How Not To Let the News Paralyze You | Tom Llamas

23:11I don't know like the last 10, 15 years of this, of this newsroom. Dan has been here and he wrote about it because a lot of what was happening in the newsroom brought you to meditation. And so I read your book and your story and everything you were saying and your anxieties. I mean, it just rang true. It's like, I've lived it. I knew exactly what you were talking about. I was not at your level. I had not had the same experiences as you had, because like you said, you're a few years older than me. But I understood what you were going through inside. I mean, I completely understood what you were going through inside.

23:39So I was like, let me try this out. And I started with your app, doing the guided meditations and started, you know, just sort of like the instructions you gave five minutes a day to 10 minutes a day to maybe twice a day. and then it's grown from there to now I do I'll do 10 minutes every morning but I'll also do 10 minutes of sort of visualizations positive affirmations and then some more prayer and so like if it's a good day I'm there 25 30 minutes but it's I come out of it I feel great I feel it feels like a workout that's the way I explain it to people you know I just feel I feel it makes me feel better it does I mean it's obviously a catchy title and it's sold billions of copies for a reason.

24:20Thank you. Even if the session of meditation feels shitty, it's still worth doing. In fact, I could argue that the tougher the workout, the more the benefit, like the grittier stuff you're confronting or fatigue or distraction or whatever, you're really working the mind. And so I always feel great. And it's just like exercise. If you're not in the gym for two weeks and then you go back to the gym, you're going to be sore. And if you don't meditate for two weeks and you try to go back to it, your mind's going to be wandering and you're going to be in a lot of places. I've also found that, and I think it's sort of the, we live in this time where we're inundated.

25:00You know, like me, somebody who like, I talk about exhausting life. If I'm walking, I'm listening to a podcast. I'm listening to a book on an audio book. I'm reading something. I'm constantly reading the news. I'm always engaged in some type of being. I love music. I'm listening to music. So there are very few times when it's silent And that's when I meditate, when it's silence. And I find some of your best ideas. Yes. Some of your best thoughts. Yes. You can figure out problems. Yes. When you sit in that meditation. And maybe that wasn't even the purpose, but then it comes to you. And it's always like, it's always sort of, as Oprah would say, that aha moment where I think, wow, I wasn't even thinking about this, but it just came to me because in the silence, it sort of emerges.

25:38And it's a powerful tool. And the best thing about it is that it's free 99. So once you figure it out, you don't have to pay anything. And it's one of those great things. And so I thank you for that, Dan, because I honestly like I don't think if I would have read your book, I would have started meditating. That's great to hear. And just to say this thing about ideas coming, there's some neuroscience, I believe, to support this idea. You know, it's like the guy from Mad Men, Don Draper. People asked him, how do you come up with these great slogans? And he would say, well, I work all day and then I go to the movies.

26:06And when you put your brain in relaxation mode, it's why we have ideas in the shower. You put your brain in relaxation mode, connections get made that wouldn't otherwise get made. And so you're definitely not alone or making that up. And on the thing about Jesus meditating, I don't know if he did, although our former colleague, Paula Ferris, who's a devout evangelical Christian, used to point out to me that the word meditation shows up a lot in both the Old and New Testament. It's true. But there is, I believe, some neuroscience to show that the brain states of deep prayer really resemble the brain states of deep meditation.

26:40So something's happening here. And some prayers, if you say an Our Father or Hail Mary, and again, I just want to be very clear here because I don't want to get in trouble, but I'm not afraid to say these things. When you say an Our Father or Hail Mary, you are saying a repetitive prayer and you're either praying to the Virgin Mary, you're praying to Jesus and to God. I have never done, is it transcendental meditation? But I know that you have a word sometimes, right? That you sort of repeat to yourself, a mantra. I've heard this on your podcast. And when I first heard that, it reminded me a little bit of these prayers, because even though you're praying several words and several sentences and they're full thoughts to who you're praying to, the repetition sort of reminded me of the mantra as well, the way you guys were describing it.

