Metta Hour with Sharon Salzberg – Ep. 268 – Anxiety Series: Emma Seppälä

For episode 268, Emma Seppälä returns to the Metta Hour for our ongoing Anxiety Series.

In this series, Sharon is speaking with Mental Health experts, providers and different researchers for tools to work with anxiety in increasingly challenging times. This is the eighth episode in the series.

Emma Seppälä is a best-selling author, Yale lecturer, and international keynote speaker. She teaches executives at the Yale School of Management and is faculty director of the Yale School of Management’s Women’s Leadership Program. She is also the Science Director of Stanford University’s Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education. A psychologist and research scientist by training, Emma’s expertise is the science of happiness, emotional intelligence, and social connection. Her latest book, “Sovereign: Reclaim Your Freedom, Energy, and Power in a Time of Distraction, Uncertainty, and Chaos” came out in 2024.

In this conversation, Emma and Sharon speak about:
  • Mental Health study on university students
  • How self-compassion figures into wellbeing
  • Reflective Best-Self Exercise
  • How the Dalai Lama made a mistake
  • Sovereignty: awareness + courage + energy
  • Suppressing emotions makes them stronger
  • Emma’s experience with an Eating Disorder
  • Working with difficult emotions
  • Different regulation techniques
  • Breathing techniques for regulation
  • Research on Lovingkindness
  • Benefits of meditation
  • How intuition can help our anxiety

Emma closes the conversation with a guided breathing practice. To learn more about Emma’s work and get a copy of “Sovereign” on her website right here. Learn about Emma’s 6-week course, the Science of Sovereignty right here.

Check out the first episode in the Anxiety Podcast Series with Dr. Jud Brewer right here.
More from Sharon Salzberg:
Jump into the first episode of the Real Life Series with Jon Kabat-Zinn
Tune into Ep. 1 of the Metta Hour to learn about The Buddha Within
Listen to Sharon’s Meditative Story, Hosted By Rohan Gunatillake
Hear from Tara Brach and Sharon Salzberg in Ep. 56 of Metta Hour