TED Radio Hour: "Finding Your Bliss"

Host: Manoush Zomorodi (NPR)
Date: December 5, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode of TED Radio Hour explores what it means to find “bliss”—to seek grounding, meaning, and joy in a turbulent world. Through conversations with emblematic thinkers and practitioners including Krista Tippett, Dan Harris, Chris Anderson, and Stefan Chow, the show investigates profound questions about living with uncertainty, cultivating loving-kindness, harnessing generosity, and reconnecting with childlike joy. Listeners are inspired to move away from goal-driven resolutions and instead embrace open questions and mindful practices as paths to deeper fulfillment.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Living the Questions with Krista Tippett

[02:39 – 14:49]

• Navigating Uncertainty:
  Krista Tippett, host of "On Being," discusses reaching a crossroads in her 60s, grappling with what her “service” should be as her life structure changed.
  “What is my work going to be to do? ... Some of the things that came to me that might be my service didn't feel possible with... the way my life was structured.” [03:46]

• Rilke’s Wisdom:
  Tippett shares inspiration from Rainer Maria Rilke, advocating for patience with “all that is unresolved” and encourages living into questions rather than rushing to answers.
  “Try to be patient with all that is unresolved in your heart... treat your questions like locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language.” [05:26]

• Dwelling with Big Questions:
  She explains this attitude as a foundation for facing the vast, open questions of our time (ecological, political, spiritual, etc.), both personally and globally.
  “We are being shaped as much by the questions we're carrying as by the answers we have it in us to give.” [07:29]

• Letting Go and Renewal:
  Tippett describes evaluating what is “life-giving” versus “depleting,” leading her to wind down her organization and embrace unexpected love at 64. “There was just too much that I was carrying in the old structure... what in the way I'm living now and working now depletes me, and what is life-giving?” [10:45]

• Love in Later Life:
  The gift of falling in love later in life brings freedom from the urgency of major life decisions—the focus turns not to duration but to deep quality and shared vulnerability. “When you're 65, you know [your mortality]... but also that I can potentially, you know, we have 20 or 30 years left. And to make a commitment to that is such a different quality of commitment...” [13:39]

2. Asking the Right New Year’s Question

[17:09 – 21:14]

• Beyond Resolutions:
  Krista Tippett recommends abandoning typical New Year’s resolutions in favor of carrying a “New Year’s question.” “Don't make a resolution. This is a radical alternative to the New Year's resolution. Ask a New Year's question.” [18:57]

• How to Engage:
  Instead of an answer, focus on what emerges through the process of living with the question.
  “If we're looking for an answer, we may be disappointed... We're looking for what emerges in us.” [19:30], [19:38]

• Letting Questions Evolve:
  Questions themselves can—and should—change as you change. “You may find as you move forward, that the question itself needs revising... So the question is alive too.” [20:57]

3. Loving-Kindness and Changing the Mind with Dan Harris

[21:24 – 35:40]

• Facing the Inner Critic:
  Dan Harris, former news anchor and author, discusses “the inner narrator” that creates dissatisfaction by judging oneself and others.
  “We have this little inner narrator that chases us out of bed in the morning and is yammering at us all day long, constantly... not focusing on what's happening right now.” [21:34]

• Breakdown to Breakthrough:
  A very public panic attack led Harris to meditation, which he first ridiculed but later embraced. “My nationally televised freakout ultimately led me to meditation, which I had actually long rejected as ridiculous.” [22:08]

• Leap into Self-Reflection:
  Harris describes his humbling “360 review,” which exposed his negative tendencies and spurred him toward deeper self-exploration.
  “Then came 26 pages of beat down... He is intentionally intimidating when it serves him. I was called emotionally guarded, a diva, and an authoritarian.” [24:43]

• Loving-Kindness Practice:
  Harris details his skeptical approach to “metta”—loving-kindness meditation—and how it reframed his internal dialogue and relationships.
  “The practice really involves... calling to mind somebody really easy to love...[then] yourself... then a neutral person... then a difficult person, and then finally all beings everywhere.” [26:45]

• Being Kind to Oneself:
  He highlights the therapeutic value of self-compassion, even for skeptics. “When you see your demons... you should put your hand on your heart and say, it's okay, sweetie, I'm here for you. And I was like, hard pass... I just talked to myself the way I would talk to a friend...” [27:56]

• Broader Social Relevance:
  Harris responds to critiques that meditation is individualistic, arguing for its broader accessibility and necessity as a supplement—not a replacement—for systemic change.
  “It's not either or. It's yes and.” [31:44]