27:22Yeah, I think there's probably a lot to that. Let's just briefly touch exercise, because I know that's part of your daily or daily-ish routine for maintaining your sanity. Can you just say a few words about why it's so important to you? Yeah, I think it's a high stress job. And like I said, we are so plugged in from the moment I wake up. And I know it's unhealthy, but it's just it is who I am. It's just the nature of the business. From the moment I wake up, I'm getting news and I'm getting emails about news and updates about stories. And this morning, right when I woke up, it was the suicide letter of, you know, this shooter who went into the NFL building and unfortunately killed several people.

28:01And that's the first thing I'm seeing when I wake up. And it's just, it's out of habit. You know, you just kind of grab the phone. I've seen the alerts and I want to make sure I haven't missed anything that's going to jolt me out of bed because maybe I have to get to New York quickly or I have to get on the air somehow. So because of that, I have the meditation in the morning, but then I have right after that meditation, maybe an hour or so after I've done some calls, I get in the gym and I'll either go for a run, I'll lift weights or I'll play tennis or something. And it's just to kind of get an hour of physical exercise in.

28:28And I just I feel better. I just think it's something you need to do. Every study we have done on Alzheimer's, on dementia, on aging, every study goes back to keeping an active life, keeping your mind active and keeping your body active. And every time we do these stories, I'm like, guys, we've done 10 of these and they keep finding the same things. But there's always, you know, one extra nugget that makes it newsworthy. But at its core, every doctor, every study has shown keeping an active mind, keeping an active body will help you live longer. And I mean, I'd love to live longer. So I'm going to be doing it.

29:00And it's something good. And I think, you know, just having worked out as a kid with my friends growing up, it's something I sort of, I think, connect me to my past too. And it's fun. And playing tennis. I'm a terrible tennis player, but playing tennis is fun and talking trash with your friends while you're playing. That's that that's actually where I excel at. Not at anything actually technical. It's the talking trash. That to me is great. You know, I think talking trash with your friends is undervalued as a mechanism for health. You don't even have to talk trash. We're just doing something, hanging out with your friends.

29:33I mean, there's a ton of data that nobody's talking about on Instagram to show that in this era of optimization, like your relationships are the thing to optimize. Oh, yeah. I mean, there's this great book, which I don't know if you've read on the 80-20 rule. And I don't know if you've read that book, but it's great. It's written by a guy who he worked in finance, but he was also a gambler. He loved gambling. He's got this great line in the book that says, earning money is great, but winning money. Oh, there's nothing better than winning money. But anyway, he has this mathematical formula. And it's really easy to understand.

30:0720 % of your friends bring you 80 % of your happiness. And it works for everything, right? 20 % of your sources bring you 80 % of your stories. Like 80 % of your stress probably comes from like this 20 % of your life. You know, it's things like that. And after reading the book, it puts a lot of things in perspective in a sense of like, how do you want to spend your day? And how do you want to spend your time and who you spend time with? And it's true. When you spend time with that core group that knows you, you spend time with the family you love, you're going to maximize your time. You start to sort of freelance and maybe we'll go to this, maybe we'll go to that.

30:39I know that's not you, Dan. That's when it starts to get sort of sort of be a waste of time. And you don't get that same experience, I think. Would you classify yourself as an introvert? I don't I don't think I'm an introvert. No, I mean, we've we've worked with a lot of introverts. It's you know, I don't think I'm an introvert. No, I'm an extrovert, but I can get very deep inside of myself. My wife, I'm sure, can tell you that at times I am an introvert at home, but I don't think I am. And I just say that because I know true introverts who are some of the most talented people I've ever met, some of the most talented people I've ever worked with.

31:14And it's funny because we work in a business where it's television and it's a spectacle and things are big and you have to be very creative. And they can be very quiet people, but as soon as they get into an edit room or as soon as they get into a script, it's like they are true geniuses. And so I don't think I'm an introvert in that way. I'm usually pretty outgoing. How would you describe yourself, Dan? I'm a super max extrovert. Like I... Yeah, I was going to say, you're out there. You're talking to people. When you were saying, you know, maybe I won't go to this thing or whatever, like I'll go to the extra thing.

