New era for Emory Compassion Center begins as founder Lobsang Tenzin Negi steps down

After 28 years of integrating Buddhist mind practices with Emory psychological research to ease suffering and build resilience around the world, Lobsang Tenzin Negi is retiring as executive director of the Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics, also known as the Emory Compassion Center. 

Under Negi, the academic center he founded became globally known for its interdisciplinary work to produce scientific research and practical strategies for teaching attention, compassion, resilience and other qualities across ages, schools and cultures. 

The center now enters its next chapter under new executive director Rob Roeser, the Alice Valli Professor of Compassion and Ethics at Emory College and Rollins School of Public Health. The center’s core work and mission will continue while widening the circle of collaborators, says Roeser, who will also continuing serving as the center’s director of research.

“Lobsang’s kindness, vision, and courage are qualities I hope to bring into the next executive directorship,” says Roeser. “We're very excited to continue partnering with the Emory community across spheres and sectors … So many people are doing similar work, and we want to help everyone row together.”
 

Educating heart and mind

Negi’s imprint on Emory began in fall 1991 when he arrived in robes as a Tibetan monastic scholar who had served as a translator for the Dalai Lama. 

Like the Dalai Lama, Negi devoted years of study to earn Geshe Lharampa, the highest academic doctorate in Tibetan monastic education, which included deep study examining how emotions and mental habits shape human flourishing. He wanted to understand what modern science, particularly cognitive psychology, could add to that knowledge.

Emory’s global influence in compassion science bloomed from that main question centered on “the education of heart and mind” that drove Negi as an Emory doctoral student.

“This inspiration came from His Holiness the Dalai Lama,” Negi says. “He made a major point to bring together our tradition and modern science to illuminate our human condition.”

Mentored by Robert Paul, former Emory College dean and Charles Howard Candler Professor of Anthropology, Negi completed a PhD examining the intersection of Western psychology and Tibetan Buddhist science of mind. 

Their intellectual collaboration evolved into the historic Emory-Tibet Partnership, which the Dalai Lama inaugurated in his 1998 Emory Commencement speech. 

Under Negi, the Emory-Tibet Partnership expanded into three global signature initiatives:

• CBCT (Cognitively Based Compassion Training) is a protocol for secular audiences to access and practice compassion. Based in the Tibetan practice of lojong, CBCT is used in 28 countries across education, healthcare and community settings.

•  Robert A. Paul Emory Tibet Science Initiative (ETSI) integrates modern science into traditional Tibetan monastic education.

•  SEE Learning (Social, Emotional, and Ethical Learning) is a pre-K-12 framework promoting secular ethics and emotional literacy, now in 78 countries. 

In 2017, the initiative became the Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics. Its staff of seven grew to 33 faculty and administrators. The Dalai Lama also made three campus visits as Emory Presidential Distinguished Professor during his tenure.

“Negi has been the spark plug, piston, drive shaft and nearly every other part of the engine moving the center along through the years,” says Gary Hauk, former university secretary and adviser to Emory presidents during the establishment and initial growth of the center. “The Center simply would not exist without the passion he brought to trying to fulfill the Dalai Lama's vision.”
 

Transforming lives through education

Many of the center's initiatives grew from close collaboration with students, faculty and global partners.

One example is CBCT, which evolved through conversations with 2005 Emory College graduate Molly Harrington. After taking Negi's course, “Tibetan Buddhism: Psychology of Enlightenment,” Harrington lobbied Negi and university administrators for practical contemplative tools that could support student wellbeing and help reduce mental health stigma on campus.

Negi went on to research how well compassion meditation training works for treating depression among undergraduates, by measuring cortisol and other biomarkers of stress. Similar studies of healthcare professionals, incarcerated people, and others showed that compassion practices build resilience.

ETSI, meanwhile, grew from an invitation by the Dalai Lama for Emory to work with the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives to develop a comprehensive science curriculum for Tibetan monastic institutions. Negi’s bridge-building created extraordinary opportunities for students and faculty to teach and learn at his home monastery and others in south India.  

“The Dalai Lama said, ‘Start small and see if it grows,’ and we took that to heart,” Paul recalls.
 

A legacy of human flourishing

Paul praised Negi for modeling what he teaches. 

“He has such drive and energy and commitment. He has a message, and he embodies it. And so, it moves people. I think he will certainly be a remembered and revered name in the history of Emory,” Paul says.  

As Negi guided the development of ETSI, CBCT and SEE Learning, the feedback gratified him.

“People say that it transformed, it saved our lives,” he says. "It has changed my life. I'm so deeply grateful and hopeful that these programs will make a difference in many people's lives."

In 2024, Negi received Emory's Thomas Jefferson Award, which recognizes faculty and staff who have made significant contributions to the university's intellectual and civic life. For Negi, however, the most meaningful legacy lies beyond academic accomplishments.

“My legacy is not simply academic,” he says. “Ultimately, it is about people, about the possibility of reducing suffering and contributing to human flourishing.”
 

The next chapter

Negi will undertake a traditional three-year meditation retreat in south India where his education began. Upon return, he will take on an advisory role with the center. 

"He embodies the kinds of teachings that we're trying to offer the world,” Roeser says. “He’s had an audacity of vision and the courage to follow that vision, even when it hasn't been easy." 

In addition to Roeser, Center leadership will shift to an Executive Committee structure that includes SEE Learning co-directors Tsondue Samphel and Ryder Delaloye, CBCT director Tim Harrison, ETSI director Tsetan Dolkar; Academic Programs director Brendan Ozawa de Silva; communications director Carol Beck, and Compassion Shift associate director Hannah Smith.