If you are only going to read one book on how to meditate, this one is probably not it. But if you want to know how meditation works for different people while getting to know Dan Harris (and others), this will certainly give you an overview of both.

I was attracted to this book because of it's title and the fact that my own experience with meditation is hampered by both my fidgety nature and my inborn skepticism. The book did address both of these for me. Unfortunately, it's difficult to read this book in one, or even many sittings, without succumbing to ennui and putting it down till later.

That said, Dan Harris is an interesting and entertaining media personality who writes well. He and his co-authors ,Jeff Warren and Carlye Adler embark on a cross-0country bus trip to introduce meditation to varied groups of people (and some from police officers to prisoners), setting up meditation booths for practice in different venues from New York, across, the country, including New Orleans, Tempe and ending in California. Along the way, and interspersed with specific instructions and "cheat sheets to summarize them), we get introduced to personalities like Josh Groban and Stephen Colbert, as well as others, famous and not famous. We also learn about Dan Harris' panic attack, immortalized on YouTube, and Dan's wife and son.

The writing is clear and sounds like practical instructions. It serves a good purpose as introductory material. However, the volume of instruction and its repetitiveness makes it hard to stick with it, lacking a human teacher. I was able to follow some of it by making my own notes as I went along. Also, I did not download a meditation app (which might have helped.) Including Jeff's difficulties with ADD helped by allowing me to relate to him. (Is that what I suffer from?)

Finally, I felt that this book tried too hard to combine these two narratives. I might have enjoyed Dan Harris' autobiography more, all by itself.

This followup to "10% Happier" doesn't disappoint. Dan Harris' hallmark wit and snarky sense of humor make reading this book utterly enjoyable, whether or not you ever get around to actually meditating.

Dan Harris’s book 10% Happier is the book that got me into meditation in the first place, so I was excited to find out that he had written a new book filled with practical tips for meditating. Meditation for Fidgety Skeptics offers helpful, practical ideas that will help overcome the reluctance of those who want to get into meditation but aren’t into the more “woowoo” aspects.

Dan wrote this book with the help of his friend, meditation teacher Jeff, as they toured the country in a bus and talked to widely varying groups about meditation. Everyone from former juvenile delinquents to the military to news and radio personalities gets a mention, so no matter what your hangups about meditation, the authors have advice for you. The book is also filled with short meditations that you can try out for yourself.

I enjoyed this book, and if you’re interested in meditation but don’t want to get all mystical about it, you should definitely pick it up.

I'm going through a stressful period on my life now and thought that perhaps meditation could help alleviate that. I jumped at the chance to read this book and get started. I didn't expect the way meditation was presented in this book, mostly anecdotal musing meant to be funny. Unfortunately I didn't find them amusing and thought it distracted from the message of the book. The authors claim a passion for meditation but that was not conveyed. Essentially I took away a few things from the book, You can meditate anywhere, you can meditate for as long or as short as you like, and everyone's mind drifts, focus takes practice.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher. All opinions are my own

I felt like a lot of the meditations were exactly the same. Maybe that was the point but I just didn't get it. A lot of them were the exact same length and consisted of the exact same process. I wanted to learn more about meditating that I felt the book offered. It was more, I tried the following meditations with my celebrity friends and they worked for me or them. I just was looking for more.

Love this book. So many books on mindfulness meditation really speak to those who already believe in the concept but don't know how to do or. This one speaks to those who secretly think "what's the point of all this?" but have nowhere to voice that skepticism.

A lighthearted, practical guide to meditation for people who are weirded out by the woo-woo. Dan Harris's self-deprecating sense of humor is a pleasure to read, and his skeptical-but-earnest attitude toward meditation and mindfulness matches up with my own. His funny personal anecdotes and pop culture references make this super readable. There are lots of short, situational meditation suggestions throughout the text—my personal favorite is "surf the urge," a means of stopping oneself from doing something impulsive (like Harris says about himself, I have a tendency to spout half-baked thoughts before I've had a chance to fully process them, so I will absolutely be deploying this to stop myself from unnecessarily acting like a jerk). Definitely a book to pick up if you've been meaning to start meditating but find it somewhat intimidating. This is highly accessible thanks, largely, to the narrative through-line (the story of Harris and his friend/meditation mentor Jeffrey Warren on their cross-country meditation teaching tour). I've been meditating for a while, so some of the early chapters (establishing basic principles of mindfulness meditation) were slightly tedious for me, but on the whole this is an engaging guide.

I gave up on this after reading about 1/10 of it. It was trying too hard to be funny.

Easy to read with lots of good tips on how to mediate and why. The author has an engaging self-deprecating style.
Thank you netgalley for the review copy.

A good introduction how-to book for beginner meditators. I enjoyed Harris' first book and picked this one up on the follow up. Reads very much like a beginning meditation series thanks to the input of Jeffrey Warren, the meditation guru here. The book is somewhat organized by "reasons why people don't meditate", but the format is so following all of the other books available for beginners, I suspect the objections were laid on top of the outline after the fact (in part because some seem to be a little odd - does anyone really choose not to meditate because they think it's too selfish to do so?) All in all, recommended for beginners who have stereotypes of meditation as religious or hippy-dippy. Otherwise, pick another book because Harris' overdone ego and the constant muscle flexing will be off-putting.

This is an interesting book; part narrative, part self-help book, part introduction to meditation. It has some scientific background for it's recommendations, but mostly it is the author's journey through skepticism of the practice all the way to full acceptance and educating others about the practice. It wasn't my cup of tea (if I"m going for a self-help book, or educational book, I prefer a little less narrative), but for some people it might be exactly what they need.