• Results and Mind Training:
  After years of meditation, Harris receives a second, far more positive 360 review.
  “He's genuinely curious and interested. He's less negative... Dan is so much kinder and more compassionate than he used to be.” [34:52]

• The Core Realization:
  Reflects on impermanence, service, and what truly matters. “There are very meaningful things you can do to be of service, which will make you happier and the people around you happier...” [35:03]

4. The Infectious Nature of Generosity with Chris Anderson

[38:11 – 50:16]

• Investigating Generosity:
  TED Head Chris Anderson explores generosity as a contagious social good—one that can spread like a positive virus. “If you can find your way to be generous... I guarantee that it will increase your own happiness.” [38:46]

• Experimenting with Giving:
  Anderson recounts giving $10,000 each to 200 randomly selected people worldwide. Most recipients chose to give much of it away—a behavior that amplified happiness for all involved.
  “The majority, I think nearly two thirds of that money was basically spent generously. People spent it on friends, on organizations, on others, and did so with great joy.” [40:54]

• Happiness Returns Multiply:
  The experiment showed donating money creates a much larger total happiness impact than simply keeping it.
  “It was estimated that the donation had effectively created a more than 200 times multiple amount of happiness that their $2 million would have given them personally.” [42:14]

• Generosity Beyond Money:
  Generosity can also mean sharing knowledge, attention, connections, hospitality, or simple acts of kindness; it's not limited to monetary giving.
  “There are many, many ways you can share what you do have.” [43:25]

• Making Generosity “Go Viral”:
  Even a small uptick in “infectiousness” greatly increases the spread of good deeds.
  “The math here is really quite extraordinary... a small difference in infectiousness can actually lead to a thousand fold difference in impact.” [45:57]

• Net Giver or Net Taker?:
  Anderson suggests self-evaluation: are you a net giver or taker in the world? Purpose and happiness are closely linked to generous engagement.
  “If it was the case that most people in our world were net givers rather than net takers, the future is probably going to be okay.” [46:50]

• Legacy and Role Models:
  Anderson reflects on his late mother—her refusal to judge and commitment to giving as a lasting influence.
  “No one who really gives to the world ever really dies. What they have done will have its own ripple effects.” [49:34]

5. Rediscovering Childlike Joy with Stefan Chow

[50:30 – 54:45]

• Play as Purpose:
  Photographer Stefan Chow recounts how play is essential, citing Confucius:
  “It is better to play than to do nothing.” [50:55]

• Playgrounds and Perspective:
  Sharing both his daughter’s and his own playground experiences, Chow emphasizes the need for adults to rediscover wonder and exploration. Through an aerial photography project, he captures playgrounds from above, revealing details only visible from a new vantage point.
  “We need to be looking at the final details in life... the little tidbits in life that makes life interesting. And more importantly, this project has also helped me to see through the eyes of a child again.” [53:23]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Krista Tippett:
  “We are being shaped as much by the questions we're carrying as by the answers we have it in us to give.” [07:29]
  “This is a radical alternative to the New Year's resolution. Ask a New Year's question.” [18:59]

• Dan Harris:
  “We have this little inner narrator that chases us out of bed in the morning and is yammering at us all day long...” [21:34]
  “The radical disarmament of your inner critic is... to give him a hug, be like, thank you, I don't have to listen to you.” [28:56]

• Chris Anderson:
  “If you can find your way to be generous... I guarantee that it will increase your own happiness.” [38:46]
  “No one who really gives to the world ever really dies. What they have done will have its own ripple effects.” [49:34]

• Stefan Chow:
  “It is better to play than to do nothing.” (Confucius) [50:55]
  “We need to be looking at the final details in life... that makes life interesting... to see through the eyes of a child again.” [53:23]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Living the Question – Krista Tippett: [02:39 – 14:49]
• Ask a New Year’s Question (Not a Resolution): [17:09 – 21:14]
• Dan Harris on Loving Kindness & Mind Training: [21:24 – 35:40]
• Chris Anderson & The Infectiousness of Generosity: [38:11 – 50:16]
• Rediscovering Playfulness – Stefan Chow: [50:30 – 54:45]

Takeaways

• Uncertainty and questioning are not weaknesses but essential tools for living a fulfilled life.
• Bliss doesn’t come from answers or control but from living deeply into meaningful questions, opening oneself to love at any age, and being gentle with oneself internally.
• Kindness (to self and others), generosity, and play are practices proven (by science and experience) to boost both individual and collective happiness.
• Finding your bliss is less about seeking solutions and more about participation, curiosity, patience, and the courage to give and explore.

Listeners are left with permission—and encouragement—to embrace “living the question” as the most reliable route to bliss in a world full of unresolved challenges.