Session 4 transcript now available
What do we learn when we track daily emotions? What is the relationship between our daily emotions and pervasive feelings of burnout and stress? Why did the Dalai Lama support the creation of an Online Atlas of Emotions, what are destructive emotions, and why did the Dalai Lama host a meeting on the topic? Can technology help us learn about our emotions? Learn more in a Mind & Life Connect session with writer, teacher and contemplative social scientist Eve Ekman. Eve is an experienced researcher and group facilitator, whose work focuses on the science of happiness, resilience, compassion, mindfulness, and emotional awareness.
Emotions can dramatically help or hinder us in leading productive, purposeful, and compassionate lives, and we are not born with clear instructions on how to work with them. This interview will weave insights from contemporary Social, Cognitive, and Buddhist Psychology lenses on understanding and transforming our emotional lives. Contemplative scientists have shown that meditation training supports emotion regulation. Emotion regulation is a term used to describe our effortful, intentional strategies to modulate emotions and our bodies’ often implicit strategies to regain calm, such as a deep breath or sigh, that happen outside our conscious awareness. Emotion regulation strategies include what is called cognitive reappraisal (reframing our experience), emotion granularity (specifically labeling and identifying our emotions), meta-awareness (becoming aware when we are emotional), and response. Date: August 17, 2023
Session Resources
Explore Eve’s work with Atlas of Emotions
Join Eve’s trainings on “Cultivating Emotions“
Read Eve’s Insights article on “Understanding our Emotions“
Watch the Mind & Life Dialogues with His Holiness, on “Destructive Emotions“
Eve Ekman
Dr. Eve Ekman is a Wellbeing Lead in the Health team at Apple, a fellow of Mind and Life, Senior Fellow for the Greater Good Science Center, and a contemplative curriculum specialist at the UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics. Her work draws from her extensive experience in clinical social work, integrative medicine, emotional awareness, contemplative science, and meditation. Her research focuses on helping professional care providers prevent burnout by providing them with easier access to practices of attention, insight, and resilience. She has developed trainings to address burnout in national and international organizations and has delivered keynotes and workshops for companies such as Airbnb, Salesforce, and Kaiser Permanente. Additionally, she has collaborated with her father, renowned emotion researcher Dr. Paul Ekman, on projects such as The Atlas of Emotions. Eve’s writing has been published in peer-reviewed journals, magazines, and books, and she is an avid practitioner of meditation, yoga, and cold water surfing.
