Dan Harris may claim some obscure “longest title” award for his 10% Happier: How I Tamed the Voice in My Head, Reduced Stress Without Losing My Edge, and Found Self-Help That Actually Works — A True Story. I happened to have opted for the audio version (proudly borrowed from the public library database), which turned out to be conducive to his writing style and pretty entertaining. His tone is casual, almost like chatting with you over a pint. A bit autobiographical, Harris spends effort outlining his background and career progression from small market local news to big time network anchor. He candidly recounts the darker side of his ascension: a burgeoning drug habit coupled with an aggressive winner-take-all approach to interpersonal relationships. He remembers getting feedback from a manager, who described him as “an asshole that nobody likes.” Personal insecurities and drug abuse smashed together with a pressure cooker corporate environment take its toll, eventually culminating in an on-air public meltdown. He has a panic attack on live television, struggling to breathe let alone speak words cogently into the camera.

Although the incident proved not to be fatal (career or otherwise), it propelled Harris to look introspectively and make real changes. He sought out a therapist, changed his “weekend habits” and began searching for answers. About this time on the career side, he had carved out a small niche, reporting on various religious themed story lines. This avenue yielded favorable reviews from his peers and bosses, but also gave him the opportunity to explore his own spirituality and the big questions in life. Harris narrates his decent down a religious rabbit hole, reporting on mainstream religious figures of Christian and Moslem faiths, but also lesser-known spiritual guru types. He gives detailed and candid accounts of Ted Haggard (Evangelical Christian), Eckhart Tolle (spiritual teacher), Deepak Chopra (spiritual teacher), Mark Epstein (psychotherapist, author) and Sam Harris (neuroscientist, author). I found this section to be the most fascinating because Harris, in his conversational tone, simply lays out his experience getting to know these individuals and how they think. You feel like you’re right there with him and he doesn’t hide his skepticism or snark. The spiritual journey eventually leads Harris to the practice of meditation and mindfulness.

Instead of a synopsis of this journey, I would rather pull out a few of the themes Harris lays on the table for the reader. These were the “aha moments” along the way, the tangible maxims he was able to extract from experience which transformed the wishy-washy conceptual into the life-altering practical.

Life is suffering. Even with a limited grasp of Buddhist tenets (I’m raising my hand right now), one may be familiar with this concept. Harris describes his surprise in learning an alternative interpretation of the phrase, which hypothesizes its meaning may be somewhat lost in translation. Instead of “life is suffering,” this theory asserts a more appropriate translation is “life is unsatisfying” or “life is impermanent.” To illustrate: when we are hungry, we eat. The act satiates the state of hunger (for a time). A feeling of fullness is achieved (also for a time). The notion of the impermanence holds for both states alike. There is no resolution, no finality. Everything is transitory. Harris cites a different example of a hypothetical lottery winner so unhappy they commit suicide, driving home the point with a fancy technical term: hedonic adaptation. I immediately think of the old adage: “It’s always greener on the other side of the fence.” These are all permutations of the same core concept: nothing is permanent, all is impermanent.

He takes this core concept and applies it to his own neuroses in a discussion of the “price of security versus the wisdom of insecurity.” His heretofore modus operandi was a type A, go-getter which, as a byproduct, produced an ever-present paranoia. He felt success was always one false move away from slipping through his fingers. He was under the misconception that professional achievement necessarily goes hand-in-hand with a sentinel-like vigilance to guard the castle. This is the cost of security, stability, success. This was all flipped on its head when he came to embrace the “wisdom of insecurity,” i.e. truly appreciating the fact that everything is impermanent and any sense of security is an illusion. This letting go was a major game changer for Harris. As a rationalist with a penchant for over-analyzing the mundane, I found myself appreciating this deconstruction.

The last notable concept that struck me is the theme of “respond versus react.” In a passage that captures Harris at his most snarky, he pokes fun of the stereotypical member of the “mindfulness” community. You know, the person that wears socks under their sandals, buys groceries from Whole Foods, drives a Subaru and listens to NPR (not that there’s anything wrong with that). Harris clearly does not fit this caricature. More importantly however, he was frustrated by the fact that these mindfulness people were always so calm and measured in their interactions with other people. How did they do it? Was it genuine or a persona? Do they have the same constant (and for the most part caustic) internal monologue judging everyone and everything around them like him? The “respond versus react” idea answered these questions. Harris began to understand that many if not most people go through life reacting to the stimulae about them. The practice of mindfulness helped him learn to note both internal thoughts and external sensory information and then consciously react to them. It sounds so simple, like when as a child you are told to count to ten before you respond to someone who hurts your feelings. It’s really not that much different. If you have ever been in traffic in a metropolitan area, you fully appreciate that most people are indeed reacting to their environment rather than responding to it. Harris notes that in learning more about the meditation and mindfulness community, the most experienced practitioners carry themselves with a nearly unshakable calmness, they understand that it is fully within their ability to choose how we respond to our environment.

10% Happier is an enjoyable book for those looking to dip their toes into the meditation and mindfulness realm. His tone and storytelling abilities make for a quick and entertaining read. Harris has written a couple of follow up books and looks to be engaged in other for-profit ventures on the topic. In pursuit of my own interests on the topic, I do plan on reading his other books. More importantly, I want to begin meditating as part of my morning routine. I plan to start small, see if I can’t do a full week of meditation for 10-15 minutes every morning after I wake. So more to come on this topic…