Professional Setbacks Happen to All of Us. Here Are Some Lessons From Resetting My Career. | Dan Harris & Toni Magyar

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This is the 10% Happier Podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hello, gang. Okay.
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I have a lot to say in the introduction to
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this episode. This is a personal episode today, but don't worry.
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It's also very practical. You're going to hear me talk
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about what I learned about issues such as focus, feedback,
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The disutility of shame or self-criticism and the value of
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expecting adversity, even though we all want life to be
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an unbroken upward trajectory of seamless progress. These are all
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things that I learned or perhaps more accurately relearned when
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I was forced to reset or restart or resuscitate my
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career last year. Just let me step back for a
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second and give you some context. Last year at around
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this time, I went public and announced that I was
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separating from the meditation app that I co-founded. That separation
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process was among the most difficult things that I have
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experienced as a grownup. It lasted three years. It brought
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up all sorts of issues for me, including anger and
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anxiety and more. And yes, I will fully acknowledge the
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fact that having a business divorce was one of the
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most difficult things in my life is proof that my
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life has been charmed and privileged. I own that. And
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yet it was really hard. The end result was that
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I left the app that I had long considered to
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be my baby and restarted a new subscription service over
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on Substack called danharris.com. A huge thank you to all
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of you who signed up for that thing. In the
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last year, we've accumulated more than 200,000 followers, many, many
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thousands of whom are actually paying, which allows me to
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pay my staff and pay all the meditation teachers who
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contribute content. So I'm immensely grateful. And I should add
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that I'm grateful not only to all of you, but
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also to the incredible people who work on my team,
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one of whom you're going to hear from today. This
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episode is a conversation between me and Toni Magyar, who
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is the CEO of my little company. I don't think
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she's ever been on the podcast before, so this should
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be a treat. She is an incredibly smart, very, very
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thoughtful person who not only leads our team, but with
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a lot of care, but also has the very big
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and sometimes very annoying job of keeping me in line.
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which she does beautifully. Tony has a rich background in
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the media space. She started in traditional book publishing and
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then moved over to podcasts and now works with me.
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So this is going to be a behind the scenes
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conversation where we talk in a very, very candid way
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about the hard lessons that we have both learned in
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the year since we launched. It's going to have plenty
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of behind the scenes content if you're into that kind
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of thing, but we also made damn sure to center
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it around the practical things that both Tony and I
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learned in over the past year or so. And of course, practical, operational,
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actionable wisdom is at the spirit of our entire endeavor.
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So that just kind of makes sense. I should also
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say this is the kickoff episode for a whole month
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of programming we're doing during the month of September. September
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is a back to school month. It's a time when
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people reset often. Sometimes in my business, we call it
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like a mini New Year's. So we have a whole
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month of programming around the theme of reset. We're coming
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out of summer. We're getting back to our routines, so
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we're resetting here on the pod. Coming up this month,
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we've got episodes on how to reset your nervous system,
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how to reset your career, and more. I told you
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this intro was going to be long. I'm almost done,
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but I've got a couple of other announcements before we
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dive into the conversation. First, we're doing some resetting, to
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be a little cute, over at danharris.com. Over the last year,
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we've learned a lot about what our customers want, so
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we are now offering bespoke products. guided meditations that come
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with all of our Monday and Wednesday episodes. Every month,
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we hire a teacher of the month who produces these
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custom guided meditations. The idea is that we can help
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you take all the cool stuff you learn in the
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episode and pound it into your neurons through guided meditations.
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This month, our teacher of the month is Vinnie Ferraro,
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a fan favorite and a personal favorite of mine. Second
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thing to say, and this is related, starting September 2nd,
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We're going to start doing live guided meditation and Q
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& A sessions every week. This is only for paid subscribers.
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By the way, the guided meditations are also only for
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paid subscribers. For the last year, we've done these live
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video meditation and Q & A sessions once or twice
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a month. They're super popular, and I also really enjoy
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doing them. So now we're going to do it every week,
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every Tuesday, in fact. So you can put it on
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your calendar, and you can count on it. Our first
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one is September 2nd, 4 o'clock Eastern. It'll be me
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and Vinny together. And then after September 2nd, indefinitely, every Tuesday,
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four o'clock Eastern, we'll do some meditation together. And if
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you miss it, you can always do it asynchronously on
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your own time. We'll send out the video. Long way
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of saying we've got a lot of cool shit going
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on over at danharris.com. Please sign up as a paying subscriber.
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As you will hear in this conversation with Tony, these
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new features, the bespoke guided meditations and the weekly live
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video meditations, they're really just the beginning. We have some
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Pretty ambitious plans. We'd love to have you in on
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the ground floor as we build this thing together. Okay,
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one last thing. I promise this is the last thing.
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This one last announcement, then we'll take a break and
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get to the actual episode. If you want to meditate
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with me in person, I am doing a live IRL
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event at the Omega Institute, which is an hour or
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two north of New York City, at the end of October,
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the weekend of the 24th. It's a weekend-long event with
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my friends Seben A. Selassie and Jeff Warren. We call
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it Meditation Party. because it's a mixture of meditation and
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also hanging out, socializing, community, et cetera. You can sign
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up at eomega.org, eomega.org. I'll also put a link in
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the show notes. Okay, quick break, and then we'll be
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right back with my conversation with the estimable Tony Magyar.
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You good to go? Yeah, I think so. Okay, so
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I'll just start. I'll just kick it off.
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Yeah, why not?
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Tony Magyar, welcome to the show.
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Thanks, Dan.
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First time appearance.
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First time. Maybe the last. We'll see.
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What should we talk about?
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Well, we're going to talk about what we've been up
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to for the last year and where that has led
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us and where we think we're going.
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Yeah.
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So September 10th last year, we published an episode on
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the show.
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It was just you.
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No guest. No guest. And you told the audience about
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a career earthquake that you'd just been through and a
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bunch of things that you learned. But that earthquake was
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you were leaving the meditation app that you had co-founded.
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And you were going out on your own, starting a
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new business, a little team. And that was a year ago.
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We have done a lot. We have learned a lot.
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So we're going to share what's been going on behind
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the scenes a little bit. And then we're going to
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talk about what have we learned about starting a business?
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What have we learned about.
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What we should be offering to our listeners and our
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subscribers at danharris.com? And then what have we learned about change?
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You've been through a lot.
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I mean, it's not just me.
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It's not just you.
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Yeah, me too.
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You know, because this whole month on the podcast, we're
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talking about resets, nervous system, career, relationships. So we want
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to kick off and acknowledge that like change is happening
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all of the time. But for human beings, that can
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be really hard. So we're going to use some very
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big changes that we've been through. to kind of help
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tease out some lessons to foreground for this whole month
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of programming.
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So just to put a fine point on it for
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the listeners, so that we'll start by talking about practical
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takeaways from a year plus of tumult in our professional
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and personal lives with the goal of giving people something
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they can do in their own lives. And then toward
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the end, we'll pull back the curtain a little bit
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do some behind the scenes stuff on what we're thinking
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about and building towards as a company. Am I summing
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that up correctly?
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I think that's pretty much right.
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Okay. Pretty much right.
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Pretty much right. I was thinking we would actually start
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by giving the audience a little more background and context. Okay.
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We're not here to spill tea or talk about the breakup.
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But I think, you know, when you are in the
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midst of this very long, painful separation process, your career
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and livelihood was like really up in the air. One
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of the potential titles we've talked about for this episode
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is how to reset after you blow up your life.
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and we're not suggesting the audience should blow up their life,
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but I think it is helpful context perhaps just to
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understand where we were and what we were doing to understand,
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you know, where we are now and how to deal
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with just the uncertainty of change.
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So the order of operations then is little background, little background,
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practical takeaways. What are we offering behind the scenes? What
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are we offering?
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Yes. Yeah. And, uh, Maybe we'll let you run free
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a little bit and talk about some future ideas that
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we have.
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We'll see how that goes. Just to frame that for
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the audience. when she talks about maybe letting me run free,
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one of the hardest parts of Tony's job, which we'll
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get into this, is she's working with somebody who chases
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a lot of squirrels. Some of you may have heard
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me talk about this before, but in that movie Up,
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which I've watched with my son many, many times, it's
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a Pixar movie. The bad guy has a pack of
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dogs who chase the good guys. And every once in
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a while, the dogs get distracted and yell the word
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squirrel and go off chasing a squirrel. And I do
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that a lot. I've got a million ideas, some of
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them good, some of them very, very stupid. And they're
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all squirrels. And we have to decide. And Tony often
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has to play traffic cop on this. Which squirrels are
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we going to chase? And how do we stay focused?
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That's the The correct context to your dry comment earlier?
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Yes, exactly. Okay, so your whole career, your livelihood was
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pretty up in the air. And there were a few
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reasons for that. You had left ABC News after 20-some
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on your career. And you did that to focus really
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on 10% Happier and the work that you do around
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meditation and mental health. But I think it was not
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long after you had made that decision that there started
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to be some conflict at the old app company. Started
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heading down the path of, you know, having to separate.
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At the same time, the podcast industry was sort of
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like going through like convulsions of several kinds. Great shows
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were being canceled left and right. People were losing their jobs.
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We had a couple contracts that were making it just
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difficult for us to know what our future was going
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to look like. Were we going to be able to
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afford to make this show? What was that going to
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look like? And we knew it was going to take
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us some time to figure that out. given the agreements
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we had in place and just the timing. The word
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we often used was existential. Things felt really challenging. And
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for reasons we're not gonna go into, we ended up
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needing to announce your departure from the meditation app a
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bit sooner than we had anticipated. And we wanted to
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give the audience a place where they could follow you
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going forward. And we wanted to offer things that we
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hadn't offered in the past. More connection to you, more
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help remembering, lessons to the show. But we also had
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to do.
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It really quickly.
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And I'm curious just to hear from you when we
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got to launch day and there was a queue of
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things that needed to happen. a press release needed to
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go out from the company, and then we could publish
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our episode. We could launch danharris.com. Do you remember how
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you were feeling that day? You seemed super chill. I
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was like a mess.
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You had seen me in the previous three years be
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anything but chill. It's not like I was perpetually relaxed.
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And there were plenty of times that you witnessed firsthand
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where I really, I don't think handled it well. It
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was like the manifestation of my deepest fears, as I've
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often talked about with you. And on this show, you know,
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I have a great grandfather who took his own life
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in the family kitchen after losing the family fortune and
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getting indicted. And I just have that kind of primordial,
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for me, primordial fear in my bones. And so this
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kind of had echoes of that. And so I was really,
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really anxious for a long time. Plus there was you know,
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it was a long process of separating from the company.
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That was a long negotiation and you were right there
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for every step of it. And of course we were
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negotiating to figure out how much money we're going to
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make on the podcast. And so it, as you said,
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it felt existential. I think for a lot of that period,
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I was just on tilt. By the time we got
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to September 10th of last year, when we announced that
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I was leaving the app and that you and I
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and the rest of this team had decided to strike
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out on our own, I actually felt reasonably good. One
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of the things I learned is how to live with uncertainty.
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There's a story that I was just thinking about this
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morning that my executive coach, who you know well, Jerry Colonna,
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who the audience may remember, he's been on the show
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a bunch of times. He has a story of talking
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to his shrink several decades ago and just saying, being
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really worried about money and feeling unsafe. And the shrink
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asked him, how much money would make you feel safe?
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And Jerry heard himself say, Bill Gates money. Which, you know,
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is of course totally ridiculous. I mean, very few people
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other than Bill Gates ever get Bill Gates money. But
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it speaks to me of how we're never gonna feel solid.
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We're never gonna, we can't get there, that we're chasing
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something that's a mirage, an illusion. And I have to
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learn this lesson over and over again, because I, you know,
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you and I talk about my desire to turn the
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volume down on a sense of precarity in my life.
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But actually, I think in my saner moments, I recognize
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that you can't get rid of groundlessness. That is the
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fundamental truth. And those moments of feeling secure, that's actually
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really more the illusion. And I hate this fact about reality,
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but it It does seem kind of non-negotiable. And so
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I think over time, I've just gotten better at learning
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how to live with it. I heard an expression recently,
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expect nothing, be prepared for anything. And I kind of
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like that. Like you and I talk a lot about
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something a guest on the show once said is like,
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life is not an escalator. So I will not expect
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a smooth upward trajectory for our company, for anything in
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my life. And I will simultaneously be prepared for anything.
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This is not like a recipe I don't think properly
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understood as being hypervigilant and constantly anxious. It's just the
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only ground that is available is the confidence that I've
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trained my mind enough and have a good enough team
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around me personally and professionally to handle whatever shit show
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might emerge.
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And it will.
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Yes, it will. Shit shows will happen.
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Yes. On the regular.
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How do you handle, I mean, I talked a little
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bit about just kind of how I handle it. One
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is just recognizing the truth of it. And two is
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self-soothing by just talking to myself and talking with you.
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So as I'm talking, I'm realizing there are a bunch
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of things that were said there. One is seeing clearly
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in Buddhist speak, Sampajana, I believe it's called, just seeing
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clearly that groundlessness is the truth. That's one kind of
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healing modality because you're not arguing with reality. The second
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is recognizing that talking to yourself, talking to myself about
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the fact that I can handle whatever comes up, like
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I'm scared of it, but I can deal with it.
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And I just look back at my history and realize
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I've dealt with lots of stuff. The third is have
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a good people around you. Another expression you and I
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use all the time, never worry alone. Those are three practical,
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actionable tools for the audience. What would you add to that? Like,
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what do you use? to get through all of this
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topsy-turvy stuff.
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I would sort of add something we were talking about
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right before we started recording, and I alluded to it
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a second ago, is just that change is constant. This
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thing that you're worried about right now, this feeling that
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you're having right now, it's about to change. It's not
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always going to change for the better, but it is
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going to change. And then I think the other... piece
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of this that you know is something that I've been
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working on very gradually is just the self-compassion piece because
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for me and I know I'm not alone here I
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tend to over index on shame and self-blame anytime it
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seems like something isn't going well And so sometimes it's
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a reminder of being imperfect, being human, needing to make
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mistakes to learn. And other times, and we've talked about
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this in terms of decisions and choices we've made together,
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it's about knowing we did the best we could with
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the information we had at the time. The circumstances... the
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media landscape, whatever, may have changed and we may regret
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our decision, but we did the best we could with
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the information we had at the time. And there were
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a lot of factors that weren't necessarily in our control.
