Thank you for having us.

We thought we'd actually start with a couple questions for you

guys, and then we'll get into our rap a little bit.

Just with a show of hands, we're curious,

how many people here might consider themselves meditators?

OK.

How about, how many people have tried it, but thought

it quote unquote "just didn't work,"

or they weren't good at it?

OK.

And it's all right to be honest, how many people

are skeptical that it works, haven't tried it?

All right, so not a lot of skeptics going here.

RUSSELL SIMMONS: They all read and shit.

These are smart people.

The research is crystal clear.

So it does work, obviously.

CHRIS MORROW: It does work.

RUSSELL SIMMONS: Yeah.

I mean, well that's what the neuroscientists are saying,

right?

Everybody's saying that.

And they say the greatest gateway

to happiness, right, meditation.

You hear it, and you hear it enough, you kind of believe it.

But if you have faith in something, you do it.

Right?

You have total faith, absolute faith, you do it.

If it makes you happy, you do it.

Meditation makes you happy, that's what they say,

that's what the research says.

Meditation gives you greater brain functionality.

You people work at Google, you're all brainiacs, right?

Greater brain functionality, greater memory,

calm nervous system, get rid of your ADD, lower

your blood pressure, all that stuff.

You know all that, because you're sitting here.

You probably studied it quick, like the quick studies

that you are.

So you already know what meditation is for,

and what they say it does, and you kind of believe it

because the proof is everywhere now.

CHRIS MORROW: Well let's rewind it for one second,

because when we asked if some people had tried it and thought

didn't work, a lot of people--

RUSSELL SIMMONS: But the skeptics, no one would say--

CHRIS MORROW: No one's a skeptic, all right.

But the people who said they tried it, and it quote

"didn't work?"

RUSSELL SIMMONS: We're going to teach them, that's easy.

CHRIS MORROW: Well let's address that.

Is it possible to do meditation wrong,

or is everyone doing it right?

RUSSELL SIMMONS: Well, yeah, wrong if you don't-- the one

thing you everyone has to have in order to be a meditator is

patience.

You have to have a bit of patience.

You know, my name is Rush, so I can meditate.

And my kids, they didn't want to meditate,

and their mother said, sit your [INAUDIBLE].

They became meditators, they said, don't move,

you know, and you sit there.

And the mind's crazy, like a monkey.

It bounces around in the head.

It's like, go to the refrigerator,

get something to eat, hit her before she breaks out,

she's gonna leave, get her this morning.

All kinds of stuff.

And you're sitting there, and your mind's

telling you, stop, stop.

And you're saying, I can't stop until the alarm goes off.

I can't.

The alarm goes off, so you can scratch,

you can do whatever you want, but you can't go nowhere.

So the mind is bouncing around like a monkey in a cage,

and then it settles, and you say to yourself, oh shit,

I'm meditating.

And then it bounces around some more,

and it transcends the thoughts even more.

And as the nervous system calms, the mind always goes after it.

That's the process.

It's simple, right?

The reason that we wrote this book is to demystify it,

meditation.

It's something I've been so passionate about for 20 years,

and I want people to do it.

I want kids in schools to do it, I want adults to do it.

I want the world to become a better place.

And if I could get more people to do it,

then I would lift the vibration of the planet

just a little bit, and I'd really

have contributed something besides entertainment.

Really contribute to the happiness of the planet,

or to the planet's ability to get along with each other

or love each other.

And so that's why this book is so important to me,

and I really have done a lot of work [INAUDIBLE].

Chris, you're watching me.

You're kind of surprised, right?

CHRIS MORROW: What am I surprised about?

RUSSELL SIMMONS: That I'm busting my ass, I'm everywhere.

CHRISMORROW:Oh no, he's working for this, it's true.

RUSSELL SIMMONS: I mean, I give the money to charity

for my books, I don't make any money on them.

I've been working, the book's been on the best seller list,

like seven weeks.

I've been consistently working, and it's going to continue.

I want to put it in schools in Chicago,

where the most violence is.

I want people to watch the reduction in violence,

and see the schools' vibrations change.

I want to see that happen with people watching,

not like the schools we have all the country

where it's going on, where the research is clear.

But I want everybody to watch us do it in Chicago,

because I want to make it happen everywhere.

That's just a big ambition, and so that's why I keep pushing.

CHRIS MORROW: Well, let's take it

back a little bit for the people who haven't read the book yet.

Talk a little bit about--

RUSSELLSIMMONS: No one's read the book.

CHRIS MORROW: Or for everyone who hasn't read the book yet,

talk about your own journey to meditation.