31:44My wife won't. Will you really? Yeah. I'll take the risk. I won't go twice if it sucks, but like I'll try it because I'm always looking to, you know, meet new people. I love that. You know, in terms of introverts we both worked with then i hope you won't mind me saying this i'll text him just to confirm but the name that came to mind is george stephanopoulos like really shy dude oh he's one of them yeah well just i don't even know if it's shy because george is very confident but yeah i'm sure george and he we're not saying any secrets he could be he could be quiet i remember he told me a story i think he was interviewing with clinton and i i think he told clinton i'm the guy who wrote dukakis's jokes it was something like that and it was like they both started laughing because, you know, clearly Dukakis had no sense of humor.

32:27And George is a very cool guy, brilliant, brilliant guy, and a very strong interviewer. But yeah, he's not out schmoozing. That's not him. No, at least not that I've seen. All right, let me ask you a question that I suspect you get all the time. We're in quite a stressful news cycle, at least for many people. I think for the people listening to this show, it's a stressful news cycle. There may be folks who are loving this news cycle, but whatever you feel about Trump, there's a lot going on. And of course there's wars in Ukraine and Gaza and climate stuff. There's a lot to pay attention to. And we now have this technology that floods us, you know, right on our phone.

33:03So I know you have to like, just be drinking from the fire hose all the time. But when people ask you, like, how do you, how can I consume the news without losing my mind or be, you know, coiled up in rage all the time? Do you have any thoughts on like what you would recommend? Look, I'm in the news business. So I want to be mindful of how I'm going to answer this question. I think you got to give yourself a break sometimes. If you're getting a crazy amount of news alerts, if you subscribe to four or five different news organizations and their news alerts, I mean, your phone is blowing up probably every hour and you're probably getting the same news alerts just from different news groups.

33:41So maybe dial it back there. And I would say just stick with the news organizations that you love and that you respect and you trust. I think nightly news is the gold standard. And then, you know, I would be mindful of the opinion-based journalism you're getting. I'm not saying run away from it because I believe the news business is like any business, just like the coffee business, right? Some people like their coffee strong. Some people like espresso. Some people want crazy lattes. The news business is not unlike that. There's something for everyone in America. That is capitalism, right? That being said, just be mindful of what you're getting and how you're getting it.

34:12And if you're getting it from friends or from Facebook or not verified sources, just be mindful of how you're sharing that kind of stuff. That's the only thing I would say, right? But everyone's an adult and they can do whatever they want. And a lot of people have turned to alternative news sources because in some ways we have let them down. And I'm not saying we like NBC News. I'll say we as sort of the media in general. and it's upsetting, but I always think that we can maybe win those folks back. And there are still millions of people who have stayed with us because they know what we're doing.

34:42It's definitely a tricky time. And it's a strange time where you have to go and fact check three different times when you get a news report. It's upsetting that Americans feel they have to do that now. It's been four years, roughly, since I retired. And I would say, you know, it was still a heated time when I was in the game, but it's much more divisive and toxic and polarized now. Do you find that you're kind of walking on eggshells to a certain extent because it's still easy to piss people off? I don't, and I'm not trying to be coy here or not tell you the truth because I know what we're doing, right?

35:19And if you stay focused and you are reporting the truth and you're sticking to the facts and write these mantras, but I truly believe them. And I say them in every interview without fear or favor, right? Without fear or favor. I believe in that and tough, but fair. Cause I think our job is to be tough in the sense that we're supposed to ask the tough questions because we're working for those people at home. So, and we're in those briefing rooms. So we should ask tough questions, but we got to be fair. So I don't, I don't walk on eggshells. Do I think our reporting has to be bulletproof? Yes, but it always has to be bulletproof.

