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Josh Misner, PhD

Mindful Living in a Distracted World

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Josh "Dr. J" Misner

Mindfulness researcher, communication professor, Choctaw native, author of Put the F**king Phone Down

Accepting the emptiness that pride provides

When I was about six or seven years old, my dad asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up.  A harmless question for sure, but one nobody had ever asked me before.  No one had ever taken an interest in finding out what I wanted out of life.

I mulled the thought over as I cut my pancakes, and the first thing I could think of was, “A judge.”  The reason in my mind for such a goal was that I wanted to be in charge of everyone and everything.  I wanted things my way.

From this early age, I had a heavy-handed sense of ambition, which was really more of an unchecked ambition, run amok.  Without much in the way of parental guidance for the rest of my childhood, my ambition continued to grow without boundaries or limitations, so I found myself always wanting more.

I would set goals for myself, and once those goals were attained, I was done with them, moving on to the next goal.  Nobody, and I do mean nobody got in the way of my goals, and nobody told me where I should stop or worse, what I could not do. Continue reading “Accepting the emptiness that pride provides” →

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Rediscover the World Through a Child’s Eyes


The following is an excerpt from Kitchen Table Wisdom, by Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D.:
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Just before she meets with Tweedledum and Tweedledee, Alice enters the wood-of-no-names and encounters a fawn. Neither the fawn nor Alice can remember their names. No matter. They walk a ways together, ‘Alice, with her arms clasped lovingly around the soft neck of the Fawn,’ until they come to the edge of the wood. Once there, the fawn suddenly remembers its name and looks at Alice with horror. ‘I’m a Fawn!’ it cries out, ‘and, dear me! you’re a human child!’ Terrified, it runs away.

As a child I spent many summers alone on a deserted beach on Long Island, gathering shells, digging for little clams, leading a far different life than the city life I led the rest of the year. Day after day, I watched everything, developing an eye for change in all its subtlety. The rest of the year in New York City, I did not look directly at anyone I did not know and did not talk to strangers. Continue reading “Rediscover the World Through a Child’s Eyes” →

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An Ode to Wonder



. . . then there are those magical moments between worlds, when we wait upon the silence and cast our gaze into the lights.  The wind serenades us with the melody of a thousand years and trees dance to a rhythm of immemorial joy.  Our palms caress crusted tips of wild grass as we comb through the meadow without words, yet mysteriously hearing their meanings echo among the chatter of nature.  A smile and bright, wondrous eyes light the path ahead while we leave our cares behind for another day, another moment, but not this one. 
Today, we soak it all in, unfettered by definition or explanation.
Today, we roam. 
Today, we marvel.
Today is ours. 
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The Bus Ride & That Smile


At the risk of submitting student grades for the week late for one of the universities generous enough to continue to employ my services, I closed up the ol’ Macbook today in favor of taking my six year-old son and his cousin to a special event.

For the first time in many years, our community brought back the excitement of hydroplane racing.  If you haven’t seen these machines race before, it is truly something to behold, as these drivers harness themselves into a fiberglass and carbon fiber contraption with a turbojet engine strapped to it, searing ahead at speeds of well over 200 miles per hour.  The sound of them alone is well worth the trip.

 

Continue reading “The Bus Ride & That Smile” →

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So we can get back up again

Today, I took my two youngest to the park to play.

Little did I know that I was going to bear witness to determination and perseverance in action, right before my eyes.

My little six year-old never made it past two monkey bars before today, but this was his day, and those monkey bars belonged to him.

I watched, as time and again, he tried and fell, but I would look at him and ask, “Parker, why do we fall?”

With courage and stubborn tenacity, he would look up at me and grasp my outstretched hand, “So we can get back up again, Daddy!”

He went further and further with each successive dusting off and repeated attempt, smiling through the frustration.

He began to smile at the failures.

He laughed every time he fell.

Then, I saw it happen.  

He made it.

When he did, he rushed straight into my arms for one of the biggest hugs I can recall in recent memory.

To commemorate his feat of unbreakable will, we made the following video tonight, and I wanted to share it here:



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A Lesson in the Importance of Failure

Thomas Edison once said: “I haven’t failed.  I’ve found 10,000 ways that don’t work.” 

I’m sure I could go on from here to recite the virtues of one famous sage after another, all of whom tried to convince people like you and I that failure is something not to be afraid of because it is inevitable, but let’s face it.  

Failure sucks.
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