discriminating love is synonymous with Nirvana Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/mushim-patricia-ikeda-484

3 Aug 202259min

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- These days, the word mindfulness has become a buzz phrase but very often people don’t know what the word actually means, much less how to practice it. One simple definition of mindfulness is the ability to see what’s happening in your mind without getting carried away by it. The benefits of doing so are vast and profound— from decreased emotional reactivity to being more awake to what’s actually happening in your life. Today's guest Joseph Goldstein talks about a classic Buddhist list called the four foundations of mindfulness, which lays out various techniques for developing mindfulness within your practice. Goldstein is one of the premier western proponents of Mindfulness. He co-founded the legendary Insight Meditation Society alongside Sharon Salzberg and Jack Kornfield. He also wrote a book called Mindfulness: A Practical Guide to Awakening. In this episode we talk about: The historical context for the four foundations of mindfulness  Why he thinks the Buddha loved lists Why the Buddha placed mindfulness of the body first on the list The steps to mastering mindfulness of the body The meaning of the word embodied and how that’s different from our usual mode of being in the world How and why to do walking meditations What are feeling tones and why are they important Practices for cultivating mindfulness of mind And we talk about some of the mantras that Joseph uses when teaching  Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/joseph-goldstein-483

1 Aug 20221h 7min

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- There are so many benefits to mindfulness with one of the biggest being the cultivation of more self-awareness. This cultivation can lead to identifying the unhelpful mental habits that can develop over the years. Today we’re going to talk to Carol Wilson who offers very clear and practical ways that Buddhist meditation can help us turn down the volume on our unproductive mental habits and be less reactive. Wilson is a guiding teacher at the Insight Meditation Society, where for many years she has taught their annual three-month retreat. She began her insight meditation practice in 1971 in India and in the 1980s she spent a year in Thailand as a Buddhist nun.  In this episode we talk about: How to be mindful throughout the day The concept of 360 degree awareness Noticing when one experiences wanting or aversion  Why Wilson believes that the root of suffering comes from making it all about us How seeing torment can help us experience freedom from the self The benefits of reflecting on your past acts of generosity  Bringing awareness to your motivations And doing a gratitude practice regularly to change the weather pattern in your mind Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/carol-wilson-481

27 Juli 20221h 3min

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- Many of us may have a reflexive reaction when we notice we’re feeling down: we want it to go away. Maybe we think something is wrong with us and we automatically self medicate in any number of ways. But how do we square this with the fact that many of us may also really like sad movies and music? And making things even more complex, how do we compute the fact that the universe is constantly handing us opportunities to feel awe, gratitude, and joy, often at the exact same moment that sadness arises? What’s going on with this complex and conflicted relationship we have with a perfectly normal human emotion? Our guest today Susan Cain has written a whole book about this called Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole. In this book, she explores how the capacity to tune in to the inherent joy and sadness of the human situation can be a superpower for connection. In this episode we talk about: Whether bittersweetness is a skill you can hone The relationship between bittersweetness and the Buddhist concept of impermanence Why we feel embarrassed about discussing sorrow and longing  How sadness can be transmuted into creativity, and how that creativity can lead us out of sadness And how America, a country founded on so much heartache, turned into, in her words, “a culture of normative smiles” Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/susan-cain-480

25 Juli 202258min

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- Sit in meditation for a few minutes and you’re likely to experience pain, either physical or psychological. Hang around the meditation scene for very long, and you are likely to hear the expression, “Pain is inevitable; suffering is optional.”  And that’s what this episode is all about— boosting your pain tolerance through meditation. Because pain really is inevitable, but can you reduce your suffering through mindfulness and compassion?  Our guest today, Christiane Wolf, argues ‘yes’. She is a physician turned mindfulness and compassion teacher and teacher trainer. She is an authorized Buddhist teacher in the Insight (Vipassana) meditation tradition, teaching classes and retreats worldwide, and she’s also the author of ​Outsmart Your Pain: Mindfulness and Self-Compassion to Help You Leave Chronic Pain Behind. In this episode we talk about: Meditation techniques that offer us a better relationship to pain How to work with the physicality of pain The stories we tell ourselves about our pain And seeing pain as an opportunity Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/christiane-wolf-rerun

20 Juli 202250min

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers. --- We all have long-standing painful patterns of behavior or inner storylines that can cause us to react disproportionately or inappropriately to everyday events.   Today's guest, Dr. Radhule Weininger, has a term for this. She calls them longstanding recurrent painful patterns or LRPPs.  Weininger is a clinical psychologist, psychotherapist, and teacher of Buddhist meditation and Buddhist psychology. She has a new book, Heart Medicine: How to Stop Painful Patterns and Find Peace and Freedom—at Last  In this episode we talk about: How to recognize a problematic pattern or when you’ve been “lrpp-ed” Why Dr. Weininger believes that Buddhism and western psychology, when practiced together, can help us deal with these recurring patterns Unpacking the word trauma The psychological term “mismatch” and how it relates to childhood trauma or hurt How to practice meditation in order to tolerate discomfort Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/radhule-weininger-478

18 Juli 20221h 5min