35:52Since I got into this business, anytime you did an investigation, anytime you did any kind of major story, you had to make sure you were buttoned up and it would go through layers. And we still have those layers at NBC News. Some of the others, they don't even have a layer and we have a few layers, you know, to make sure that we're right. Obviously we have a bigger target because we have bigger audiences, but going in every night, I know that we have tried our hardest and we have done our best as a news organization to present the stories that are on. And when something's not ready, one of the greatest rules in journalism, when in doubt, leave it out.

36:24And if we're not 100 % sure, if we're not bulletproof on something, we're going to hold it. Yeah. To me, none of that sounds coy. Like having been in a job similar to yours, the truth kind of is a shield. So I might piss people off, but I have checked it twice. I've checked it thrice even. And it's not just me. One of the things that really made me feel protected was because I'm aware that I, like everybody else have biases was the fact that there's editorial oversight. Like it's going through several layers. Your producer who's with you in the field, the producer and the anchor back in New York, legal and standards department, they're all eyeballing this stuff before, you know, it comes out of my mouth on television.

37:05And biases can still be in there because I think there are probably cultural biases, you know, shot through the mainstream media for sure. But in my experience inside the belly of the beast, it was a lot of well-intentioned people trying to cover the news, as you say, without fear or favor. And I think also, I talk about this a lot. I like to think of the newsroom as sort of a family-style dinner. And what I mean about that is that I want to hear from people. So I like to ask questions in the news like, is this the lead? What do we think about this? Hey, what do you think about this? Because I want to make sure people are speaking up and hearing because there are a lot of different people in the newsroom from different backgrounds.

37:42And I want to make sure we're hearing from everybody to make sure we're getting it right. Right. And that's the benefit of having sort of a bustling, bubbling newsrooms. And you've worked in these newsrooms. Unfortunately, what happened during the pandemic is that, you know, everyone sort of went into work from home and into their silos of, you know, just sort of working in front of a computer and trying to do their own jobs. Now people have come back over the last two, three years to the office place. And it's like some people, I'm sure it's taken time to kind of come back and talk and be. And it's okay to be loud and to say, what do you think about this?

38:12Or I think we should do this. And that's what I want because I think that journalism gets better the more we sort of talk and share ideas. And everyone has a sort of piece of the pie. Yes, I completely agree. What I found as I've gotten older is that in the news business when I was coming up, it was dominated by people who really didn't want to hear your opinion. and yeah no that is true and that i took that kind of hierarchical militaristic style into my now i'm hearkening back to my 360 review again where you know my the people who worked for me were like dude you know you say you want openness but like do you really and i've really had to work hard to actually mean what i was saying you know it's a very good point because i've thought about that as well, because we both worked for some people that were, I think, incredibly talented, who had great ideas and were great newsroom leaders.

39:06And they knew instantly whether something was a story or not a story or what was going on, but they made decisions. And I think that is, you can do both. I think you can be that person, Dan, and you can also be the person to say, I love the phrase, let's red team it, which red team is like, what's the complete opposite idea. What's like something out of left field? Like, let's lead with this. Like, oh, okay. Because I think that just helps people out because again, it's good to have people that are making decisions that are effective leaders, but also you got to listen to your people too, I love that.

39:36Let's red team it. I'm going to steal that.

39:41Coming up much more with Tom Yamas.

39:53We don't have a lot of time left, but I do want to hear about your parents. As you know, I knew about your Cuban heritage, and you are, as I will have said in the introduction to this episode, you're the first Latino anchor of a weekday evening news broadcast, which is amazing and awesome. Well, I guess it's not awesome that it took this long, but it's awesome that you're the one. Your parents' story, I didn't really know all of the details. And so can you share some of it? Because it makes this achievement, I think, even more meaningful. Yeah. I want to tell a quick story and we have time, don't worry, but I'm going to tell a quick story, Dan.

40:28I don't know if you remember this, but when Fidel Castro died, do you remember this on weekend GMA? Yeah, I do. So Fidel Castro dies and I get awakened either by my wife or a text alert that Fidel Castro has died. And I've thought about this moment as a journalist, as a Cuban American, my entire life, my parents have talked about this moment. But it was Cubans thought it was going to be sort of this this turning point in Cuba, though it wasn't. And I remember I opened up the New York Times app and the first line of the report was, I think it said something like the prince of the revolution has died.

