Choose to love. Love is more about us being loving than about other people being lovable. In fact, choosing to love is twice loving: it’s a loving act to call up the intention to love, plus there is the love that follows.
Rick Hanson
Author / Psychologist
Follow on:
Expertise
Biography
Rick Hanson, Ph.D. is a psychologist, Senior Fellow at UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, and New York Times best-selling author. His eight books have been published in 33 languages and include Hardwiring Happiness, Buddha’s Brain, Resilient, Neurodharma, Just One Thing, Making Great Relationships, A Happy, Healthy Mom, and Mother Nurture – with over a million copies in English alone. He's the founder of the Global Compassion Coalition and the Wellspring Institute for Neuroscience and Contemplative Wisdom, as well as the co-host of the Being Well podcast – which has been downloaded over 30 million times. He offers free newsletters, and his online programs have scholarships available for those with financial needs. He’s lectured at NASA, Google, Oxford, and Harvard. An expert on positive neuroplasticity, his work has been featured on CBS, NPR, the BBC, and other major media. He began meditating in 1974 and has taught in meditation centers worldwide. He and his wife live in northern California and have two adult children. He loves the wilderness and taking a break from emails.
Articles
Talk + Meditation: How to Use Anxiety – and Not Be Used by It!
Anxiety can be useful — until it isn’t. Learn how to listen to what worry is telling you, then let go of what you don’t need.
Try a Softer Tone
There are three elements of tone: 1) Explicit content 2) Emotional subtext 3) Implicit statement about the nature of the relationship.
Talk + Meditation: 5 Ways to Take Things Less Personally
Life is going to bump into us. People will disappoint us, criticize us, misunderstand us, drop the ball, or sometimes genuinely treat us badly. The question is how to deal […]
Feel Cared About
Feeling cared about buffers against stress, increases positive emotions, promotes resilience, and increases caring for others. Learn how to feel cared about to gradually fill any holes in your heart.
Being Well Podcast: People Pleasing vs. Fawning: Why We Do It and How to Change
Dr. Rick and Forrest talk about what separates people-pleasing from the fawn response, and why those differences affect what actually helps.
Talk + Meditation: Why It’s So Hard to Set – and Keep – Healthy Boundaries
Healthy boundaries can bring more freedom, peace, and connection to our relationships.
Know You’re a Good Person
Is it hard to believe you are a good person? Try to take in the good of feeling cared about; recognize goodness in your acts of thought, word, and deed. Enjoy this beautiful goodness, so real and so true.
Being Well Podcast: Depleted Mother Syndrome: Why Moms Burn Out, and How to Recover with Jan Hanson
Forrest is joined by his parents, psychologist Dr. Rick Hanson and nutritionist Jan Hanson, to discuss “Depleted Mother Syndrome:” the exhaustion, brain fog, and low mood so many mothers experience.
Talk + Meditation: Why Good Boundaries Make Better Relationships
Healthy boundaries can bring more freedom, peace, and connection to our relationships.
Turn Anger into a Peaceful Heart
3 things to help guide you to find peace: Stop Things from Building Up, Understand What’s Making You Angry, Find Key Ways to Turn Anger into a Peaceful Heart
Being Well Podcast: How to Feel Your Feelings with Simone Saunders
Forrest talks with trauma therapist Simone Saunders about how to go from knowing your patterns to being able to do something about them when things get intense.