So what would it take to make you re thinking, deeply held belief or point of view that is one of adam grants. Recent ass Adam is an an additional psychologists and ted speaker whose sole millions of books, his ted talks, have been viewed, think something like twenty five million times and he helps people find meaning and motivation network he's been whartons PA rated professor for seven straight years, he's leaving expert on really how we can find motivation and meaning live more generous and creative lives and items. Work has inspired people to really rethink fundamental assumptions about motivation, generosity and creativity. Interestingly, and past life, he is also a former junior olympic springboard diver and his new book. Think again, it is really fast,

in deep dive into how we come to form point of views, opinions and beliefs. Wise important to hold even our staunchest beliefs more lightly than we think and what happens when we? a doggedly attached to opinions and beliefs, even as the world first, to reveal that maybe we shouldn t really I too share this conversation with you, I'm jonathan fields, and this is good life project the. Not yet global private aviation leader is known for personalizing every detail of your travels because net, yet standard is not just meet their definition of perfection it's to exceed yours. discover more at net jets, dot com, library-

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a panic attack on national television and then set out on this journey of transformation and he's now on a quest to help others also achieve peace and happiness, and every week Dan talked to top scientists meditation teachers. Even the odd celebrity in wide ranging conversations that explore topics like productivity, anxiety and psychedelics and relationships. The interviews cover everyone from brene brown to sara burrell s to sam Harris and more. I love learning from his questions and experiences, an incredible guests. Think of listening to ten percent happier as a workout for your mind, find ten percent happier wherever you listen to podcasts. I was catching up on some of the work that you've been doing the last couple of years and saw these these two studies that came out in twenty nineteen Twenty one was about moderate procrastination, increasing creativity and the other was about things where you have a high, intrinsic motivation for particular task

potentially leading to reduce motivation to do what pray much everything else, so I was looking at the summit. taken together. It sounds like this is permission it'd be a moderately motivated slacker. That's you know it's it's funny that the two papers, they're they're, both witchy haitian, is one of the most creative people. I've ever met, and I had a very similar reaction when she came to me with both of these ideas, like you're saying, if you put off your work, not because you're lazy, but because you haven't figured it out, and it's hard and you take the things you are really interested in and you make sure. They don't make all your other works extremely boring. To be more creative and more productive. Yes, yes, I think so and we decided to go in and tested, it turns out, it's obviously a little more complicated but

yeah there. There are times when your first thoughts are not your most creative thoughts and waiting for the right idea to come can lead you to and unexpected solution, and there are times if you saw the time Jonathan heard of you have this too, but I've learned not start my day with my favorite project, because number one and I'll. Never do anything else, I'm completely absorbed in that and so much fun, but number two. If I do ever get to the next project, nothing is at all exciting and motivating by contrast itself when he mentioned because our sometimes structure my day, so I almost have to earn the right to do the thing I really want to do same sam. It's a reward, yeah and also, I know once I'm in it. It's sort of like I'm just going to go all in and kind of like consumes a lot of cognitive bandwidth, but yeah it was. It was really funny to see those two things and and how they just sort of like in my mind, instantly sorta like wove together to create permission.

did you a lot of what I already wont to do anyway. I love it yeah. I won't talk him, your book and some of the ideas in the book. It's really fascinating. I think it's a really interesting moment in time for you'd be dropping this conversation as well, and before we talk about the ideas, though we gotta talk about the cover, because when you you look on the credits for the cover and the back of your book, there's somebody credited for the concept who happens to share your last name, you're, the first person to ask me about this Jonathan. I love it So over the summer, we are trying to figure out what the cover should look like and weep toy around with the idea of some optical illusions and through them all out very quickly. We may we wanted something that would make you think again, but they just all the optical allusions. They were either too hard depart or they didn't, they were trite, we'd seen them a million times and they just didn't stick and finally, one day I was just trying to figure out what should this be, and I was talking with my wife

and at our our others, daughter Joanna whose twelve came in and started brainstorming with us and later that day she said me a couple ideas and one of them was she said what, if you had a match with water instead of fire, that is ingenious and that became the cover and that the best part of it was. I learned something. First of all, I needed to rethink, who I or two for creative ideas. Right because there is a brilliant creative mind in my own house that I was not having enough conversations with, but the other thing that that really struck me is she had a very different process for thinking through what a great cover would look like, Then I would have had I actually have even described the book. She just she said. Ok! Think again. Well, that's it's like I'm supposed to think about the opposite of what I think

