You Are Not So Smart

In this episode, we sit down with therapist Britt Frank to discuss the intention action gap, the psychological term for the chasm between what you very much intend to do and what you tend to do instead. It turns out, there's a well-researched psychological framework that includes a term for when you have a stated, known goal – a change you'd like to make in your life – something you wake up intending to finally do or get started doing, but then don't do while knowing full well you are actively not doing what you ought and wish you had done by now. After we discuss this phenomenon and how to deal with it, we get into procrastination and how to escape all manner of dead-end behavioral loops.  The Getting Unstuck Workbook [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/731229/the-getting-unstuck-workbook-by-britt-frank-lscw/] The Science of Stuck [https://www.scienceofstuck.com] Kitted Shop [https://kitted.shop/referred-by-davidmcraney66] The Story of Kitted [https://kitted.app/article/kitted/the-story-of-kitted/0051] How Minds Change [https://www.davidmcraney.com/howmindschangehome] David McRaney’s Twitter [https://twitter.com/davidmcraney] YANSS Twitter [https://twitter.com/notsmartblog] Show Notes [www.youarenotsosmart.com] Newsletter [https://davidmcraney.substack.com] Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/youarenotsosmart]

Sarah Stein Lubrano tells us about her new book, Don't Talk About Politics, which urges us not to lose hope or become frozen in frustration when it comes to polarization and faulty discourse because the good news is that we don't just know, scientifically, why the marketplace of ideas is currently failing us, we know how, scientifically, we can do better.  Sarah Stein Lubrano's Website [https://www.sarahsteinlubrano.com] Don't Talk About Politics [https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/dont-talk-about-politics-9781399413923/] Motivated Numeracy Paper [https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2319992] How Minds Change [https://www.davidmcraney.com/howmindschangehome] David McRaney’s Twitter [https://twitter.com/davidmcraney] YANSS Twitter [https://twitter.com/notsmartblog] Show Notes [www.youarenotsosmart.com] Newsletter [https://davidmcraney.substack.com/] Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/youarenotsosmart]

In this episode we welcome psychologist Mary C. Murphy, author of Cultures of Growth, who tells us how to create institutions, businesses, and other groups of humans that can better support collaboration, innovation, performance, and wellbeing. We also learn how, even if you know all about the growth mindset, the latest research suggests you not may not be creating a culture of growth despite what feels like your best efforts to do so.  Mary Murphy’s Website [https://marycmurphy.com/] Cultures of Growth [https://marycmurphy.com/cultures-of-growth/] Carol Dweck at Google [https://open.spotify.com/episode/53huOnca4alzjYKHbNR4RL] Paper: A Culture of Genius [https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=3e7eb3e8886f54f2d112dbd760f4bea4ded19750] How Minds Change [https://www.davidmcraney.com/howmindschangehome] David McRaney’s Twitter [https://twitter.com/davidmcraney] YANSS Twitter [https://twitter.com/notsmartblog] Show Notes [www.youarenotsosmart.com] Newsletter [https://davidmcraney.substack.com/] Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/youarenotsosmart]

Alex Edmans, a professor of finance at London Business School, tells us how to avoid the Ladder of Misinference by examining how narratives, statistics, and articles can mislead, especially when they align with our preconceived notions and confirm what we believe is true, assume is true, and wish were true. Alex Edmans  [https://alexedmans.com] May Contain Lies [https://alexedmans.com/books/] What to Test in a Post Trust World [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpJx5VLQMxk] How Minds Change [https://www.davidmcraney.com/howmindschangehome] David McRaney’s Twitter [https://twitter.com/davidmcraney] David McRaney’s BlueSky [https://bsky.app/profile/davidmcraney.bsky.social] YANSS Twitter [https://twitter.com/notsmartblog] YANSS Facebook [https://www.facebook.com/youarenotsosmart/] Newsletter [https://davidmcraney.substack.com/] Kitted [https://kitted.shop/] Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/youarenotsosmart]

In this episode we sit down with Brian Klaas, author of Fluke, and get into the existential lessons and grander meaning for a life well-lived (once one finally accepts the power and influence of randomness, chaos, and chance). In addition, we learn not to fall prey to proportionality bias - the tendency for human brains to assume big, historical, or massively impactful events must have had big causes and/or complex machinations underlying their grand outcomes. It’s one of the cognitive biases that most contributes to conspiratorial thinking and grand conspiracy theories, one that leads to an assumption that there must be something more going on when big, often unlikely, events make the evening news. Yet, as Brian explains, events big and small are often the result of random inputs in complex systems interacting in ways that are difficult to predict. Previous Episodes [https://youarenotsosmart.com/podcast/] Brian Klaas [https://brianpklaas.com/] Fluke [https://brianpklaas.com/fluke] How Minds Change [https://www.davidmcraney.com/howmindschangehome] David McRaney’s Twitter [https://twitter.com/davidmcraney] David McRaney’s BlueSky [https://bsky.app/profile/davidmcraney.bsky.social] YANSS Twitter [https://twitter.com/notsmartblog] YANSS Facebook [https://www.facebook.com/youarenotsosmart/] Newsletter [https://davidmcraney.substack.com/] Kitted [https://kitted.shop/] Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/youarenotsosmart]