The Dalai Lama’s Guide to Happiness

“You'd expect somebody who's the object of devotion for millions of people to be intimidating, but he's actually so down to earth,” says Jade Weston, a Senior Meditation Producer for Ten Percent Happier.

Weston recently spent two weeks in Dharamshala, India – the hillside city where His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama resides – developing content for Ten Percent’s new course, “The Dalai Lama’s Guide to Happiness.”

When it came to the 10-session course, the Dalai Lama had just one demand: that it be available to everyone, free of charge, in perpetuity.

Presented in Ten Percent’s signature style, the course centers around conversations between app co-founder and podcast host Dan Harris and the teacher (here, the Dalai Lama), each followed by a short, guided meditation. You can go at your own pace, and the longest session is 15 minutes.

Here are three of the keys to happiness illuminated in the course:

If you’re distracted all the time, you are less happy. Conversely, being able to offer your attention to what’s right here actually feels good. The first stop on the road to a happier mind is training your attention to be more present.

“Caring about others is the greatest source of fearlessness and strength,” says Weston, of the most powerful lesson she took away from her time with the Dalai Lama.

Putting others first is what the Dalai Lama calls “wise selfishness.” It’s the counterintuitive truth that one of the most effective ways to be happier is to think of someone other than yourself.

It’s said that harboring ill-will towards others is the equivalent of holding a hot coal in your hand and expecting it to burn someone else. But is it possible to put down our resentments and actually feel good-will towards those on the other side? It’s not easy – but we can do it, and it pays off.

Ready to learn more? Check out the course on Ten Percent Happier.