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It's really helpful, actually, because the shame and the guilt
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and the self-blame and the self-laceration does not help your business.
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Absolutely not. The more I fixate on what I think
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my failings have been, the harder I might try to
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push myself to deny them, overcome them, change immediately, which
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isn't going to happen, even if it's unintentional, then the
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harder I'm going to push on other people, right? That
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thing of the thing we don't want to see in
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ourselves that we haven't accepted, haven't integrated, it bleeds out
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into our relationships with other people. So needing to slow down,
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have more compassion, be a little bit gentler and not
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be a neurotic drill sergeant is so critical because if
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I'm doing it to myself, it will have repercussions, not
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just for me, but for the rest of the team
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and our whole business.
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I think what you're talking about here is kind of
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the punchline for my next book. which I was just
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writing a chat. I was writing the key chapter where
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I realized this, this morning, which is, I believe what
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you were just talking about, which is that we have
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two spirals available to us at all times. One is
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what you were just describing, which my friend Evelyn Tribbley
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describes as the toilet vortex, where you're hard on yourself
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and then you take that on other people and then
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you feel like shit. And then you're even worse to
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other people and then you feel even worse and then
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down you go. And the other, which I think can
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often kick off with self-compassion, is as you learn how
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to take care of your own mind, well, then your
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relationships improve because you're easier on other people. And because
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relationships are the most important variable in human flourishing, then
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your inner weather gets even bombier, then the relationships improve
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even more, and then up you go. I call that
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the cheesy upward spiral. And people think of business, I think,
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often as, I don't know, purely commercial outside the realm
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of the spiritual, for lack of a better word. But actually,
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it's a great crucible for practicing all the stuff we
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talk about on the show.
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Absolutely.
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Absolutely.
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But over the last couple of years when I've taken
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on too much or felt like I made a mistake
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that was somehow unforgivable and wanted to quit or fire myself,
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it is true that actually your book in progress and manuscript,
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as funky as it is right now, as you toil
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away on your rewrite, has been hugely helpful. And it's
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one of the things that really motivates me to keep going,
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keep building this business, because I know the work that
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you're doing and that we're all doing really can change
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people's lives. And that's a big deal.
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I would like to finish this book. It has been
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a tough slog. But just to put a little meat
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on the bone of what you were saying there, that
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When you say you're excited about it, one of your
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areas of expertise really is the business of creating content
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that will help people. You came up through publishing and
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then you went to podcasts. Then you worked in a
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company that mixed podcasts with a meditation app. And now
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you're the CEO of a company that's really, really focused
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on that. And your vision, which I really share, is
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the book comes out. It hopefully inspires a bunch of
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people to do the things that I did in the book.
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And then we then create an infrastructure of courses where
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people can learn how to do the things that you
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can watch me fuck up in the book. So it's
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kind of like you go to a movie and then
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you go to the theme park afterwards. And we are
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building the theme park. We're building both at the same time.
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And that's what you're from a professional standpoint. That's where
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you really feel most energized. Yeah, super excited.
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And I think we can use that as a segue
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to like, what is this? theme park.
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I do want to just go back to something you
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said that I think is a key learning that we
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should dwell on. Are you okay with that? Yeah. So
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before I was listing at least three things I learned
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in the aftermath and also in the prodrome of blowing
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up my whole life. One is, you know, the value
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of mindfulness, like seeing clearly what reality is so that
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I'm not at war with it. And after a while,
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you start to surrender into it and relax like, But yeah,
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I can see we're in a world of ceaseless change.
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That doesn't mean I don't have any agency. It doesn't
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mean I'm going to be resigned. But it means I
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can learn how to respond wisely to things instead of
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reacting blindly. Mindfulness can be trained through mindfulness meditation. The
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second part, I described it as like developing a sense
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of confidence that you can handle whatever is going to
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come your way. But I actually think the bigger framing
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for the second thing would be self-compassion. Just learning how
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to talk to yourself in a way that reduces your
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own anxiety and makes you more effective and takes out
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of the equation to the best of your ability the self-criticism,
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the guilt, the shame, all of that stuff. And I
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would add, back to our discussion around my comportment during
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this very tumultuous period of time, I think one area
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of shame reduction for me is being okay with the
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fact that I'm some sort of quasi-guru who fucks up
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all the time, you know? And like, that's okay. Like,
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and that's, I think, I hope, maybe this is self,
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what's the word I'm looking for? Letting myself off the
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hook in some way. But I hope that's good modeling
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for people listening and watching, which is that, you know,
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you can do this for a living and still screw up.
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And I know a lot of meditation teachers who make
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mistakes in their lives. And then why this self-compassion matters,
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I think really, and this is what I wanted to
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double click on is, I said the third lesson earlier
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was never worry alone. But I think actually the third
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lesson is like stress, and we know this from the data,
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is reduced by having people you trust in your orbit
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who you can talk to about the shit that's going on.
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But as I often say, other people are, you know,
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a necessity. And this is the head fuck, they're a
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titanic thing in the ass. And so you need to
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learn a bunch of skills to handle other people. And
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so one of the skills that I think is an
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ongoing work in progress for me is learning how to
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be a leader. I was an anchorman at ABC News
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for 21 years and before that in local news, and
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I never had a direct report. Nobody actually worked for me.
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I was a leader in some sense, but really I
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was just kind of doing my own thing. And to
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the extent that I was a leader and people were
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looking up to me, I whiffed on that a lot.
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I was self-focused. So I never really learned how to
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be a manager. And then now I have my own
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company and only I really have one direct report, you.
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So I'm the guinea pig.
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You're the guinea pig. Yeah, people should not feel envy.
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But just to go back to something you said earlier
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that I made a note of that might have been
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confusing for people, which is that you have had at
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moments the desire to fire yourself. And that is a
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real thing. And we had a little moment a couple
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of months ago where you really wanted not to fire yourself,
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but to demote yourself. And that kind of led to
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a whole cascade of events that I, my story is
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we're positive in the end, but I want to hear
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you tell the story and then we can talk about
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what we both learned in that process.
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Yeah. Okay. You know, and I'll just be a little
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vulnerable here and let the listeners in though. I think
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I alluded to this already. my sort of default mode
481
00:28:06.150 --> 00:28:12.299
is not good enough. And so there have been periods over,
482
00:28:12.640 --> 00:28:16.660
particularly the last year, of feeling like, yeah, somebody would
483
00:28:16.700 --> 00:28:19.180
be much better at this than me. I can think
484
00:28:19.339 --> 00:28:23.099
of all these different skills or experiences or backgrounds and
485
00:28:23.259 --> 00:28:25.339
they just, they wouldn't make these mistakes and they would
486
00:28:25.400 --> 00:28:27.380
know these things and they would be better than me.
487
00:28:28.259 --> 00:28:32.839
And adios, I should get out of here. But of course,
488
00:28:32.980 --> 00:28:35.980
I As we were just talking about, I'm really excited
489
00:28:36.009 --> 00:28:38.440
about what we're building. So my brain would start to
490
00:28:38.509 --> 00:28:41.329
work on trying to figure out, because I also love
491
00:28:41.369 --> 00:28:46.130
a puzzle, where can I fit? Where can I still
492
00:28:46.190 --> 00:28:53.410
be useful, but not out over my skis? So that
493
00:28:53.470 --> 00:28:58.569
had been playing out in the background for probably a year.
