Rick Hanson

(SPRING 2012)

Rick Hanson, Ph.D., is a neuropsychologist and author of Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, and Wisdom (in 21 languages). Founder of the Wellspring Institute for Neuroscience and Contemplative Wisdom and Affiliate of the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley, he's taught at Oxford, Stanford, and Harvard, and in meditation centers in Europe, North America, and Australia.

Taking In the Good: Mindfully Internalizing Positive Experiences
We will discuss the brain's evolved negativity bias, which makes it like Velcro for negative experiences but Teflon for positive ones, creating vulnerabilities for anxiety and depression. Then, drawing on contemplative neuroscience and research on implicit memory, we will explore how to teach clients the three steps of deliberately savoring positive experiences. Last, we will investigate the optional, fourth step of taking in the good: pairing positive experiences with negative ones. Throughout, there will be a mix of presentation, discussion, and internal guided experiential activities.