Let me think about opposites in one of the opposite. She came up with was fire and water and it just a kind of about from there. So I am obviously incredibly proud of her that she came up with the idea for my book cover, but it also it's it's probably it's the cover that I've gotten the most glowing feedback on before people now who created so means a great moment of dad pride for me yet I love that it, sir, the theirs this word out of you know the word noxious wish you had so yeah. You know it which is its net. carriers in radio year when somebody, you love so so dearly justice that you feel it is as if it your own success. It even better though it's better than your own success, because I agree, I'm I'm not I'm not alone in that, because I feel like when I accomplish something: five minutes later Ok. What's the next skull, whereas this this feeling of of joy and pride that I have heard Joanna's accomplishment here it it stays with me

yeah. So agree with that and as a father of a daughter, no issues also surly really creative and thinks differently. Really similar experiences and Joanna also is here doing this sort of like yeah what she's twelve so not like at for her living, but she threw up a website because what sounds like once. You realize I could do this for dad. Miss was kind of funding, maybe there's something else going on here. I'm amazed how you, how did you know this I didn't have existed. I know you have really. Either damn near homework or you are a skilled stocker. But yes, she she decided that she would start a little a little business. Consulting on cover concept, so she created her own website, and then, while she was working on that, she sent me out of the blue one day, a draft of a book trailer, which we ended up use now, she is also trying to help others make their own book trailers. So it's been is so fun to see her fine, it outlet for her creativity and yeah. I guess

I would say it never would have occurred to me that a twelve year old can do any of this, and in retrospect its obvious that she has all these talents, and this is a great way for her to be applying them. Yet It really is amazing, but it also speaks to what you certainly touched on briefly, which is this notion about who we go to to think things through. As you know, and I think we sometimes we fall into the trap of having our our go to pee You know the people who we deem for some reason are worthy of contributing on a level that would be valuable, in all of a sudden. You know it's sort of like this one moment in time, just kind of makes you rethink it. It does. I think it's part of, though, becoming a lifelong Recognising that every single person you meet can teach you something yeah thumb beginners mind. I think that something is constantly dropping back into

I get it doesn't matter how accomplished you are how expert you are in something you gotta always keep the gates of learning open and let's talk about the this relate the fundamental ideas here when we think about thinking. I think a lot of us think about yeah like cognitive function, creativity, one of the combine Is it going to thinking but unhindered, been alive, debate recent around this notion. You're coming at the process of taking from a really different, serve like alternate angle, which is but what about not just the process of thinking, but what about the process of reach thinking, and I guess what I'm curious about is sorta like allowed gate is what are we talking about when we're talking about rethinking, when I think about rethinking I'm thinking about mental flexibility and having the until flexibility to question assumptions and opinions and beliefs and knowledge that you ve taken for granted, so I guess I've. I don't know when this happened. Actually, but some point was: writing.

Again. The psycho crystallize for a lot of research I done, and when I realized is that rethinking really starts with intellectual humility. Knowing what you dont know and once you you're aware of all the things that you are ignorant about, it's a lot easier to do, your convictions, which then makes you curious about what could be wrong, is their information out there that my complicate my existing views and more curious you get. The more likely are to discover new information, and if you processes cover is the right way. They reinforce you whom your humility, because they remind you that knew so little going in and now you know a tiny bit more, but there's that much more to keep learning in it and then kicks office go, where your excited to rethink other things, and I think the problem is too many of us. Instead of entering into rethinking cycles, we end up in an ever confidence cycles where We are proud of our existing knowledge. That gives us too much conviction with

go and see what we want and expect to see confirmation, biased and desirability by us and then that validates preconceived notions and we get prouder and proud of what we know to the point that we become arrogant no reason to rethink I'm right. Thus, the stated the world right now, you're gonna say I didn't rise. When I started writing this book, how Then it would be to what we are seeing in the world. But yes yeah. I mean it's interesting. Also, you know a member. nine years ago with mountain glaser, and he said so much that has stayed with me and shape the way that I moved to the world and one of them and he said, was remember line because it was literally like you just caught my breath. He said certainty is closing of the mind you know here was a guy were when I sat down with them. He was in his eighties I can't in every way and still perpetually placing himself in a state of unknown, and assuming that he doesn't, he doesn't know everything. In fact, he doesn't know most things, even though

