Polly Young-Eisendrath, PhD, is a psychologist, writer, speaker, and Jungian analyst who has published 15 books, including The Self-Esteem Trap, The Cambridge Companion to Jung, and Women and Desire. Her most recent book, The Present Heart: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Discovery, is a meditation on the healing power of love—based on her experience with her spouse who died from early onset Alzheimer’s disease—that attempts to answer the question: “What is love, anyway?”

Polly Young-Eisendrath came to psychology and psychoanalytic training through the doorway of Buddhist practice, taking formal Zen vows in 1971. As a psychoanalyst and a mindfulness teacher, Polly is optimistic about the gradual emergence of a fresh view of the human mind from the dialogue between psychoanalysis and Buddhism. Along those lines, Polly directs Enlightening Conversations, a nonprofit organization that sponsors conversational conferences between esteemed psychoanalysts and Buddhists teachers in different cities in the United States.

An associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Vermont and clinical supervisor at Norwich University, Polly Young-Eisendrath maintains a full-time clinical and consulting practice in central Vermont. With 35 years of clinical experience as a Jungian analyst, psychologist, educator, couples therapist, and 45 years of Buddhist practice, she has been teaching mindfulness for more than 12 years.