494
00:28:58.589 --> 00:29:02.109
So we started to work more and more closely together.
495
00:29:02.230 --> 00:29:05.019
But you didn't tell me this, really. I didn't really
496
00:29:05.079 --> 00:29:06.599
tell you. I mean, I signaled.
497
00:29:06.700 --> 00:29:09.579
One time I came over to your house and was like, so, Dan,
498
00:29:09.680 --> 00:29:14.019
I think maybe, you know, you said you were going
499
00:29:14.039 --> 00:29:17.119
to like interview for who the person was who was
500
00:29:17.160 --> 00:29:19.140
going to like run this company with you.
501
00:29:19.180 --> 00:29:20.000
You didn't really do that.
502
00:29:20.039 --> 00:29:22.700
I think maybe you should. Maybe you want like a
503
00:29:22.779 --> 00:29:26.839
different kind of person. Like very like, I don't know, maybe.
504
00:29:26.859 --> 00:29:29.400
Because I think one of the things that I've learned
505
00:29:29.440 --> 00:29:32.259
is where we can get into trouble is when you're
506
00:29:33.849 --> 00:29:37.200
historical reluctance to just kind of say the hard thing
507
00:29:38.450 --> 00:29:43.220
meets my self-centeredness. because you're dropping breadcrumbs, but you never
508
00:29:43.279 --> 00:29:46.140
actually really came out and said it. And I was
509
00:29:46.200 --> 00:29:48.940
not attuned to the breadcrumbs because I'm just worried about
510
00:29:48.980 --> 00:29:52.309
my own shit. And I think the story you'll tell
511
00:29:52.369 --> 00:29:53.970
in a minute where it really came to a head,
512
00:29:53.990 --> 00:29:57.670
I think was a huge wake up. I think for
513
00:29:57.710 --> 00:29:59.329
both of us, I'm reluctant to speak for you, but
514
00:29:59.910 --> 00:30:03.519
I've seen you really lean into being more direct in
515
00:30:03.559 --> 00:30:07.019
the aftermath of that. And I've seen in myself at
516
00:30:07.059 --> 00:30:11.589
least an effort to be more vigilant, not hypervigilant for,
517
00:30:13.450 --> 00:30:16.450
as Jerry Colonna likes to say, like, what's not being said?
518
00:30:17.190 --> 00:30:19.950
You know, what's the undercurrent here that people are too
519
00:30:20.190 --> 00:30:21.880
afraid to say to me because I have the power?
520
00:30:25.039 --> 00:30:30.160
I agree with all of that. What happened in January,
521
00:30:30.259 --> 00:30:32.369
not to get too far in the weeds, this is
522
00:30:32.400 --> 00:30:34.940
when we were having that conversation sort of mid to
523
00:30:34.960 --> 00:30:41.230
late January. We had finally some clarity on the podcast
524
00:30:41.269 --> 00:30:43.470
and the revenue for the podcast. It was the first
525
00:30:43.529 --> 00:30:49.950
time in over a year that we had confidence that
526
00:30:49.990 --> 00:30:53.130
like we had jobs and you were going to be
527
00:30:53.170 --> 00:30:59.980
able to pay your bills. And we'd been looking forward
528
00:31:00.019 --> 00:31:04.200
to this conversation because things had been so foggy. And
529
00:31:04.279 --> 00:31:07.349
our team was waiting for us to be able to
530
00:31:07.390 --> 00:31:10.150
give them some news. They were all dealing with a
531
00:31:10.190 --> 00:31:12.930
lot of uncertainty too. So we had just enough information
532
00:31:12.970 --> 00:31:17.349
to sit down and talk about what are we building towards?
533
00:31:17.529 --> 00:31:23.819
What are people's roles? And I went into that feeling unprepared.
534
00:31:23.859 --> 00:31:27.059
I'd been really sick for two weeks. but I put
535
00:31:27.099 --> 00:31:30.420
together a memo. I was also advocating for where we
536
00:31:30.460 --> 00:31:35.559
needed to resource to start building the ecosystem that we
537
00:31:35.599 --> 00:31:40.920
would want to have 16 months, 18 months, however long
538
00:31:41.269 --> 00:31:45.529
from where we were. And so we were having all
539
00:31:45.549 --> 00:31:47.650
these conversations about what we were going to make and
540
00:31:47.690 --> 00:31:52.309
what roles people should have. And I didn't even like
541
00:31:53.250 --> 00:31:57.630
consciously tell myself not to raise a hand and say,
542
00:31:57.650 --> 00:32:01.339
I don't think I'm in the right role. I just
543
00:32:01.460 --> 00:32:08.319
literally forgot about myself. And I didn't remember myself for
544
00:32:08.359 --> 00:32:09.940
like three or four days.
545
00:32:12.029 --> 00:32:12.549
What I had.
546
00:32:12.509 --> 00:32:16.410
Actually done in this memo and proposal is create my
547
00:32:16.569 --> 00:32:19.549
own fantasy job, a new role.
548
00:32:19.569 --> 00:32:21.450
For somebody else.
549
00:32:21.880 --> 00:32:25.009
And for somebody else. Yeah. And it wasn't until several
550
00:32:25.049 --> 00:32:29.680
days later, I remember just being like, what have I done?
551
00:32:30.380 --> 00:32:34.940
I've just ruined all my future happiness. And I sent
552
00:32:34.960 --> 00:32:37.619
you a message and I was like, dude, out of
553
00:32:37.660 --> 00:32:42.980
it right now. Like, it's not urgent, but like, we
554
00:32:43.019 --> 00:32:49.000
should talk. It's funny, I felt very sheepish about reaching
555
00:32:49.079 --> 00:32:51.569
out to you in that way. And then when we
556
00:32:51.730 --> 00:32:55.509
actually talked, I think it was revealing you were concerned
557
00:32:55.589 --> 00:32:57.259
you had done something that upset me.
558
00:32:59.880 --> 00:33:01.400
You're like, oh, I didn't fuck up.
559
00:33:01.539 --> 00:33:02.519
I didn't do something.
560
00:33:02.559 --> 00:33:04.480
And I'm like, no, dude. When you said we need
561
00:33:04.559 --> 00:33:07.819
to talk, I could feel like I felt like I
562
00:33:07.819 --> 00:33:09.480
had a flu. I was like, oh, I fucked up.
563
00:33:09.539 --> 00:33:12.789
And so I did something. I'm in trouble. Sorry about that.
564
00:33:13.470 --> 00:33:16.809
When we started the call, it was clear that was
565
00:33:16.890 --> 00:33:20.250
not what was going on. And I was relieved. Yeah.
566
00:33:20.769 --> 00:33:26.210
And then you did a very kind, compassionate, good leader thing,
567
00:33:26.609 --> 00:33:30.809
which I think I've tried to model recently, is just
568
00:33:30.890 --> 00:33:37.180
say like, that's cool. Like nothing's set in stone. We
569
00:33:37.220 --> 00:33:40.619
can set aside some time. We can talk this through.
