10% happier How I tamed the voice in my head, reduced stress without losing my edge, and found self-help that actually works--a true story

Harris had the ambition and drive to rise to ABC News television anchor. He'd felt the journalistic heroin of reporting from war zones, anchored national broadcasts, and even recovered from cocaine addiction. But he also had a voice in his head, the same voice most of us wrestle with, constantly second-guessing him. If he could only quiet that voice, he'd be happier and less stressed. Harris was already covering the religion beat when he veered off on a personal journey to find answers beyond the self-help gurus. Along the way, he talked to Eckhart Tolle, Deepak Chopra, a host of Jewish Buddhists, and even the Dalai Lama before reluctantly trying meditation. Approaching it with all the skepticism of a reporter, Harris checked out the neurological research and learned that meditation was being used in the corporate and military arenas to heighten focus and clarity. After going on a meditation retreat, he ultimately found the balance he sought between ambition and inner peace. In this brave, completely engaging, and often hilarious book, Harris achieves his aim of demystifying meditation.--Bush, Vanessa Copyright 2014 Booklist

How meditation relieved an award-winning journalist's stress and depression. In 2004, when Nightline co-anchor Harris filled in on Good Morning America, he suddenly suffered a debilitating panic attack during the live broadcast. That event was the culmination of years spent overextending himself personally, with recreational drug experimentation, and professionally, working for various news outlets across the country as well as stints in war-torn Iraq. The on-air meltdown spurred Harris to research nonmedicinal therapeutic remedies. Though Harris' journalistic assignments would bring him face to face with influential self-help spiritualists Eckhart Tolle and Deepak Chopra, neither dispensed the precise amalgam of assurance and credibility necessary to truly diffuse his afflictions. After his wife Bianca's success with books by sage psychiatrist Mark Epstein, Harris found himself connecting with the good doctor's Buddhist leanings, befriending him and swiftly embracing the art of meditation, instead of debunking it as the hokey "exclusive province of bearded swamis, unwashed hippies, and fans of John Tesh music." For the author, the effects of meditation were evident almost immediately: "The net effect of meditationwas striking.It became a way to steel myself as I moved through the world." After a 10-day retreat, chronicled in the book's most entertaining section, Harris began applying this new calm, centered approach to his hectic livelihood in the media and began adopting a new attitude and approach toward instances of negativity and misfortune. That was soon put to the ultimate test during a precarious interview with Paris Hilton. Harris never loses his sense of humor as he affably spotlights one man's quest for internal serenity while concurrently navigating the slings and arrows of a hard-won career in the contemporary media spotlight. Friendly, practical advocacy for the power of mindfulness and enlightenment.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.