The "Wellness" Industry Sells Us On Rigid Optimization. It Doesn't Work–But This Might. | Nidhi Bhanshali Pandya

10% Happier with Dan Harris

10% Media, LLC

Health & Fitness, Mental Health

4.6 • 12.2K Ratings

🗓️ 14 January 2026

⏱️ 82 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A deep dive on Ayurveda, a sophisticated system for health that's been refined over millennia.

Nidhi Bhanshali Pandya is a renowned NAMA-certified Ayurvedic Doctor, the bestselling author of Your Body Already Knows (2025), and international speaker/educator known for her modern approach to women's health and longevity.

In this episode we talk about:

What Ayurveda actually is beyond TikTok trends
How ancient Ayurvedic principles align with (and differ from) modern medicine
How to brace yourself in the face of an imbalanced ecosystem
The human tragedy of overoptimization
The value of awe, fascination, and pattern-seeing as more effective than discipline or force
The three codes of life
The framework to come back into our own intelligence in the kindest way
How modern life (especially electricity) disrupted our biological rhythm and created chronic imbalance
The concept of balance and the Buddhist middle path as echoed in Ayurvedic texts
The "inner climate" framework
Practical tools for sleep, including concrete daily practices to offset "imbalances"
The concept of agni (digestive fire) and how to support it
A three tiered toolkit for self-regulation
The perils of jumping into change
Why cold drinks and excessive water can disrupt digestion
Radical acceptance and gratitude

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Transcript

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0:00.0	This is the 10% Happier Podcast. I'm Dan Harris.
0:08.0	Hello, everybody. How we doing? Today we're going to talk about the problem of self-optimization.
0:24.4	We're also going to talk about some ancient alternatives to optimization. But let's stay with the problem for a second.
0:31.1	This issue of optimization is a symptom of a deep problem, I think, in the overall wellness world, where we're sold sometimes
0:39.0	this idea that we need to spend an enormous amount of time and energy and money fixing ourselves,
0:45.9	endlessly tweaking our workouts, tracking our sleep, counting our steps. It really preys on
0:51.3	our insecurities, our fears, our pervasive sense of insufficiency.
0:56.0	And I'm not saying that we shouldn't try to be healthier or better in any number of ways.
1:01.3	But, and this is paradoxical, the first thing you need to do if you want to grow and change is to
1:06.5	accept yourself as you are.
1:09.0	Because you can only get so far if you're approaching personal development,
1:13.7	spiritual growth, whatever you want to call it, from a place of self-hatred.
1:18.5	If you're succumbing to what has sometimes been called the subtle aggression of self-improvement.
1:23.9	So like I said, today we're going to talk about an ancient alternative to self-optimization.
1:29.1	Specifically, we're talking about something called Iyerveda.
1:32.7	Iyerveda often gets reduced to overpriced supplements and spa treatments, but at its core, it is a deep and sophisticated system for health that has been refined over millennia. Some of the ideas in Ayurveda have been
1:46.9	studied by modern science. Others have not. So you can think of this episode as an exploration
1:52.3	rather than strictly speaking medical advice. If something here sparks your interest,
1:57.3	check him with a qualified health care provider before you make any changes.
2:02.5	My guest today is Nidhi Pandia.
2:08.3	She's an Ayurvedic doctor and the author of a best-selling book called Your Body Already Knows.
2:14.1	In this conversation, we talk about what Ayurveda actually is beyond all of the TikTok trends, how ancient Ayurvedic principles align with and differ from modern medicine,
	...

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