570
00:33:41.319 --> 00:33:41.740
And we did.
571
00:33:41.819 --> 00:33:44.359
We sat down in a conference room for the better
572
00:33:44.640 --> 00:33:48.759
part of a day and we talked through what did
573
00:33:48.779 --> 00:33:52.109
I really want to be doing? What was I doing
574
00:33:52.369 --> 00:33:56.869
that was maybe getting in the way of that? And
575
00:33:58.089 --> 00:34:02.490
were we kind of aligned on what you needed, what
576
00:34:02.529 --> 00:34:04.789
the business needed, and what I wanted? And we found
577
00:34:04.849 --> 00:34:07.329
out we were. I was just kind of poorly doing
578
00:34:07.369 --> 00:34:12.400
like four jobs at the time. And it was hard
579
00:34:12.719 --> 00:34:21.309
for me still in that moment to trust that The
580
00:34:21.369 --> 00:34:26.320
move wasn't put somebody in this role who can do
581
00:34:26.659 --> 00:34:29.980
all of these things, that I am failing at doing
582
00:34:30.159 --> 00:34:36.900
all of them. But you were very, I don't want
583
00:34:36.920 --> 00:34:41.559
to say forceful, but you were very assertive in a
584
00:34:42.360 --> 00:34:48.000
very kind and generous way of like, nope. You've got
585
00:34:48.059 --> 00:34:51.199
this and you need to pay yourself more.
586
00:34:52.320 --> 00:34:53.840
And I remember.
587
00:34:54.840 --> 00:34:58.639
Also feeling some shame about that. But I think a
588
00:34:58.679 --> 00:35:00.659
couple of days later, I was able to say like,
589
00:35:01.260 --> 00:35:05.550
thanks for advocating for me. I wish I could have
590
00:35:05.590 --> 00:35:10.130
done it for myself, but thanks for doing that because
591
00:35:10.170 --> 00:35:11.010
it's pretty rare.
592
00:35:11.030 --> 00:35:16.980
I remember feeling embarrassed, actually. we had a whiteboard and
593
00:35:17.000 --> 00:35:19.840
we were listing everything that was on your plate. And
594
00:35:19.860 --> 00:35:23.030
it was ridiculous. It was, there's so much shit that
595
00:35:23.050 --> 00:35:24.829
was on your plate and so much shouldn't have been
596
00:35:24.869 --> 00:35:27.949
on your plate. And I was like, well, I'm this
597
00:35:27.989 --> 00:35:31.050
person's boss. I have one direct report. And I didn't
598
00:35:31.070 --> 00:35:33.510
even know all of this. I should have known all
599
00:35:33.530 --> 00:35:37.829
of this. And so I've failed. I remember feeling that
600
00:35:37.969 --> 00:35:42.389
really acutely and then thinking, all right, well, okay, I failed.
601
00:35:43.690 --> 00:35:45.900
But what am I gonna do now? And so then
602
00:35:45.940 --> 00:35:48.619
we just circled all the things on the whiteboard that
603
00:35:48.659 --> 00:35:51.760
you wanted to be doing. We took everything else and
604
00:35:51.920 --> 00:35:54.480
put that into a category. And there's actually a human
605
00:35:54.519 --> 00:35:56.599
being sitting right outside of the studio right now whose
606
00:35:56.639 --> 00:35:58.969
first day it is. And she's going to do all
607
00:35:59.010 --> 00:35:59.469
that stuff.
608
00:35:59.690 --> 00:35:59.809
Yeah.
609
00:35:59.969 --> 00:36:01.489
Welcome, Taylor. Welcome, Taylor.
610
00:36:01.510 --> 00:36:02.309
Shout out. Yeah.
611
00:36:02.349 --> 00:36:05.849
So to me, that wasn't some like triumphant and look
612
00:36:05.889 --> 00:36:08.550
at Mr. Compassionate Dan thing. It was like I learned
613
00:36:08.570 --> 00:36:11.210
that I need to be a better boss. And being
614
00:36:11.250 --> 00:36:16.429
a boss is its own kind of psycho-spiritual endeavor. And
615
00:36:16.610 --> 00:36:18.349
the other thing I learned, and this is something we've
616
00:36:18.369 --> 00:36:21.329
talked about a lot, is that if you look at
617
00:36:21.389 --> 00:36:26.610
the nucleus, the sort of core leadership team in this company,
618
00:36:27.659 --> 00:36:34.760
everybody tends toward both introversion and being a people pleaser.
619
00:36:35.159 --> 00:36:40.610
And I tend toward massive extroversion and somewhere, you know,
620
00:36:40.670 --> 00:36:43.690
not too deep, but somewhere on the narcissism spectrum. You
621
00:36:43.869 --> 00:36:46.170
have to do what you do. You have to be.
622
00:36:46.409 --> 00:36:50.449
You can't be an anchorman for 30 years without wanting
623
00:36:50.489 --> 00:36:52.369
to be the center of attention, et cetera, et cetera.
624
00:36:52.530 --> 00:36:55.510
And so that moment was a huge wake-up call of, okay,
625
00:36:55.849 --> 00:36:59.730
it's okay that this is the personality mix on the team,
626
00:37:00.190 --> 00:37:03.360
but I have a lot of responsibility not to let
627
00:37:03.380 --> 00:37:04.070
this go south.
628
00:37:05.340 --> 00:37:08.400
And so where we landed was like, no, you need
629
00:37:08.440 --> 00:37:10.260
to focus on the things you want to focus on.
630
00:37:10.280 --> 00:37:13.530
You're actually really good at them. And- get some help
631
00:37:13.570 --> 00:37:15.530
for everything else. Yeah.
632
00:37:15.570 --> 00:37:17.010
Your mean boss was like, I'm not going to let
633
00:37:17.030 --> 00:37:19.690
you demote yourself. I'm going to force you to take
634
00:37:19.710 --> 00:37:21.460
a promotion and pay you more.
635
00:37:21.480 --> 00:37:25.380
I know. God, you're so, so tough.
636
00:37:25.420 --> 00:37:28.000
But that was, I mean, it's also, this isn't about
637
00:37:28.039 --> 00:37:31.980
like what the Tibetans call idiot compassion, you know, catastrophic altruism.
638
00:37:32.280 --> 00:37:35.170
This is enlightened self-interest. I know you're really good at
639
00:37:35.210 --> 00:37:37.849
your job. It's in my best interest to unshackle you
640
00:37:38.030 --> 00:37:40.969
to let you really run. So, I mean, yeah. So
641
00:37:41.050 --> 00:37:43.659
I don't want to, portray myself here as some sort
642
00:37:43.679 --> 00:37:47.260
of Dalai Lama type figure although the Dalai Lama himself
643
00:37:47.340 --> 00:37:50.440
talks about this idea of wise selfishness that's what I
644
00:37:50.539 --> 00:37:53.539
think is kind of like the best of humanity like
645
00:37:53.619 --> 00:37:56.219
being useful to other people makes us feel good and so.
646
00:37:56.239 --> 00:37:57.880
Yes you told me many times this is in my
647
00:37:57.920 --> 00:37:59.179
own self-interest.
648
00:37:58.780 --> 00:38:03.059
So like yes yes right it reminds me of this
649
00:38:03.079 --> 00:38:05.320
thing I heard from some Buddhist monk somewhere that when
650
00:38:05.340 --> 00:38:07.440
you take care of your own mind you're taking care of.
