Human Flourishing and the Mind-Body

media release:  Just as we can improve our physical health with regular exercise, we can improve our emotional well-being with a training program for the mind. At Wisconsin Idea Spotlight: Human Flourishing and the Mind-Body Connection, join our panel of experts as they discuss elements of our health we can’t see or touch, but that we certainly still feel. Speakers include neuroscientist and founder of the Center for Healthy Minds Professor Richard Davidson, chair of the UW Department of Family Medicine and Community Health Professor David Rakel, and integrative family medicine physician Adrienne Hampton. Learn about neuroplasticity and how research in the lab confirms that, by learning and practicing the well-being skills associated with awareness, connection, insight, and purpose, anyone can have a healthier mind, regardless of their external circumstances. This event is presented in partnership with the Center for Healthy Minds and the UW Department of Family Medicine and Community Health.

Free Admission, but Registration is required.

About the panelists:

Richard J. Davidson is the William James and Vilas Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is the founder of the Center for Healthy Minds. Davidson is best known for his groundbreaking work studying emotion and the brain. His research is broadly focused on the neural bases of emotion and emotional style as well as methods to promote human flourishing, including meditation and related contemplative practices. Davidson coauthored Altered Traits: Science Reveals How Meditation Changes Your Mind, Brain, and Body and The Emotional Life of Your Brain. He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine, founding coeditor of the American Psychological Association journal “Emotion,” and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters. In 2014, Davidson founded the nonprofit Healthy Minds Innovations, which translates science into tools to cultivate and measure well-being.

David Rakel is the Esther Millard Endowed Professor and chair of the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health in the UW’s School of Medicine and Public Health (SMPH). He is also the founder and former director of the University of Wisconsin Integrative Medicine (now Integrative Health) Program. He is the author of a book on the power of the therapeutic relationship titled The Compassionate Connection, and he has received funding from the National Institutes of Health to study the clinician effect and to incorporate healing modalities into medical school curricula. Rakel has been awarded the Leonard Tow Faculty Compassion Award and has been elected to the Gold Humanism Medical Society.

About the moderator:

Dr. Adrienne Hampton, an associate professor in the UW Department of Family Medicine and Community Health, is a Zen practitioner and integrative family physician. Hampton is an ordained priest and instructor in the Chosei lineage of Zen. She provides a patient-centered blend of integrative and allopathic primary care, as well as integrative medicine consultations with a focus on one-on-one therapeutic yoga and meditation. Additionally, she routinely leads wellness workshops for medical professionals.