41:01Something to that effect. And I of the open New York Times and I immediately wrote an email to you, I think maybe to Paula Faris and the EP of the show. and I said, listen, I don't know if you guys are going to be covering this story, but you should really think about two perspectives. Sometimes there is this romanticism that's written about Fidel Castro that is completely off base. He was a killer and a liar. And I sent you the email, and then you write back, do you want to come on? And I said, okay. And I didn't really think it through, but I said, sure. And we came on and we reported the news.

41:35I think we had Jim Avila, maybe even in, I don't know if he was in Cuba. I don't know if we had sent him to Havana, but I think he might've been there. And then I remember we came out and you came to me and I said that and I broke down and it was kind of wild because I broke down on live TV and I was sort of shared the stories of how we grew up having to send food and money and put medicine and packets of Kool-Aid into greeting cards and hide them because the government would steal it because there was no money or food. It was sort of a crazy moment on live television, but I'm glad I did that, you know, because that's like, that was the whole reason why I had sort of written you because I didn't want, I didn't want it to be sort of whitewashed in a way of, of saying, oh, this, this leader, you know, cause some people say he was a hero cause he stood up to the United States, but he was a terrible person.

42:22He was a dictator in the worst form, you know, and he destroyed a beautiful country. And it was just cool that, you know, you sort of, you saw the passion in the email and you're, you realize you're like, okay, let's, let's put Tom And I got to be honest with you, I don't know if they were happy how that turned out. Who? But I think it was important. Who's they? Management. Really? It was definitely a very powerful and impactful television and journalism. But I had heard some stories. And again, they could be rumors. I don't know. But like that maybe some weren't super happy about the way that turned out.

42:51But it was real. I mean, it doesn't get more real than that. I remember thinking it was incredibly powerful and brave. not that you had planned it, but to not stuff it down and just to show some basic humanity, given what you and your family had gone through. Yeah. If the bosses didn't like it, I think they were behind the times. Like we're in a different world where being a full-fledged human is allowed. You know, it's interesting because people have asked me about bias in the media and I've heard about bias in the media since I was a child, because every time Fidel Castro was interviewed, my parents would have a sort of a post game, you know, like with all like the uncles and aunts and cousins and like talk about was that interview biased or, you know, were they too soft on him?

43:38And I remember these conversations as a child. So I remember hearing about sort of bias in the media and how you had to be tough, but fair and ask tough questions as a little kid before my parents had any idea that I was going to be in this business. But that has been sort of top of my mind since I was a young person. Yeah. And I think I got a better sense of your personal and professional trajectory, reading a little bit more about how your parents had immigrated and not under easy circumstances. It's never easy to feel like you need to flee your homeland, but it's also not easy to get into this country.

44:10And they have some stories that you might want to talk about, but you grew up engaged with the world in ways that most children are not. Oh, oh, completely engaged in the world and conversations about communism, conversations about presidential elections, conversations about what was happening with immigration, with the rules surrounding Cubans that were trying to leave Cuba, the Cuban rafter crisis, the Soviet Union collapsing and then pulling out of Cuba. I mean, this was like a Tuesday for us. Like we were living through all this in the 80s and 90s. And so watching news in both English and Spanish was an everyday affair.

44:47And talking about it was very common. I mean, we talked about all things in life. You know, we weren't like, this was dominating our life. But I remember a lot of conversations at any time, like someone would call from Cuba, everyone had to be quiet because it was an important call. And it was what family needed what and what we had to send and how this person was doing and this person might arrive. Can we help them? But yeah, that sort of shaped my childhood in that regard. I think a lot of immigrants and the son of immigrants have a similar experience. Cuba just happened to be a very active player on the global stage.