651
00:38:07.440 --> 00:38:11.059
The world I think that's enough lessons. We'll wrap up
652
00:38:11.380 --> 00:38:15.500
memory lane and some of the lessons learned. But I think,
653
00:38:16.480 --> 00:38:18.380
you know, if we could sum them up, it's like
654
00:38:19.920 --> 00:38:24.900
anytime you're trying to grow or you're trying to change,
655
00:38:24.940 --> 00:38:33.570
when you're trying to reset anything, you need self-compassion. You
656
00:38:33.590 --> 00:38:36.730
need to take it easy on yourself. You need a
657
00:38:36.750 --> 00:38:44.190
support network. And you need to tap into your meditation practice. Yeah.
658
00:38:44.210 --> 00:38:45.789
When you put it that way, it's pretty fucking simple.
659
00:38:48.750 --> 00:38:50.789
We'll be back here next year and be like, these
660
00:38:50.829 --> 00:38:56.030
are all the things that we fucked up, but we're learning. Exactly. Right.
661
00:38:56.090 --> 00:38:58.110
And there's a lesson in that. There is.
662
00:38:58.309 --> 00:39:02.769
We just keep doing it. Yes. Looking back can be
663
00:39:02.949 --> 00:39:06.389
so helpful. I was also reflecting, you know, it's not
664
00:39:07.929 --> 00:39:10.210
just working with you and all the work that you
665
00:39:10.250 --> 00:39:13.650
do and our relationship that is helping me grow. Also,
666
00:39:13.710 --> 00:39:16.550
I've had an amazing therapist for the last two years.
667
00:39:17.130 --> 00:39:19.650
I talk to my husband more. I have a really
668
00:39:19.690 --> 00:39:21.630
good friend right now who's always happy to talk to
669
00:39:21.690 --> 00:39:23.929
me about work. And so all of these things have
670
00:39:24.409 --> 00:39:27.690
helped me, but I can see that it's taking time,
671
00:39:27.769 --> 00:39:31.800
but I can see the progress. And so that is motivating.
672
00:39:32.139 --> 00:39:36.380
That gives me hope. The technology works, as you say. Okay.
673
00:39:36.659 --> 00:39:39.500
So also, though, over the course of this year, we
674
00:39:40.139 --> 00:39:43.639
went from starting danharris.com to.
675
00:39:46.030 --> 00:39:49.969
Provide this audience a place to follow you after the separation.
676
00:39:49.989 --> 00:39:54.530
Wanted to help them remember what they're hearing on the podcast.
677
00:39:54.570 --> 00:39:59.000
So we started these regular emails with a takeaway from
678
00:39:59.039 --> 00:40:04.519
you related to the podcast episode, cheat sheet summaries, transcripts.
679
00:40:04.760 --> 00:40:06.780
In the early days, we were having some of our
680
00:40:06.860 --> 00:40:10.889
podcast guests in the chats. And you started doing some
681
00:40:10.969 --> 00:40:12.889
live meditation.
682
00:40:12.230 --> 00:40:13.630
And Q & A' s.
683
00:40:15.349 --> 00:40:17.530
Before we get into where are we now and where
684
00:40:17.570 --> 00:40:20.389
I think we're going, I'd be super curious to hear
685
00:40:20.530 --> 00:40:25.500
from you. What have you learned from some of the
686
00:40:25.539 --> 00:40:30.599
experiments we have done over the last year about what
687
00:40:30.719 --> 00:40:32.239
really helps people?
688
00:40:32.260 --> 00:40:35.460
The first thing to say, and this is not what
689
00:40:35.480 --> 00:40:37.420
you're asking me, but I do want to make a
690
00:40:37.440 --> 00:40:41.039
case for experimentation generally. Being willing to fail, it is
691
00:40:41.079 --> 00:40:44.280
the opposite of perfectionism. We tried a bunch of stuff,
692
00:40:44.300 --> 00:40:46.539
you listed a bunch of them, and some of them
693
00:40:46.559 --> 00:40:48.800
worked and some of them didn't, and that's okay. It's
694
00:40:48.860 --> 00:40:51.739
super important. In terms of the question you did ask me,
695
00:40:51.780 --> 00:40:53.500
which is, you know, what have we learned on the
696
00:40:53.539 --> 00:40:56.570
level of what's working with the customer and what we
697
00:40:56.590 --> 00:40:59.309
think is onward leading as it pertains to what we'll
698
00:40:59.329 --> 00:41:04.469
build in the future? To me, what seems obvious, hopefully
699
00:41:04.489 --> 00:41:06.050
I'll be right about this, and I think you and
700
00:41:06.070 --> 00:41:09.119
I agree on this, is the most energy we feel
701
00:41:09.179 --> 00:41:11.519
as a team and I feel as a person is
702
00:41:12.070 --> 00:41:15.789
and customers seem to feel in their response is around
703
00:41:15.809 --> 00:41:19.679
these live sessions where I'm guiding in meditation and then
704
00:41:20.010 --> 00:41:23.579
taking people's questions. I have the energetic sense and we
705
00:41:23.599 --> 00:41:26.579
have some data to back this up. That's where people
706
00:41:26.639 --> 00:41:29.500
are most engaged and are feeling the most impact. And
707
00:41:29.579 --> 00:41:32.920
I really enjoy doing it. And so I think what
708
00:41:32.960 --> 00:41:36.000
we're going to build toward is what you and I
709
00:41:36.059 --> 00:41:39.079
often refer to as like a next generation meditation app.
710
00:41:39.119 --> 00:41:42.320
You need to have a large body of guided meditations.
711
00:41:42.340 --> 00:41:45.440
You need a timer, you need some courses, and we
712
00:41:45.460 --> 00:41:47.159
know how to do that. We've done that before and
713
00:41:47.179 --> 00:41:50.769
we'll do it again. But what no app has done,
714
00:41:51.170 --> 00:41:55.329
to my knowledge, really is build in the community aspect.
715
00:41:55.670 --> 00:41:58.449
And community can come off as kind of like a vague,
716
00:41:59.289 --> 00:42:06.320
anodyne term, but there's so much evidence from millennia of
717
00:42:06.380 --> 00:42:12.130
contemplative history and from modern science that turning self-improvement into
718
00:42:12.150 --> 00:42:14.570
the carpool lane is a much more effective way to
719
00:42:14.610 --> 00:42:16.639
do it. Like the Buddha, as you've heard me yammer
720
00:42:16.699 --> 00:42:20.599
on about many times, talked about the three jewels in
721
00:42:20.739 --> 00:42:24.099
what he was building. One was the Buddha, meaning, you know,
722
00:42:24.119 --> 00:42:27.559
just like an example of awakening as part of human potential.
723
00:42:27.619 --> 00:42:30.239
The second was the Dharma, the teaching of the Buddha
724
00:42:30.260 --> 00:42:32.199
about how to do that. The third was the Sangha.
725
00:42:32.539 --> 00:42:35.079
And it wasn't like two plus an asterisk. It was
726
00:42:35.900 --> 00:42:39.769
Three equal jewels. The Sangha is the community of meditators.