What led you there?

RUSSELL SIMMONS: Well, I went to yoga

a little over 20 years ago, because there

was no guys there, just girls.

All just beautiful girls.

They didn't have Lululemon see-through,

no shit like that, just shorts.

You know?

And I went to yoga, and there was a gay guy or two there,

but no guys, you know.

So anyway, I went to class.

And when I came out, I was high as hell.

I was like, oh shit, if I keep doing this,

I'm not going to make any more money,

because-- little bit of freedom.

And I used to think that-- the neurotic kind of person I

was, the noise that was always in my head, the rethinking

and rethinking, and the insomnia,

and the things that I was afflicted--

that those things were part of the formula for success.

That working, overworking, overthinking,

was part of the process.

And so I came out, I was a little worried,

because for a moment there was a little freedom from that.

And I learned since then that the seconds of stillness

are the only time you can ever make an informed decision, be

creative, or ever, never happy in the future or the past.

So the fluctuations of the mind are

the cause of suffering and sadness,

and the stillness of the mind causes happiness.

You know, every prophet has said it in every language,

and it's promoted throughout all religious dialogue, always.

But we have not embraced it.

And now all the doctors are saying it,

and they have all this proof, and so we should embrace this.

This idea of quieting the mind, consciously

working to quiet the mind.

Everything that we do, really, is geared towards this.

Everything we do-- take drugs, dumb the mind down,

get the noise out.

So it's cloudiness or clarity, are the two choices.

CHRIS MORROW: But haven't you always been looking for that,

even before you understood what meditation was?

RUSSELL SIMMONS: Before I took drugs?

CHRIS MORROW: Well, yeah, because I remember

there's a famous story that Rick Rubin tells--

RUSSELL SIMMONS: I started taking drugs very early.

CHRIS MORROW: Yeah.

But from that era--

RUSSELL SIMMONS: I took drugs really early.

Before that, I didn't think about it much.

Did I misunderstand the question?

CHRIS MORROW: I didn't even get the question out.

But I mean, what I'm saying is, he tells a story about-- this

is probably like early '85 or mid '80s whatever,

living in NYU dorm rooms.

RUSSELL SIMMONS: Are you on the [? past ?] steam room story?

CHRIS MORROW: Yeah, the steam room story.

RUSSELL SIMMONS: We all do-- I mean everything--

CHRIS MORROW: Do you guys know the steam room story?

RUSSELL SIMMONS: No, they don't [INAUDIBLE].

Everything is geared towards quieting the mind.

We don't realize it, we make the mind

go crazy while trying to quiet the mind.

We want the mind to be still, because that sunset--

the basketball players, we want to be in the zone.

You want to see the ball coming, catch it with this hand,

put it around here, and hand it to your man

so he can dunk the ball.

Right?

That's what we want to do, right?

Ball players, and they want to see it coming.

When the mind is fluctuating, you can't even catch the ball.

But when the mind is still, the rim is as big as this room,

you can't miss.

That expansive mindset is what we're all looking for.

In a car accident, everything's moving slow,

because you've carved out the past and future, everything's

oh shit.

That's the way the world is really

moving all the time, that slow.

It's the fluctuation of your mind keeping you

from seeing all the miracles as they unfold.

All the stuff given to you, all this beauty,

you don't see any of it because you've

got the noise in the mind.

We want to quiet the mind.

And when we quiet the mind, we see it all.

You've read this stuff-- because you're all smart people,

you've read-- it's true.

And having faith in it gives us more opportunity

to move towards it.

That means you have the tools available to you--

you have meditation, you have do-good karmic work,

all the shit.

All this stuff goes together, but the meditation--

of all the tools, of all the eight parts of yoga,

of all the religious teachings.

Of all the things that are meant to quiet the mind

to give you this consciousness, this heaven on earth,

no tool is greater than quiet time.

Because in here, is where it all is.

CHRIS MORROW: All right, but there

are a lot of different types of meditation.

The type that we talk about in the book

is mantra based meditation.

What brought you specifically to that style, or that approach?

Or did you to try other ones first?

How did you settle on mantra?

RUSSELL SIMMONS: I think I've tried a lot since,

but I mean I started out, my first teachers

taught me to let go.

It's good, it's a good mantra.

It's a mantra based meditation.

And then they taught me candle gazing.

That's good.

They taught me concentrating on a thing.

On a thing that won't move.

You ever been in the water in a pool,

and you're just chilling right?

You want the water just to like--

and you're just chilling, that's meditation.