45:17And I think that's why it was so at the forefront of our news viewing and sort of in our lives. And then you had, I was surrounded, you know, my community was 99 % Cuban American. It was literally all my friends, of course, all my relatives, but then the baseball teams. I mean, there were obviously other kids who were people that were from Miami or grew up in Florida that weren't from Cuba. But by and large, in the 80s and 90s, I mean, it was northwards of 90 percent. To say the least, immigration is a prominent story in the news right now, and you've got to cover it. How does your personal history, your family's personal history, color your coverage?

45:53And do you have to police whatever biases you might have? I know I'm under a microscope. So my mom left right after Castro takes over. So her family gets out pretty quickly. They lived in Havana and they come to Fort Lauderdale and life is very hard for them pretty fast. Money runs out and everyone has to start working pretty fast, including my uncle who was a child and my grandmother who had not worked in her life because they had come from an affluent family in Cuba. And then suddenly she's taking on multiple jobs. And then my dad's side of the family, they wanted to kind of wait out cast for a little bit and see what would happen.

46:25I mean, because it wasn't like politics were incredibly stable in Cuba. So there was always a chance that maybe someone would overthrow Castro. So they stood back and waited about six years and they saw things get really bad in those six years. So my dad is getting to a point where his parents don't want him to go to school anymore because they're teaching them that, you know, Fidel will provide and God will not provide. And basically all sort of like the Ten Commandments, if you will, of communism. And they're just seeing scary things happen. Political dissent doesn't exist anymore. He starts to devalue the currency.

46:59I mean, things are changing. There's obviously things with the United States are getting worse and worse by the day. So they get out and they go through Mexico six years later, and they have to actually cross through the Rio Grande. They are political refugees, but they weren't able to fly out of Cuba because at this point, Casper sort of shut everything down. So they crossed through the Rio Grande and my father and my aunt had to cross the Rio grand with a coyote and they cross over that. They didn't see their parents for a while. It wasn't a long time, but it was kind of one of those moments that my dad obviously would never forget as a child because he was 12 years old.

47:33And then my parents, my grandparents come over and they make their way by bus to Miami and they start a life there. They, they're political exiles and they start that process and they start from scratch from nothing, you know, no money, not knowing the language and little by little trying to build up their lives as well. Just like my mom's family did and struggled a lot, just like every Cuban did. And many Cubans who came over had it probably even worse than my parents did. There were a lot of people that came over as children without their parents. What was called Peter Pan flights, Pedro Pan, Jeff Bezos, his dad, Mike Bezos is actually a Pedro Pan kid where basically things were so bad in Cuba.

48:09Imagine this, Dan. People were putting their children on planes and flying them to the United States with the help of the Catholic church. And then these American families would take in these Cuban refugee kids and they would raise them. And some kids never saw their parents again. It's crazy. So they lived through that. That's kind of like the backdrop of us being very engaged, at least me in the news and watching the news. So you asked how I cover immigration. I know there's a microscope on me. I'm the son of immigrants, but I also have a superpower in the sense that just because I can speak Spanish, I can get now the story of the person who is either being detained or who's trying to cross into the United States.

48:47I know we are a country of laws. I believe in this country. I think it's the greatest country in the planet. My parents thought us to be very proud Americans. And I know that there's laws and you got to follow the laws. And so as a reporter, I take all that out of it. And I just use what I have, which is my skills, knowing that I can speak Spanish. I can get the story on this side. I can speak to Border Patrol on this side, obviously in English. And to understand what the immigrant experience is that someone has to get up and walk from Venezuela through Central America into the U.S. What is going on in their life that they've been compelled to do this with children?

49:22And then knowing that there's a reality that they're not going to get in now, that they have been stopped and they have been caught and they're likely going back. It's telling that story. And that's what I feel my job is. That's it. That is my job to tell what happened. My job is not to advocate for one side or the other. Now, if there are abuses on either side, we will report that and we will always put that on television. But like you said, I mean, the truth is where I'm headed. And that's the only thing that I'm concerned about. Makes complete sense. And never easy to be under a microscope.