727
00:42:39.989 --> 00:42:42.389
And honestly, I don't even think as I look at
728
00:42:42.409 --> 00:42:47.289
the Buddhist world writ large in America, I don't see
729
00:42:47.309 --> 00:42:49.469
a lot of it happening at meditation centers. There's no
730
00:42:49.550 --> 00:42:52.460
real structure for people to get to know each other
731
00:42:52.480 --> 00:42:55.559
and to do this thing together. And so I think
732
00:42:55.659 --> 00:42:59.260
that's a lot of what makes me excited about building
733
00:42:59.320 --> 00:43:02.119
going forward. I don't want to spew too many words.
734
00:43:02.360 --> 00:43:04.079
And I might have said some shit that has gotten
735
00:43:04.099 --> 00:43:06.019
me in trouble with you already. But how is what
736
00:43:06.039 --> 00:43:08.139
I'm saying landing thus far? Great.
737
00:43:08.400 --> 00:43:09.760
You're not in trouble. Okay, good.
738
00:43:09.880 --> 00:43:10.119
Yet.
739
00:43:10.960 --> 00:43:15.579
I'll just add specifically, you know, some of the things
740
00:43:15.619 --> 00:43:20.340
that we're thinking about is when we do future courses
741
00:43:20.659 --> 00:43:25.210
or little mini series, how do we create sort of
742
00:43:25.349 --> 00:43:29.750
discussion groups or cohort based things where people can really
743
00:43:30.400 --> 00:43:35.380
interact with one another. Further down the line, future state,
744
00:43:35.559 --> 00:43:39.659
we have a lot of excitement and energy around actual
745
00:43:40.199 --> 00:43:46.869
in-person work as well in this process of wanting to
746
00:43:46.909 --> 00:43:53.590
build something that incorporates a lot of live digital, maybe
747
00:43:53.719 --> 00:43:58.000
eventually IRL, ways for people to interact with each other
748
00:43:59.019 --> 00:44:04.250
and critically a lot of really great teachers as well.
749
00:44:04.349 --> 00:44:08.650
So not just you, we have started dipping our toes
750
00:44:09.230 --> 00:44:13.670
into the water of incorporating more teachers. So starting in
751
00:44:13.909 --> 00:44:18.780
June during our Get Fit Sanely series, we added guided
752
00:44:18.820 --> 00:44:23.210
meditations for every full episode from the great Carl Lai,
753
00:44:23.679 --> 00:44:30.760
who also went live with you that week, which was awesome. July, August,
754
00:44:30.820 --> 00:44:35.519
we've continued to have guided meditations for every episode. And
755
00:44:35.719 --> 00:44:37.840
we kind of call it teacher of the month. So
756
00:44:37.940 --> 00:44:41.880
every month on the podcast, you sort of get the
757
00:44:41.900 --> 00:44:46.239
backstory of a meditation teacher. And if you're a paid
758
00:44:46.280 --> 00:44:51.650
subscriber at danharris.com, you get guided meditations every Monday and
759
00:44:51.670 --> 00:44:53.690
Wednesday from that same teacher. So you kind of get
760
00:44:53.730 --> 00:45:00.369
to practice with them. And what we're adding now To
761
00:45:00.449 --> 00:45:05.429
really further build up sort of the Sangha component is
762
00:45:05.750 --> 00:45:08.769
each month, the teacher of the month will also be
763
00:45:08.849 --> 00:45:13.340
hosting live meditations and Q & As for subscribers.
764
00:45:13.860 --> 00:45:18.039
So there'll be some sense of continuity. We'll be exposing
765
00:45:18.440 --> 00:45:23.969
our customers to our world of close friends of mine
766
00:45:24.210 --> 00:45:27.929
and ours who are meditation teachers who are really, really vetted, really,
767
00:45:27.969 --> 00:45:30.699
really qualified. And really excited to be working with us.
768
00:45:31.570 --> 00:45:32.329
That's really cool.
769
00:45:33.030 --> 00:45:37.510
Yeah. And in the future, I hope there's even more
770
00:45:37.889 --> 00:45:40.539
of this. But this is the next step. And it
771
00:45:40.619 --> 00:45:42.639
is a big step for us. You've talked in the
772
00:45:42.679 --> 00:45:49.380
past about having wanted to for so long really combine
773
00:45:49.719 --> 00:45:55.050
the teachings and the podcast with the practice, really make
774
00:45:55.070 --> 00:45:59.989
it actionable. So that's what pairing the guided meditation does.
775
00:46:02.219 --> 00:46:06.139
But I think giving the consistency of one teacher per
776
00:46:06.219 --> 00:46:11.199
month gives people a better sense of some of the
777
00:46:11.239 --> 00:46:15.429
different flavors, different styles, helps them find maybe teachers that
778
00:46:15.510 --> 00:46:19.449
resonate with them more than others. But then the opportunity
779
00:46:20.289 --> 00:46:23.590
to practice live with that teacher and ask questions is
780
00:46:24.360 --> 00:46:28.739
I think will really help deepen a lot of people's practice.
781
00:46:29.079 --> 00:46:31.420
And I think it's a big step for us to
782
00:46:31.519 --> 00:46:36.730
get to this point and is just the beginning, I think.
783
00:46:36.829 --> 00:46:40.150
Yes. Just, I made a few notes of things that
784
00:46:40.170 --> 00:46:45.130
I wanted to emphasize from your excellent statement of like
785
00:46:46.010 --> 00:46:48.260
where things are and where we probably will go. One
786
00:46:48.280 --> 00:46:50.400
of the things I look forward to is changing the
787
00:46:50.440 --> 00:46:54.809
name and, and, having it be something that speaks to
788
00:46:54.849 --> 00:47:00.800
the big tent where I can be MC or ringleader,
789
00:47:01.280 --> 00:47:06.239
but we're really emphasizing hooking people up with these great teachers.
790
00:47:06.500 --> 00:47:08.719
The final thing to say is that I think you
791
00:47:08.739 --> 00:47:11.530
said it really well, that right now our current state
792
00:47:11.710 --> 00:47:13.949
is we've done a ton of work over the last
793
00:47:13.989 --> 00:47:17.070
year and we think we have a lot of very
794
00:47:17.090 --> 00:47:22.159
interesting signals. And so we As of this month, September 2025,
795
00:47:22.159 --> 00:47:27.139
we will be doing guided meditations for all the Monday,
796
00:47:27.219 --> 00:47:30.820
Wednesday episodes so that you can take the lessons in
797
00:47:30.840 --> 00:47:32.619
the show and pound them into your neurons, as I
798
00:47:32.679 --> 00:47:35.590
often say. And in the name of community, we're going
799
00:47:35.610 --> 00:47:40.389
to do once a week live guided meditations. But I
800
00:47:40.429 --> 00:47:44.949
think the– I've been told experimenting is not a good word.
801
00:47:45.010 --> 00:47:47.050
At some point you have to stop experimenting and commit
802
00:47:47.070 --> 00:47:47.369
to something.
803
00:47:47.389 --> 00:47:49.989
Yes, and commit to something, right. But we are trying stuff.
804
00:47:50.650 --> 00:47:55.000
now based on real feedback and real intuitions on our side.
