Emily Esfahani Smith
Journalist and author
Emily Esfahani Smith is a journalist who wrote The Power Of Meaning, a book about seeking meaning in a world fixated on happiness.
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About Emily Esfahani Smith
Emily Esfahani Smith is a writer and journalist based in Washington DC. Zurich, Switzerland, is her birthplace, and she was raised in Montreal, Canada. She studied philosophy at Dartmouth College, where she began her journalism career. She holds a 2013 master's in positive psychology from the University of Pennsylvania, where she also taught the subject from 2013 to 2018. The Power Of Meaning came out in 2017 from Crown and has been translated into 16 languages. Its central idea is that the pursuit of happiness has pulled people away from the search for meaning. Her TED talk based on the book has been viewed more than 6 million times. Her articles have appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and The Atlantic.