whose stunningly accomplished. That's all always stay with me you know, one of the things that you are just bring up is this idea of. I think we were losing the distinction we in our police and our density you know at- and it's one thing to change your values, urging the thing that you believe you see proof and okay. So it's not true anymore. I changed my police but if that thing is connected to who you see yourself as being in the world, is an entirely different equation such a problem. I almost every time I read any political step free or see something on the news that references, current events. I just want to say to everyone involved in the conversation you know you don't actually have to believe everything you think Every opinion that enters your head is right. Not every feeling that enters your heart is right and last time I checked, if you wanna, keep evolving in your knowledge, you actually have to be open to changing your might, which is easier said than done,

yeah I mean because it means you know we're talking about shedding, shedding everything he now a year changing we with your millions out and in it there just phrase which has been bandied about in the world. I feel it gets really become much more popular last decade or so identity, politics and its fascinating. Make it. I've been really curious about this and ties into the work that you ve been doing. You know when, when we act We have somebody really associate with a set of beliefs, an identity, lower they're, far more likely to get out and actually act on your behalf when you want them to, but the downside of that is, it's almost impossible to change their minds. Even when clear evidence,

was that you like this is not in fact the objective truth, any more or as close as we can come, and I feel like we we're it's not just politics. This is this: is of like identity action. Taking like we're constantly persuading people, not just you take a different point of view, but to stand in a different identity and because it gets us what we want in theory, but the destruction that comes after is really Is it bad horrendous and I think one of the easiest way to see that is to get it mental time machine and imagined, You were born in a different era or a different point in history, so janet It is a good chance that you and I lived in the seventeen hundreds. We know a lot of people that we thought were totally reasonable had the identity of slave owner right, and you wouldn't bother to question that and think about how unspeakably wrong that is, and I can

wondering how many of our identities today are people going to look at in a hundred or two hundred to three hundred years and say I cannot believe, anyone believed that it was a good idea. Let us- inside as quarter who they were yeah. No, it said some the benefit of hindsight and especially what like, with a a whole lot of space, that something you describe the sort of three modes of being a preacher prosecutor and politician. Talk me through this little bit. I had so much fun with us, because the original idea comes from my colleague felt at luck and when I read his work about these mental modes. It just it hooked me as an organizational psychologist, because he was writing about how we spend a lot of our time, thinking and talking, like jobs we ve never held. So when you get into preacher mood, you are basically proselytizing the truth that you ve already found and your job is to enlighten everybody else when you're in prosecutor mode. It's the reverse. You have to prove other people,

And win your argument or your case, and it so easy to see how those two mindset stand in the way of rethinking. Because if I'm already raid. And I know you're wrong. I might be open your mind, but I don't have to budge an inch and then this third mode, thinking like a politician, is a little more flax When you're in politician mode, your seeking the approval of an audience you're trying to campaign lobby to get their support and you might end up catering to their opinions rather than you are deeply held convictions because you want to fit in order Want something from them, the problem is that once you get a ticket to join their tribe, you are based we drinking whenever coolly they serve, and so you change your mind at the wrong moment for the wrong reasons yet which is really hard to pull back from the know it? It's with you? We have these three murders which it seems like the did. The fault is

one of those three most of the time, rather than yellow, take an alternative approach to making up your mind or or being open to actually change your mind down the road, part of it comes from identity. We talked about low, but you know it. reading your work. Also, it brought me back to robert Cialdini his early work, which is what thirty five years old. At this point, and all around persuasion- and there is. There is one of the principles I remember him, sharing, which he turned the consistency principle, which is here that we funding only once we say or do something in the world. We want to see our rules and also be seen as being a consistent human being act consistently with that and that Europe's us up your it can be really powerful before taking constructive action, but it also stops us from dropping into this place of re. Examining what we're doing yeah, I think bob captured it perfectly with his his description of the consistency of commitment, a fact which, in some ways to the point you are making earlier, is a tool

people used to persuade others, but I think it's also it's also weapon that we inadvertently used against our ourselves that prevents us from changing and growing. And I'm not gonna, say we should live our lives as hypocrites. I am saying, though many times when we get accused of being flipped. Lepers are moments when we encountered more credible sources or more valid information and we've we've made progress in our thinking and I think in such a polarized time, people a really hard that they struggle to sort out. Ok what has changed their mind. Are they doing? Are they doing it for political reasons, to affiliate with a group or prove their allegiance, or are they doing it because they have actually gotten closer to the truth? Yeah that and that's that's delicate, and maybe it's not a binary thing either in hurts it yes and thing, especially in this momentum.