49:53But as you just said, I was saying before, the truth is a great shield in these situations. Let me ask you just as a final question here. And I don't know if this is the right button up question, because I have no idea where this is going to go. But I read that you hand out this book that I had never heard of called the lion trackers guide to life. You hand it out to people. Yes. I will send it to you. I give it to people. It's not, it's not like I'm not like Dan Harris going to like that Saturday party with a trunk full of the 10 % happier books. Like just like flinging them. Like, yeah, I'll go to that new party.

50:24I'm going to hawk 20 more books. So no, I don't hand it out, but I give it to people, people who like to think about life and hold a copy of somebody I gave it to because she loves thinking and talking and quotes and just what is our purpose out here? And she's just such a great teacher and friend. But I gave it to her because I was really touched by the book. And there are so many great quotes. Essentially, the book is about a kid who grows up in South Africa and his family buys a preserve and they rebuild the preserve and they make it this beautiful area. And it's his connection growing up with the guides who are the locals, the people who live in Africa, who go out and track the lions and what he's learned from them.

51:03And sort of the main focus of the book is this quote, which is, I don't know where I'm going, but I know how to get there. And the lion tracker listens to that because the lion tracker can get lost suddenly and they may not know where they're going, but they see a blade of grass sort of folded in a strange way. They see what may be a print another way and they follow that. So again, they don't know where they're going, but they know how to get there. And to me, that was like, that's it, man. That's what this is about. That's what this journey is about. And it's sort of listening to yourself and believing in yourself and not knowing where you're going to end up, but just sort of knowing how to get there.

51:42Another great quote, I mentioned this with Nehota too, is that too much chaos is unstable, but too little is not living. And I kind of believe that too. Yeah. Yes. Well, it's also a denial of reality because everything's changing all the time. And if it feels stagnant, then you're missing something big. Yeah, I agree with that. And I'm going to send you a book. I'm going to send you a couple books. All right. I appreciate it. Tom, so I'm grateful to you for making the time. You're a busy dude. I really appreciate it. And also just super happy for, as I said before, happy for you, proud of you.

52:17It's just great to see. Dan, it's been an honor to be here. You are somebody that communicator. And I'm so happy that you are still communicating with people in probably a much bigger platform now and helping people because I mean, 10 % are happier. Definitely changed my life. And I know you've changed a lot live. So thank you for hearing me out and listening to my story. Thank you, brother. And as I said before, I get to work in my bathing suit. So it's more comfortable than it is. Oh yeah. No, I'm sure you're in the bathing suit now. I am. I am. I am. Last, last question, Tom. Just remind everybody of the name of your show, where we can watch it and why we should watch it.

52:57I got two shows, NBC Nightly News with Tom Yamas. It's on NBC 630 Eastern. A great network newscast. We have a great team. It is the best of NBC News at night. And then we have Top Story, which is on NBC News now. It is our streaming show. As soon as Nightly News wraps at 659.59, we hit a button and the studio comes up and it's Top Story and it's our streaming show. It's an hour of all the best of NBC News, just a little bit longer and geared a little bit more towards a younger audience. and we can watch that on Peacock? On Peacock, on NBC News Now, anywhere where you have a Wi-Fi signal. It's free and it's the future of our business and NBC News has leaned into it and it's a great product.

53:34Thanks again, Tom. Thank you, Dan. I appreciate it. Thank you for having me.

53:42Thanks again to Tom Yamas. Very proud of him and very cool to have him on this show. Don't forget to sign up over at danharris.com and you can join our weekly live meditation and Q &A sessions. Our next one is on Tuesday, December 16th at 4 Eastern. We do these every Tuesday at 4 Eastern. Finally, thank you to everybody who worked so hard to make this show. Our producers are Tara Anderson and Eleanor Vasili. Our recording and engineering is handled by the great folks over at Pod People. Lauren Smith is our managing producer. Marissa Schneiderman is our senior producer. DJ Kashmir is our executive producer.

54:15And Nick Thorburn of the band Islands wrote our theme.

54:23Thank you.