Anu Gupta
As a gay immigrant of colour, Anu came to the work of breaking bias after almost ending his life due to lifelong experiences with racism, homophobia, and Islamophobia. The realisation that bias can be unlearned helped lead him out of that dark point and inspired a lifelong mission to build a global movement for social healing based on principles of mindfulness and compassion.
A lifetime Fellow of the Mind & Life Institute and Penn State Dickinson Law School's Antiracist Development Institute, Anu is a dedicated meditation practitioner in the SRF and Theravada lineages.
Anu is also the author of a bestselling book, Breaking Bias, which features a foreword from His Holiness the Dalai Lama and offers mindfulness-based tools to heal from bias, trauma, and disconnection. His work has reached over 300 organisations, training more than 100,000 professionals and impacting over 30 million lives.
As a peer-reviewed author, his original research was supported by competitive grants including the National Science Foundation. He has written and spoken extensively, including on the TED stage, the Oprah Conversation, TIME, Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, Newsweek, and Vogue Business. Anu holds a JD from NYU Law, an MPhil in Development Studies from Cambridge, and a BA in International Relations and Islamic Studies from NYU.
He has lived, studied, and worked globally, including as a Fulbright Scholar in South Korea, a student of Spanish in Mexico, a champion for women’s rights at the UN, and the founder of a nonprofit in Burma. His practice deeply informs his commitment to collective healing. He lives in New York City with his partner.