How to get out of your head (and get over yourself)

Joseph Goldstein’s hack for glimpsing “not-self”

Many people get interested in Buddhism because they want stress relief, but then find themselves washing up on the rocky shores of not-self—the brain-breaking notion that the self is an illusion.

People generally have three problems with this concept. First they find it massively counterintuitive. Second, they’re not sure why it even matters. And third, they have no idea how to experience not-self, personally.

I’ll take these one by one.

On the first point, the key is to understand that two things can be true at the same time. Yes, on one level, you’re real. (Look in the mirror, that’s you.) But on a deeper level, if we were to take a high-powered microscope to your body, we’d see it’s just subatomic particles spinning through empty space. The same is true for your mind. Sure, you feel like a self, but it’s impossible to locate a solid, unchanging nugget of “you.”

Let’s take the second question: why does this even matter? It’s actually huge. Because once you stop taking your thoughts, urges, and emotions so personally, they become much more workable. When you no longer view your anger and anxiety as personally monogrammed monoliths, those emotions don’t own you as much.

Are you still with me?

If so, you might find yourself dwelling on the third question I posed above: How do you actually experience this insight for yourself?

My longtime friend and teacher, Joseph Goldstein, has a simple but brilliant hack called the passive-voice practice. I’ve found it extraordinarily helpful, personally.

Here’s how to do it:

When something is happening—a sound, a thought, a feeling—most of us automatically frame it in the active voice.

• “I hear the sounds coming out of my phone as I consume the news.”

• “I am thinking uncharitable thoughts about people with whom I disagree politically.”

• “I feel angry/anxious.”

Joseph’s suggestion is to shift from the active voice to the passive voice.

• Instead of “I’m hearing,” try “Sound is being known.”

• Instead of “I’m thinking,” try “Thinking is being known.”

• Instead of “I’m feeling,” try “Anxiety is being known.”

Joseph explains that this passive-voice framing quietly removes the “I” as the subject. The experience is still happening—sound, thought, feeling—but it’s not happening to a solid “me.”

So, the next time you’re stressed, distracted, or overwhelmed, ask yourself the question: “What is being known?”

And then perhaps you can add another question: “Known by what?”

Don’t worry if this practice doesn’t “work” right away. Just play with it gently over time.

You can apply the passive voice to anything: sights, sounds, thoughts, etc. Again, not-self may sound esoteric, but it’s incredibly practical. As I mentioned, when you stop taking your thoughts and emotions so personally and relate to them simply as things being known, they start to have much less power over you. Check it out.

Click here to listen to my new episode of 10% Happier where I speak to Joseph Goldstein and Sam Harris about the power of seeing through the illusion of self.

Paid subscribers get a custom guided meditation called “Dial Down Your Reactivity.”

Also out: today’s episode with professors John Makransky and Paul Condon about how compassion is a radical antidote to anxiety and anger. There’s a guided meditation for this episode, too, called “Do Yourself a Solid.”

I’ll be doing a live meditation and Q&A with Teacher of the Month Christiane Wolf tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. ET, for paid subscribers. Zoom link beneath the paywall below. Drop your questions for us now in the chat.

Paid subscribers get the 10% Happier podcast ad-free, as well as:

• A cheatsheet for each episode — with key takeaways, time-coded highlights, and a transcript

• The ability to comment on posts and participate in subscriber chats

• Access to our weekly live video sessions on Zoom, in which I and/or our meditation Teacher of the Month guide a meditation and take questions

• Tailor-made meditations every Monday and Wednesday, led by our meditation Teacher of the Month and designed to pair with the podcast episodes

Join the party.

Join us live on Zoom

Our next weekly Live Meditation and Q&A for paid subscribers is Tuesday, Nov. 25 at 4:00 p.m. ET with Teacher of the Month Christiane Wolf and me.

You can join from your browser on your laptop or desktop (no download needed) or download the Zoom app for your device.

Meeting info: