Breaking Bias
Where Stereotypes and Prejudices Come From-and the Science-Backed Method to Unravel Them
Will be published approx. on 20. January 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
400 pages
978-1-4019-9670-3 (ISBN)
Description
For readers of Caste, Sapiens, and The Dawn of Everything, a page-turning deep-dive into how bias is learned-plus a strikingly original and highly effective set of tools to un-learn it.
Imagine a world without bias. A world where all human beings can truly be just as they are and unleash their full potential.
Take a moment to imagine how you feel in such a world-not what you think about it, or whether you believe it's possible, but how you feel.
This is the proposition that opens Breaking Bias. It's your invitation to embark on a journey that will radically change your experience and show you how you, in turn, can help reshape our world.
Drawing on two decades of original research and experience training thousands of students, Anu Gupta, a lawyer, scientist, and educator whose work focuses on diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging, has written a comprehensive and compellingly readable guide for anyone who wants to understand and unlearn conscious and unconscious biases. Whether you're a teacher or student, engineer or creative, parent or grandparent, this book will train you to become more aware of and transform bias in your daily life and within you-especially beliefs and perceptions you may hold about yourself and others.
Blending ancient Buddhist wisdom with modern scientific evidence, Anu takes us on a deep-time journey to explore human identities and identity-based biases and to recognize that breaking bias is the key to unlocking multiple crises in our world-from racism, sexism, classism, and other -isms to burnout, loneliness, and climate change. Then he offers his signature PRISM toolkit-a science-backed, somatically informed set of contemplative tools-to help us dismantle learned bias within ourselves and in the world around us, moment by moment, with probing questions and writing prompts throughout the book that invite us to put these tools to use right from the start.
Breaking Bias is one of the few books that go beyond examining the history of bias to offer actual training in how to reduce bias, and it's the only one written by an author with Anu's unique intersectional identities: a gay brown immigrant with Buddhist, Christian, and Hindu roots who is also an American lawyer and scholar of bias with lived experiences that span the globe. This is a book with the potential to transform the way we think and the way we live.
Imagine a world without bias. A world where all human beings can truly be just as they are and unleash their full potential.
Take a moment to imagine how you feel in such a world-not what you think about it, or whether you believe it's possible, but how you feel.
This is the proposition that opens Breaking Bias. It's your invitation to embark on a journey that will radically change your experience and show you how you, in turn, can help reshape our world.
Drawing on two decades of original research and experience training thousands of students, Anu Gupta, a lawyer, scientist, and educator whose work focuses on diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging, has written a comprehensive and compellingly readable guide for anyone who wants to understand and unlearn conscious and unconscious biases. Whether you're a teacher or student, engineer or creative, parent or grandparent, this book will train you to become more aware of and transform bias in your daily life and within you-especially beliefs and perceptions you may hold about yourself and others.
Blending ancient Buddhist wisdom with modern scientific evidence, Anu takes us on a deep-time journey to explore human identities and identity-based biases and to recognize that breaking bias is the key to unlocking multiple crises in our world-from racism, sexism, classism, and other -isms to burnout, loneliness, and climate change. Then he offers his signature PRISM toolkit-a science-backed, somatically informed set of contemplative tools-to help us dismantle learned bias within ourselves and in the world around us, moment by moment, with probing questions and writing prompts throughout the book that invite us to put these tools to use right from the start.
Breaking Bias is one of the few books that go beyond examining the history of bias to offer actual training in how to reduce bias, and it's the only one written by an author with Anu's unique intersectional identities: a gay brown immigrant with Buddhist, Christian, and Hindu roots who is also an American lawyer and scholar of bias with lived experiences that span the globe. This is a book with the potential to transform the way we think and the way we live.
Reviews / Votes
"I commend the author and hope this book will help people to come closer to one another through breaking biases on the basis of secondary differences like race, religion, rich or poor that divide us."- from the Foreword by His Holiness the Dalai Lama
"Your biases can hurt other people, but they can also hurt you. They can damage your relationships and degrade your decision-making. But the good news is: they're not your fault, and they can be addressed. Anu is the perfect guide to transform all biases in the modern world."
- Dan Harris, New York Times best-selling author of 10% Happier and host of the Ten Percent Happier podcast
"Evolving beyond the biases that separate us is the core task of humanity if we are to meet the existential challenges that face us. Anu Gupta is a brilliant scholar and a wonderful guide on this deep-time journey to uncover the root causes of bias in our world and, even more importantly, within ourselves. . . . This timely book is a beacon of hope in our precious, hurting world."
- Tara Brach, Ph.D., best-selling author of Radical Acceptance and True Refuge
"Learning to see and understand bias is deeply important for our world, especially now. Breaking Bias is a valuable and illuminating curriculum that will help not only with understanding bias but also ending it."
- Jack Kornfield, author of A Path with Heart and After the Ecstasy, the Laundry
"Masterful, practical, and wise, Breaking Bias is essential reading. Weaving together insights from science, history, and awe-inspiring personal reflections, Anu Gupta gives us a powerful handbook for how to break bias from the inside out. Learn how to dismantle systems of oppression, embrace the worth of all beings, and build a world of belonging, right where you are."
- Valarie Kaur, best-selling author of See No Stranger and founder of the Revolutionary Love Project
"A tour de force! Part history lesson, part personal science experiment, part tool kit, this book brings together deep wisdom with practical skills to help us all learn how to move out of our conditioned biases and into a new, more connected way of relating to each other. A must-read!"
- Judson Brewer, M.D., Ph.D., New York Times best-selling author of Unwinding Anxiety and The Craving Mind
"Compassionate, vulnerable, and mind-expanding, Breaking Bias is a powerful guidebook to deepen our understanding of bias and how to break the cycle. Merging modern Western sciences, ancient Buddhist wisdom, and shame-free inquiries, Anu sparks individual awakening for collective change. This book is an invitation to join the movement toward a world celebrating our diversity and honoring our inherent belonging."
- Sharon Salzberg, New York Times best-selling author of Lovingkindness and Real Life
"As a theologian and scholar of psychology and religion whose research is centered in disrupting racism, I've scoured the literature on the subject of bias. Breaking Bias uniquely captured me and would not let me go. It is beautifully constructed to invite mindfulness, empathy, and transformation. Anu's kindness accompanies the reader on a journey informed by the depth and breadth of his experience, research, wisdom, compassion, and hope for a healed world. A must-read for all who yearn for a more just society."
- The Rev. Jacqui Lewis, Ph.D., senior minister for public theology and transformation at Middle Collegiate Church and author of Fierce Love
"Anu Gupta gives us a clear view of how bias takes root in society, ranging from the beginnings of written history to the realities of the modern world. He invites us on an inner journey to take our own beliefs and hold them up to the light. Breaking Bias will radically shift your perspective on the power structures around you while drawing you a new map of the world. This book inspires change and creates a new vision where isolation and exclusion can be replaced by connection and belonging."
- Deepa Purushothaman, best-selling author of The First, the Few, the Only, executive fellow at Harvard Business School, and retired managing partner at Deloitte
"In Breaking Bias, Anu Gupta's clarity and openheartedness invite us to reflect on the great suffering caused by racial, gender, and all forms of stereotypes, to understand more fully their religious, social, and economic underpinnings, and to explore ways of freeing ourselves from these deeply conditioned patterns. . . . It's rare to find a work that is so unflinching in its analysis and so compassionate and understanding in illuminating the way forward. Highly recommended!"
- Joseph Goldstein, author of Mindfulness: A Practical Guide to Awakening
"Breaking Bias is a triumph! Anu Gupta has developed an invaluable resource for anyone who wants to understand how contemporary social, ethnic, cultural, gendered, religious, and anthropocentric biases came into being, how they spread, and how to break through them! In this book, Gupta offers a comprehensive historical overview of bias with clear articulations of how bias shapes inequity in social, organizational, national, and international policies. This book is a must-read!"
- Dr. Kamilah Majied, author of Joyfully Just: Black Wisdom and Buddhist Insights for Liberated Living
"Anu Gupta explores crises of human interrelationality at the level of the soul: questions that prompt deep reflection and offer avenues for even deeper relationships. Doing so as a friend, a teacher, and a scientist, his approach is one that envisions flourishing for all. This helpful and necessary book is a balm."
- Padraig O Tuama, author of Poetry Unbound and host of the Poetry Unbound podcast
"In Breaking Bias, Anu Gupta offers us a powerful and accessible overview of both the roots of our species' prejudices and the actions we must take to free ourselves from them once and for all. He skillfully weaves historical analysis of various human systems of domination with reflective prompts, guiding the reader through their own thoughtful and gradual process. Anu's relatable stories of his own journey make this sometimes challenging material a joy to read."
- Sebene Selassie, author of You Belong
"Anu Gupta is a professional bias breaker. He's brought his wisdom to more than 80,000 people around the world from all walks of life. Yes, he's a master teacher. Yes, he will expertly guide readers through a breadth of impressive knowledge and actionable steps rooted in neuroscience to unlearn and break bias. But most importantly, Anu is an unfailingly kind friend who genuinely wants the best for all of us. How lucky are we to have Breaking Bias in our hands?"
- Barbara Becker, author of Heartwood: The Art of Living with the End in Mind
"Breaking Bias is a landmark achievement-a beautifully constructed and elegantly written journey into what it means to be a complex, sensitive human being who embraces the fullness of life by confronting individual and societal misperceptions that keep us apart and helping us move beyond them. Building on his incredibly diverse lived experience, Anu Gupta has given us a wonderful book-full of passion, hope, and, yes, love-backed by meticulous research and searing analyses. A timely book, but also one for the ages."
- Janet Dewart Bell, Ph.D., author of Lighting the Fires of Freedom and Blackbirds Singing: Inspiring Black Women's Speeches from the Civil War to the Twenty-First Century
"With brilliant prose and infinite grace, Anu Gupta's Breaking Bias invites every single one of us to look in the mirror and marvel at what we see, then go out into the world and challenge the notions that stand in the way of our ability to look at one another and do the very same. With sacred practices, thoughtful data, and a deep reverence for life, Breaking Bias helps us bring greater understanding to the learned and often painful attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors that separate us from ourselves and each other. We can do better. And this timely and crucial book shows us the way."
- Rha Goddess, founder and CEO of Move the Crowd and author of The Calling
"What a gift! Breaking Bias is a call to all of us to grow up to our potential and down to our depths. This is more than a book. It is a beautiful witness to our inherent possibilities and a guide to the transformation that can save us from ourselves."
- Dr. Larry Ward, senior teacher in Thich Nh?t H?nh's Plum Village tradition, author of America's Racial Karma, and co-author of Love's Garden, A Guide to Mindful Relationships
"In today's interconnected world, the need for equity and healing has never been more pressing. Breaking Bias equips readers with the tools and knowledge to challenge the status quo, transform bias right away, and catalyze meaningful change. . . . Whether you're a seasoned social entrepreneur or an aspiring changemaker, this book offers invaluable wisdom and inspiration to navigate the complexities of bias and social impact work."
- Cheryl Dorsey, president of Echoing Green
"This is the best articulation that I have read of what bias is, how it comes to be, and how it can be ended. . . . Through powerful and tender stories, spiritual wisdom, and the latest science, Anu lovingly guides us to look honestly and compassionately at our conditioning so we can bring about lasting freedom and well-being for ourselves and our world. This is required reading for all of us!"
- Kaira Jewel Lingo, author of We Were Made for These Times and co-author of Healing Our Way Home: Black Buddhist Teachings on Ancestors, Joy and Liberation
"Breaking Bias might be the most important book you read in the 21st century. As sweeping as any Yuval Harari book and as challenging as Paul Hawken's, Anu Gupta's powerful and impeccably researched book is a master class in understanding our species: why we are the way we are and how to create a better world where belonging replaces bias. Everyone in a position of power, authority, or influence needs this book."
- Susan Davis, founding president and CEO of BRAC USA and co-author of Social Entrepreneurship
"A rigorous and expansive investigation of a human tangle and illness-assumption and bias. I am grateful for Anu's innovative antidote of PRISM, a pragmatic and heartening medicine to confront and transform the root causes of bias. Let's take the medicine together."
- Koshin Paley Ellison, Zen teacher and author of Untangled: Walking the Eightfold Path to Clarity, Courage and Compassion
"Breaking Bias is a powerful invitation to examine our subconscious attitudes, beliefs, and conditioning, and to finally rewrite the stories we have told about ourselves and others, to embrace a more inclusive and loving world that comes about when we become the change we seek."
- Ananta Ripa Ajmera, best-selling author of The Way of the Goddess and The Ayurveda Way and founder of The Ancient Way
"Anu shares a profound journey to breaking bias that we deeply need in order to free ourselves and our society from the ancient neural reflexes of our tribal past. This inner and outer journey is one that could not be more timely and more important for creating the world we carry in our hearts."
- Douglas Abrams, co-author of international bestseller The Book of Joy and executive producer of MISSION: Joy
"Anu Gupta has written a wonderfully accessible book that marries his personal journey with Buddhism and bias-busting. It's moving, practical, and filled with useful strategies. Highly recommended!"
- Shakil Choudhury, author of Deep Diversity
"Anu has dedicated a lifetime to investigating, deconstructing, and rebuilding how we perceive ourselves and others. In a time where the world feels more divided than ever before, Breaking Bias is an urgent antidote to the confusion and suffering of modern life, offering wisdom rooted in science and contemplative practice. I genuinely believe this book can transform those who come into contact with its message."
- Manoj Dias, author of Still Together and co-founder of Open
"You are holding in your hands a crucial guide for all who are committed to the vital work of dismantling both personal and systemic biases. . . . Gupta's emotional, groundbreaking frameworks and exercises leave a lasting impact, [inviting] deep reflection on our relationship with societal norms and the biases we all hold. . . . Breaking Bias marks an achievement in the work of antiracism and a world without bias, and I see it as a vital text for anyone wanting to interrogate bias and lead with greater compassion, love, and courage."
- Jorge Fontanez, CEO of B Lab U.S. & Canada
"Anu Gupta's Breaking Bias is a major contribution in its focus on locating the roots of identity-based biases and the inequities that flow from them. From page one, the reader is centered in such a way that inclusion is inescapable. Gupta connects with readers by channeling his experiences and asking readers to immediately consider their own experiences with the subject matter of bias, exclusion, and inequity. Gupta's approach sets a tone that will encourage lively reflection and conversation. Through this book, readers will be engaged in a process of co-creation of a more inclusive, more just, and more fair society through organic, positive paradigm shifts in culture and community."
- Danielle Conway, dean and Donald J. Farage professor of law at Penn State Dickinson Law
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Carlsbad
United States
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
B/W INTERIOR
Dimensions
Height: 224 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 33 mm
Weight
408 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-4019-9670-3 (9781401996703)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Anu Gupta
Breaking Bias
Where Stereotypes and Prejudices Come From - and the Science-Backed Method to Unravel Them
E-Book
09/2024
Hay House UK
€20.49
Available for download
Person
Anu Gupta is an educator, lawyer, scientist, meditation teacher, and the founder and CEO of BE MORE with Anu. His work has reached over 300 organizations, training more than 80,000 professionals, impacting over 30 million lives.
As a gay immigrant of color, he came to the work of breaking bias after almost ending his life due to lifelong experiences with racism, homophobia, and Islamophobia. The realization that bias is learned-and can be un-learned-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. He has written and spoken extensively, including on the TED stage, the Oprah Conversation, Fast Company, and Newsweek.
Anu received his JD from NYU Law, MPhil in international development from Cam-bridge, and BA from NYU in international relations and Islamic studies. He has lived and worked across the globe and currently resides in New York City with his partner.
www.anuguptany.com
As a gay immigrant of color, he came to the work of breaking bias after almost ending his life due to lifelong experiences with racism, homophobia, and Islamophobia. The realization that bias is learned-and can be un-learned-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. He has written and spoken extensively, including on the TED stage, the Oprah Conversation, Fast Company, and Newsweek.
Anu received his JD from NYU Law, MPhil in international development from Cam-bridge, and BA from NYU in international relations and Islamic studies. He has lived and worked across the globe and currently resides in New York City with his partner.
www.anuguptany.com