Hearing. You say that I'm torn between thinking, you're right and oh now. This can make things even harder, but I think I think you are right ends. I think, especially in our own heads, it's extremely difficult to separate out. You know when I change my mind. Am I doing it because of the pressure of a group that I don't wanna be excluded from or that have role models that I am here that I'm tryin to follow in the footsteps of verse is, am I using the most unbiased, the most rigorous standards, to figure out what I believe yeah it's complicated. You know, especially when we bring belonging into the conversation. You know it going all the way back to putnams and bowling alone, yeah like- and I think it's only gotten worse in the last couple of decades, where all the places we used to seek belonging the institutions, your organization's, the job. You know, like faith based places, trade groups, bowling leagues. I kind of don't exist or they don't provided any more, but it's a human need. So once we find it in that you're in affiliation with a group

And there's a set of beliefs that wrapped around that, yet it's not just saying no to the police anymore were potentially risking being outcast from a group who are you? He really to want to walk away from or be shunned in in a serious way. No thanks. I worry about a lot is: is the group polarization effects where you join a group and everybody in the group has let's say, relatively modern views. If they interact for a couple weeks, then they all tend to come at more extreme than they were and part of that is, you know, they're stuck in an echo chamber or a filter bubble, but part of it is that the people that groups pay the most attention to the peoples that,

typically gain the most status in a group are the ones who are most prototypical the of the group and when you think about being prototypical of a group that means representing the group's essence standing for their values and their dna and their identity and so oftentimes the person whose elevated to be the most important member. The group is the person who has the most extreme passion for what our belief or principle. The grip stands for and over time. That can mean that a group that starts out with pretty reasonable views can land in a fairly unreasonable place? Yeah- and I think, probably politics putting your pops into mind as when we're talking about the quote group. But the fact is this can be families. This can be work. This can be

friend groups. This is not a a dynamic which is sort of like limited to any one domain. It's it's based in human nature. It is- and he reminds me of of John heights argument that we're where group ish as creatures that were redrawn to kind of identify with an in group and see the people in that group in some ways it extensions of ourselves, and then everybody who doesn't belong to the group and subscribe to whatever our beliefs are, is a potential adversary and is so puzzle to me a deep look at it and social media, for example, I can not a man. It only wanting to follow people with one set of beliefs, Are you learn anything all you're doing is real, say what you already think you know and there's there's no there's our growth. there's no evolution there. So I wonder what would happen if we all made a point to sailor,

I'm gonna take at least a quarter or a third of the people. I follow and they're gonna be people where I disagree with their conclusions, but I'm impressed her in trade by their thought process. I'll Well, then imitation makes a lot of sense, but also what you're, effectively asking people to do is step away from a potential. Slipstream of safety invalidation, which people really want. Yeah I would just rather be right than feel right now, I'm right there with you. Not yet global private aviation leader is known for personalizing every detail of your travels because net, yet standard is not just meet their definition of perfection. It's to exceed yours, discover more at net jets dot com,

good right? It is supported by master class, so I have been reading books for over a decade, but I've never written a novel, and lately I've been filled like I actually have a thriller in me and did it about dodgy is one of my favorite writers and that genera and her sinking wouldn't be so cool? If I could leary learn from him, which is why I was so excited discover I actually could, and so can you on master class, so with master class, you can learn from the best so many different fields to become your best anytime anywhere and at your place there are over a hundred and eighty classes and notches. Writing is little everything from the science of better sleep, with Matthew, walker, to cooking with Thomas keller, that's thomas keller, gardening, with wrong faintly to relational intelligence, with stare peril and just new classes added monthly, and now that David about archie classroom, but I learned so much like how to find an idea using his writers prism or how to outline that idea and

