Hello and welcome back to the savvy psychologist I'm Dr. Ellen Hendrickson and every week I'll help you meet life's challenges with evidence-based research, a sympathetic ear, and zero judgment.

So today I'm delighted to have with us Dan Harris. Dan is an Emmy Award winning journalist and the co-anchor of ABC's Nightline and the weekend editions of Good Morning America. He's the author of 10% happier, a number one New York Times bestseller.

And he went on to launch the 10% happier podcast and an app called 10% happier

meditation for fidgety skeptics, which by the way I think is the best

title ever he lives in New York City with his wife Bianca their son Alexander and

three ASPCA cats his new book meditation for Skeptics, is part road trip documentary, part myth busting, part

meditation how-to, and is available now. So Dan Harris, thank you so much for talking with me.

You know, I love the way you describe the new book because I've actually had trouble

describing the new book, so I'm going to steal what you just said.

Don't you, that's, you can do that, feel free.

But I really, I really enjoyed both of your books, so 10% happier and meditation for

Fidgety Skeptics.

And so for our listeners who might not be familiar

with your story, can you give us a short background

on how, on your, you know, some would say

unlikely path to meditation?

Yeah, I'm not at, I'm not a stereotypical meditator. You're not.

Definitely not a stereotypical meditation evangelist.

Yeah, I quite famously had a panic attack on national television back in

2004 on Good Morning America. I was anchoring the news updates, which is the person who comes on at the top of each hour and delivers the headlines and

I just like a lot my ability to speak because I just, I lost my ability to speak because I was just freaking out and you can see it on

YouTube if you want.

...