Michael Imperioli (From The Sopranos and White Lotus) Knows a Shitload About Buddhist Meditation

10% Happier with Dan Harris

10% Media, LLC

Mental Health, Health & Fitness

4.6 • 12.9K Ratings

🗓️ 1 May 2023

⏱️ 62 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

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Actor Michael Imperioli is best known for a string of memorable onscreen performances that include Goodfellas, The Sopranos, and most recently on The White Lotus. What you may not know is that he has a deep Buddhist practice and has actually grown into something of a meditation teacher.

In this episode we talk about:

The classic celebrity life crisis that brought Imperioli to Buddhism
The importance of consistent practice as a way to get familiar with your mind so that your thoughts and emotions and urges don't own you
The specific Tibetan Buddhist tradition Imperioli practices and what his daily practice looks like
Whether meditation helps him be more creative
How acting and meditation are similar
Whether getting older affects our ability to grok impermanence
Why Imperioli started teaching meditation online
How to meditate off the cushion in daily life

Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/michael-imperioli-591

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris.
0:19.6	Hello, I cannot tell you how impressed I was by Michael Imperial.
0:25.4	Actually, I can't tell you. I'm not telling you right now. It's a ridiculous expression.
0:28.8	Anyway, I've been watching Michael Imperial for decades and good fellows on the sopranos and
0:34.4	most recently on White Lotus. I vaguely knew that he was interested in Buddhism, but it wasn't
0:39.2	until I sat down with the guy face to face that I realized what a deep, deep practitioner he really is.
0:46.1	He's actually grown into something of a meditation teacher. In fact, in this conversation, we talked
0:51.6	about the classic celebrity life crisis that brought him to Buddhism. The importance of consistent
0:56.9	practice as a way to get familiar with your mind so that your thoughts and emotions and urges
1:02.1	don't own you. The specific Tibetan Buddhist tradition in which Michael Imperial practices,
1:08.0	what his daily practice looks like, whether meditation helps him be more creative,
1:12.4	how acting and meditation are actually pretty similar, whether getting older affects or does not,
1:19.4	your ability to grok impermanence why he started teaching meditation online,
1:25.1	how to meditate off the cushion in daily life, and the two most common things. Michael hears from
1:30.3	people who are just starting to meditate. I should say this is the first in a series of big name
1:35.5	interviews we're going to be doing this month. It's a new series we're calling bold face.
1:40.2	Every Monday in May, we're talking to a celebrity who has the guts to spill their guts. Stay
1:45.6	tuned for Mike D and Neil deGrasse Tyson coming up. And then on Wednesdays this month, we're going
1:50.6	to do some deep Dharma. We've got a bunch of Buddhist teachers on the show to break down a classic
1:55.9	Buddhist list, the eightfold path. We're kicking it all off in two days with the teacher Daraa Williams.
2:02.8	I think you're going to like it. We're going to weave throughout the month of May, which by the way,
2:06.4	is mental health awareness month. Mondays we've got celebrities, Wednesdays deep Dharma. Let us know
	...

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