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Is the inciting incident or process or experience that makes us go from a place. it ain't like this is who I am. This is what I believe this is the people that I'm rolling with to all of a sudden waking up one day and saying oh like the saturday is not serving me. and I need to actually re examine how I didn't we to the world and and and and start to actually go out and acquire a different set of processes and tools. That's such an important question. I don't feel like we have a clean answer to it. You know I can. I can point to lots of evidence, for example, that extended contact with people who hold very different views or who have different experiences and especially having respectful exchanges with those people can shift your thinking over time I can eat. I can certainly point you'd have evidence as well that when people are repeatedly confronted with the fact that their beliefs are are undermining their ability to achieve their goals that

little bit more likely to say, maybe I should change course, but for every one of those cases we can think of examples of people who have the exact opposite reaction to those creations right, you were told over and over again that their startup was a terrible idea. How many times have you watch shark, where it closes with all five sharks, hang for your own safety and future. Please Abandoned this idea, and it's this kind of heroic delusional grit of saying I didn't realize that you know I should have invested a grid. And you know in being an effective entrepreneur, and there are lots of ideas that I could pursue as opposed to where these people get trapped is this is the one idea, and this is this- is definitely going to make it and notes, it's sometimes amusing. It's almost like the other real reality t v. Show example of this is american idol and how many of us have laughed at that the person who clearly cannot carry a tune and just can't

it and will not listen to both the audience and expert judges who say I'm sorry singing is really not for you, and that is one of the things in life that seems to pit chicken or by talent than by effort. This is all a long way of saying I don't know the answer to your question. I think that one of the ways of thinking about the question now is to say I think we would have an easier time be open minded ends. Rethinking more frequently, if we said every time I catch myself preaching or prosecuting or politicking scientists do here This is obviously this is something I find appealing as a social scientists, because it's part of my training but actually think relevant. Everybody thing you like scientist is, is actually we ve seen demonstrated in in business theirs recently with entrepreneurs in ITALY where

their randomly assigned one group the control europe is going through, and entrepreneurship training course. Essentially, there's another group, that's given all the same, since, but there are embedded in a framework of saying about running your business. Like a scientist, your strategy is a fury go out and do customer interviews to develop hypotheses and then do a product launch. create a minimum viable product within av test and As an experiment to say will is my hypothesis true or false, and the results are staggering, over less than a year, the control group that gets regular entrepreneurship, training there. They're all pre revenue and they average about three hundred dollars per start up in revenue. The group that learns to think, like a scientist, averages over twelve thousand dollars in revenue and though the major reason for that is their much more willing to have it There are a lot more likely to say her. This strategy that I thought was genius this pro

that I knew everyone is gonna love. My experiment did not support my hypotheses, so it's time for me to change course, yeah. I mean that they make so much answer me and being servile alive long entrepreneur at the same time, having sort of studied the different approaches having it, really fascinating, to see the completion of the scientific method and start up methodology. You know where the rains a method ology, which is essentially nightmare. The process you were talking about at all about, like I papa says he like rapidly gathering evidence to either prove disprove either one is ok as long as you were, the primary metric not succeeding or approving something it just learning exactly. You know which interesting to me is that has become real. embraced in the world of start ups and pivoting, is you know like a huge thing at sight. Neo everybody. Is the idea you start with is not the idea day when succeed with it so rare in that world, and yet

You know, and then we see designed thinking and human centred design, which is bearing this ring in broader, complex problem solving and the business world. And yet it doesn't seem to really happen spend it out from that and even in the world of business is limited to this one fairly narrow domain and so much more of the business world kind of looks at it is as near like those are the weirdos like it, it's right for them, but not for us at their own parents it's it's so sad? I cannot tell you how many ceos of large companies I've seen just tank their organisations because they weren't even willing to run some experiments, let alone question their intuitions ends. I just at this point. I just want to say to them: blackberry, blockbuster, kodak, sears, you going out. Many is that is that the group that you're hoping to join cause you're on your way. I mean sex,

sake, innovators, dilemma, and yet it still exists in so many cultures. You also brought this dm yeah I think thing lay aside as it is, is a core part of the rethinking process is learning to really slowly shift. What you're doing not being again you mentioned earlier competence and theirs? I guess an interesting relationship between confidence, cognitive flexibility and competence that all plays into this yeah there is, I think I ve actually start to rethink my views on confidence, because we ve all been told that one of the biggest barriers to people achieve

