[MUSIC] Welcome to our course, "Managing Emotions During Times of Uncertainty and Stress." My name is Marc Brackett. I am a professor at Yale University, the Director of the Center for Emotional Intelligence and author of "Permission to Feel." I have the honor of being your co-instructor for this course along with my colleagues, Diana DiVecha, Nikki Elbertson, Jessica Hoffmann, Susan Riello and Robin Stern. Take a moment and just think about the last number of months. How have you been feeling? Really, how have you been feeling? What we know is that our lives have been a roller coaster ride of emotions. And what research shows is that our feelings and emotions matter a great deal for everything in life. From our attention, to our memory to everyday learning, to decision making, to the quality of our relationships, our physical and our mental health, our creativity and our academic and workplace performance. But there's hope. Researchers and practitioners over the last couple of decades have spent an enormous amount of time developing strategies and tools and resources to help us all manage our emotions, and stress in particular, more effectively. This course will help you develop a deeper understanding of the science and our biology, the psychology of stress as well, to help you develop the skills that you need to support your own health and well being and support other people in achieving theirs. The first half of the course is designed specifically to support you in building a more advanced emotion vocabulary for you to learn more evidence-based strategies to support you in supporting your health and wellness. And then the second half of the course is designed to help you support others, especially students, in labeling their feelings and managing their emotions effectively. Throughout the entire course, there will be opportunities to develop personal action plans that you can apply these skills directly and immediately to your everyday lives. Last, I just want to extend my gratitude to everyone to the scientists of the practitioners, to all of my colleagues who have put enormous time into building this course. And finally, I'd like to express my gratitude to all of you, because without you we would not be able to create a healthier, more equitable, innovative, compassionate society. So with that, let's begin.