A Buddhist hack to elevate your mood

Plus: a 30-day free trial to the Waking Up app

When in the grips of anxiety, anger, or sadness, you might be tempted to avoid your uncomfortable emotions through denial, compartmentalization, or self-medication.

The traditional mindfulness antidote is to turn towards your feelings—to feel them fully as a way of letting your system metabolize them. If you make the supremely counterintuitive move of leaning into your emotions, you see that they come and go, and that you can mount a saner response to the situation on the other side.

But here’s an additional move for your sanity repertoire, via the meditation teacher, Joseph Goldstein: Be generous. Give something away.

Joseph’s personal policy goes like this: whenever he feels the impulse to give—to be generous in some way—instead of second-guessing it, he just does it.

It could be something small—a compliment, a check-in call to a friend—or it could be something quite large, such as a financial donation.

How many times have you had an impulse to give that you have overridden? I can’t afford this. The other person may not even want it. What difference will it make anyway?

Joseph has trained himself to set aside those reservations and tune in to the wisdom of the initial impulse. He says he’s never once regretted it.

There are so many reasons to wring your hands these days. Political tumult; geopolitical instability; accelerating climate threats. Not to mention the quotidian conflicts and indignities that confront all of us.

Generosity is a powerful countervailing force. There’s a reason why the Buddha often taught generosity before he taught meditation; it’s a great way to induce both agency and a healthy sense of letting-go.

Speaking of the Buddha: Today on the podcast, Joseph talks about the Eightfold Path, the Buddha’s cookbook for an awakened life. You’ll hear Joseph in conversation with both me and our mutual friend, Sam Harris, proprietor of the excellent Waking Up app. I highly recommend you check out the conversation. Not only is there a tsunami of practical wisdom, but there are also a lot of laughs.

Paid subscribers can listen ad-free here.

It’s also available—with ads—on your favorite podcast player, and on YouTube.

The conversation is actually the first of a four-part series that Sam, Joseph, and I have recorded on the Eightfold Path. The rest of the episodes won’t air on my podcast, but will instead be available on Waking Up.

If you go to wakingup.com/tenpercent, you will get an exclusive, 30-day free trial, where you can sample all their offerings, including meditation courses for all levels. (And if money is an issue, you can request a full or partial scholarship.)

Just to be clear, I will still be ramping up our offerings here—there will be new live meditation sessions, guided meditations, and meditation challenges. However, if you happen to be in the market for a full-on app experience, I believe that Waking Up is genuinely top-notch.

Below, paid subscribers get the episode cheatsheet (which includes key takeaways, time-coded highlights and a transcript), the ability to comment on my posts, access to my subscriber chats, and invites to my twice-monthly live video sessions, in which I guide a meditation and take questions. The next one is April 8th at 4PM ET. Join the party.

Episode cheatsheet

The big takeaway

Joseph Goldstein discusses with Dan and Sam Harris how Right View, the first step of the Buddha's Eightfold Path, is crucial for setting the direction of our spiritual journey. It encompasses both mundane understanding of karma and actions, as well as deeper insights into the nature of reality and liberation. By cultivating Right View, we align ourselves with wisdom and create the conditions for greater happiness and freedom.