The gauze is that they don't have the confidence to aim high enough or work hard enough or pursue whatever dream they have, and I dont disagree with that. There's plenty a research to support it think. What we overlook, though, is that the effective success on confidence is often bigger than the reverse that you build your confidence through achieving success that you do. we have to magically discover confidence how thin air before you can achieve something meaningful. You can build your confidence through achieving something meaningful, and I think that what that requires a different kind of confidence, which is associated for me, with with actually maintaining and gaining competence, as opposed to becoming overconfident to the point that you don't know what you dont now and your bad thing is, you think, you're good at ends. You become a victim of the dunning krueger effect in every last

So I had a really interesting conversation with Sarah blankly about how she knew that she was ready to start spanks and my basic question for her was: how did you have the confidence to do that? You ten worked fashion or retail. You didn't know how to run and build a business. You never had never applied for a patent before I just couldn't and myself going for that, and she said I didn't have confidence in my knowledge and skills in any of those areas. I knew I didn't know what I was doing, but I had coffee so my ability to learn- and I think So many of us when we think about confidence, we define it as believing in my existing knowledge and skills and ass, the wrong kind of confidence, what we want is confidence in my ongoing ability to learn, and I think that's what we're keeps us humble and curious and allows us to to flex as opposed to becoming rigid yeah, I mean

whether you feel like there's a tie in between that notion, and he liked carol. Dweck's work on fixed vs growth mindset, you know and and whether some of us just sort of come in a way were we're shaped in that he cannot. You got what you got in, that's what it is and whether that please into this tired conversation way, which is really limited, dehydrating, carols, workin I've mindset is a big part of this idea of seeing yourself as a learner. I think this goes further than cause when you have a growth mindset, you in that year your knowledge and skills are potentially malleable, but you don't necessarily think that you're the person who's able to grow in this particular way, and I think if, if you look back on your experience and say, let me think through all the times that I've you know, I've initially struggled something and then gotten better you can start to realize. You know that, what it means to be human, that that is as one

the things that differentiates us from any other species is. We are remarkably good at learning. You see it with. You know, with tiny, tiny babies re starting to pick up language at a rate that no adult could could master. You see it with. You know just the extraordinary athletic feats that recapture on television every day where I think of my days as a springboard diver, for example, and when I first stepped on a diving bored, I could barely do a somersault and it was unfathomable to me that out one day dear two and a half flips into twisted dive into the water and know where I was, and that was that was learning right- It was a discipline, but. I think seeing yourself as a learner, as opposed to seeing yourself as an expert might be one of them. A mental distinctions between being status, with what you know and being excited to rethink what you now gather makes little sense to me. You know one of these. and my mind is your sharing. That is that, while there is

there's a certain blessing internally that that shift in frame theirs. So when you open yourself to a process of perpetual growth, it. Yours opening yourself to a process of perpetual grief that I think some people's struggle with, because you perpetually have to accept the fact that the thing that you thought and believed in, and maybe you identify yourself it's time to, let it go and if that, especially as a part of your identity, it's like constantly grieving the loss of that, even though it's being replaced by the joy of learning something new well, I think I think you just got right to the heart of a shift in perspective that that probably more of us could go through, which is rethinking is only a loss if you are attached to your old bullet.

If you took your opinion and you just treated as a as a hunch- and he said well, you never have a sneaking suspicion that this could be true. You find out that it's not how interesting I learn something new right. The moment you get attached to it, and you say this is me. This is foundational too. How I think the world works is the moment, at you experienced the pain of of having to let something go and I'm not saying we shouldn't have any strong convictions. Of course we should. I have a strong conviction that we should have some strong convictions, you're hearing my voice right now, so I guess I have met a conviction, but I think we take too many beliefs too seriously. I think we identify with so many opinions ends? I guess what I would say about that is. We have all experienced the joy of being wrong, which is when, when somebody challenges a weekly held assumption and were delighted by the surprise I remember reading