805
00:47:55.480 --> 00:47:58.760
And we're going to continue to test and grow with
806
00:47:58.780 --> 00:48:01.960
the audience. We're going to be getting real-time feedback from
807
00:48:01.980 --> 00:48:04.340
the audience, from the teachers, and from our team, and
808
00:48:04.519 --> 00:48:07.110
figuring this out as we go with a grand vision,
809
00:48:07.239 --> 00:48:09.449
I think. And I don't know exactly how this is
810
00:48:09.469 --> 00:48:11.530
going to look, and you made a really nice nod
811
00:48:11.590 --> 00:48:13.969
at this, which is that I and the rest of
812
00:48:14.010 --> 00:48:16.809
the team are really excited about the fact that there
813
00:48:17.269 --> 00:48:20.670
are these tools tested online, as I said before, through
814
00:48:20.730 --> 00:48:24.760
millennia of contemplative history and now modern science that help
815
00:48:24.800 --> 00:48:27.500
you do your life better. And it includes meditation, but
816
00:48:27.539 --> 00:48:33.820
also communication skills and self-compassion and time management and sleep
817
00:48:34.090 --> 00:48:37.610
and exercise and the whole panoply, the whole pantheon of
818
00:48:37.690 --> 00:48:40.670
no-brainers out there that we can teach people how to
819
00:48:40.730 --> 00:48:46.010
do through a bunch of modalities like an app or
820
00:48:46.159 --> 00:48:50.679
some sort of technological solution that provides both teaching and community.
821
00:48:50.739 --> 00:48:53.039
And then over time, hopefully, I don't know what any
822
00:48:53.059 --> 00:48:55.639
of this looks like. I just, I can't draw you
823
00:48:55.679 --> 00:48:58.179
an exact picture of where we're going, but I have
824
00:48:58.219 --> 00:49:03.289
a really strong sense of what the impact will be,
825
00:49:03.369 --> 00:49:06.949
which is just taking these tested solutions and finding the
826
00:49:07.010 --> 00:49:09.429
best way to knit them into people's lives.
827
00:49:10.090 --> 00:49:14.260
Yeah. Use your megaphone, so to speak, to help draw
828
00:49:14.320 --> 00:49:19.789
people in, provide these amazing teachers and keep building on.
829
00:49:19.860 --> 00:49:23.679
I think, not just sort of the resources, the content library,
830
00:49:24.119 --> 00:49:28.789
but experiences for people. Yeah, that's really exciting. And as
831
00:49:28.809 --> 00:49:32.070
you said, we don't exactly have a clear roadmap yet,
832
00:49:32.190 --> 00:49:35.389
but we'll keep Coming to you here on the podcast
833
00:49:35.820 --> 00:49:41.360
over at danharris.com to be renamed when legally and otherwise
834
00:49:41.380 --> 00:49:48.519
an option. And in the meantime, really just want to
835
00:49:48.619 --> 00:49:54.579
appreciate our whole team. Yes. And everybody who listens and
836
00:49:54.639 --> 00:50:01.579
everybody who subscribes and their patience with us as we learn.
837
00:50:03.900 --> 00:50:10.840
And develop. And, you know, we talk about launching something new.
838
00:50:13.610 --> 00:50:19.730
And maybe that being an app of our own. And
839
00:50:19.769 --> 00:50:22.769
that's going to mean some change, too. Yes. And so
840
00:50:22.809 --> 00:50:26.190
just to state, like, we do not want to put
841
00:50:26.289 --> 00:50:32.010
our team or this audience through change unnecessarily. Now that
842
00:50:32.090 --> 00:50:35.030
we can have a little bit more control of our
843
00:50:35.090 --> 00:50:39.010
own destiny, we'll be very good and clear communicators and
844
00:50:39.110 --> 00:50:43.630
not surprise anyone and treat this audience really, really, really
845
00:50:43.730 --> 00:50:46.670
well as we build. We're going to take you on
846
00:50:46.730 --> 00:50:48.070
this ride with us.
847
00:50:49.909 --> 00:50:52.690
That is one of your many strong suits. I said
848
00:50:52.710 --> 00:50:56.789
before that sometimes direct communication interpersonally has an edge for you,
849
00:50:56.829 --> 00:51:00.849
but you're really good at communicating directly. to the team
850
00:51:00.889 --> 00:51:04.320
and to the customers about where we're going. And that's,
851
00:51:04.530 --> 00:51:06.760
I've learned a lot from that. And then the other
852
00:51:06.800 --> 00:51:09.340
thing that I've learned by watching you is, and by
853
00:51:09.639 --> 00:51:12.699
screwing it up, frankly, is how important it is to
854
00:51:12.760 --> 00:51:15.099
express gratitude to the team, which you did a couple
855
00:51:15.139 --> 00:51:20.619
minutes ago. I felt the gratitude and I saw, I think, much,
856
00:51:20.760 --> 00:51:24.440
if not all of what was being done, but over time,
857
00:51:24.480 --> 00:51:27.579
really learning how important it is to say out loud
858
00:51:27.679 --> 00:51:30.340
that I appreciate X, Y, and Z.
859
00:51:30.579 --> 00:51:30.780
Yeah.
860
00:51:30.960 --> 00:51:32.260
So thank you, Tony. Great job.
861
00:51:33.219 --> 00:51:33.659
Thanks, Dan.
862
00:51:39.139 --> 00:51:41.500
Thanks again to Tony. I think you can hear in
863
00:51:41.539 --> 00:51:44.780
that conversation why she is the exact right person to
864
00:51:44.820 --> 00:51:47.800
be leading this team. She's amazing. Thank you, Tony. Don't
865
00:51:47.820 --> 00:51:50.210
forget to sign up over at danharris.com to become a
866
00:51:50.250 --> 00:51:53.849
paid subscriber to reap all of the exclusive benefits that
867
00:51:53.869 --> 00:51:57.610
will be raining down upon paid subscribers starting in September.
868
00:51:58.320 --> 00:52:00.880
And don't forget, we'll be doing a live guided meditation
869
00:52:00.920 --> 00:52:02.920
and Q & A with Vinny on September 2nd at
870
00:52:02.920 --> 00:52:08.400
4 Eastern and then henceforth live meditation sessions every Tuesday.
871
00:52:09.079 --> 00:52:11.440
And also don't forget to join me for another installment,
872
00:52:11.659 --> 00:52:15.840
a live in-person installment of Meditation Party, a workshop we
873
00:52:15.889 --> 00:52:18.829
do at the Omega Institute. The registration link is ready
874
00:52:18.869 --> 00:52:22.170
for you to click right there in the show notes. Finally,
875
00:52:22.210 --> 00:52:23.730
I just want to thank everybody who worked so hard
876
00:52:23.769 --> 00:52:27.050
on this show. Our producers are Tara Anderson. Caroline Keenan
877
00:52:27.170 --> 00:52:30.619
and Eleanor Basile. Our recording and engineering is handled by
878
00:52:30.659 --> 00:52:32.980
the great folks over at Pod People. Lauren Smith is
879
00:52:33.039 --> 00:52:36.969
our managing producer. Marissa Schneiderman is our senior producer. DJ
880
00:52:37.010 --> 00:52:39.690
Kashmir is our executive producer. And Nick Thorburn of the
881
00:52:39.730 --> 00:52:41.889
band Islands wrote our themes.