The the the moon might have formed out of nag moraine from the centre of the earth. Mind boggling! I can't quite quickly grasp what that even me but I was so excited to discover that maybe it wasn't a separate asteroid and that- and you could say oh wait a minute, but that up and your entire worldview them, it might have been born from inside the earth. Well, guess what that's court him? who here so it doesn't bother me? I just think most of us will be met, off if we had more of our views. Work that way where we say you know what my views about about the best ways to accomplish my goals, my views about in a what policies are gonna, be effective. My views about how to be a good parrot. Those are theories and use ride him and putting them into action because their wet evidence I know of and the experiences that I've had are pointing toward. But the moment I find out there that that they might not be

or they might be incomplete, that's great. I've just discovered something and I'm in a grand from It- and it doesn't have to involve grief there now, the notion of attachment and grasping, I think it's such a it's kind of this new ones, but really critical part of the the process for is to very blue let's have it is, isn't it. I'm just gonna keep rolling, and I think I think what I think is nearly interested It may be valid now, but who knows what I think like down the road I'm open to the possibility that it might not be you set up? he may have told me this couple years back and then I've heard you talk about it. When you write, I think they started when you're ready, but maybe maybe it was different. you centuries assemble a group of people to challenge you. So it's not even just you trying to your own mechanisms to challenge yourself, but you ve, created this superstructure that exists outside of you and sort of like giving people the role of coming out

and ten unnaturally surly challenging your thoughts and an you welcome this and am fascinated buys of that structure. Well, it started because I learned early in my career that have not smart enough or objective enough. to see all the holes in my own work and their their workarounds. One of the workarounds is putting something away for a couple of weeks or a month, and I have had experiences where I come back to a draft that I hadn't seen in six weeks. Who is the moron who wrote this How could his thinking have been so simple and incomplete? And but I think creating them experience is one you wouldn't get that much done, because it would take you for ever to have all of your work and to their still gonna be things you don't see, because ok, I've I've gain some distance from that work in those six weeks right. Maybe I've changed point o o o four percent, but I'm still mostly me the same person who,

if you read the first draft as though I I really need diversity of background and thought in order to challenge my thinking, so I didn't at first have a. A philosophy around that I was a sort of haphazard, least sending out draft to people in saying what what would your challenge? What should I rethink and then eventually I realize this is a whole different way of thinking about my network. I've always known the value of a support network and had people who believed in my potential and cared about my success and were there to encourage me when I got discouraged, and so if you Jonathan, of course, You, you are actually one of those people. When I started writing you said you sent me at and just enormously helpful document about how to launch a book and how to share your ideas, and I had no clue what I was doing before. and I felt like ok. Maybe this is something I could do after reading that and then arise where we need more than just a support network. We need a challenge at work. We needed for people who are going to point out our blind spots?

and see the shortcomings in our work that are invisible to us or that we don't want to see, or in some cases solve problems that we have identified and urges stuck around how to move forward, and I think that's that's one of the real gifts that you ve given as an author. Is allowed in the wisdom that you share about how to spread. Ideas is counter intuitive edit. It challenges people to question the things they think are effective and what I've done lately, which is different now that I think about having a challenge network. As I said, ok, what are the qualities of the people who have been in that role so, hopefully for me, and their often very disagreeable they they enjoy having the feisty debate, but they also just like my support network believe and my potential in care about my success. And so I've started going back to those people in say: hey, you know it. You ve noticed, but I consider you my challenge network ignore, those times when I didn't like your feedback or push back too hard. That's it

how I work out ideas, and I just I really value the thing that. I learned from you and I would love if you could keep challenging me and I get more useful feedback because of that, because when people think about In me. They no longer worry that they're gonna hurt my feelings. They actually you know that I'm gonna take. It is helpful. They know I worry that it's gonna damage our relationship because I'm trying to make it clear to them You know that the only way that you can disrespect our relationship is by biting your tongue on something that might make me better. Yet It's been really interesting to see how it certainly formed into a real structure thing, but also, I think what you heard about making not just or formal, but also really understanding who should these people be? And what is the underlying intention? You? It's not a destructive yet nodded bringing you down it is. Everybody's relate they're going at the idea, the not going at you as an individual they're going at the idea. You know and an end

bigger idea is this process will make the net idea better exactly, and I think there we ve all encountered critics who we are trying to boost their own egos or troll for some unknown reason, and this is a different group of people. These are thoughtful critics. These are people who enjoy playing with ideas who are excited to figure out. k? What will somebody who really fundamentally disagrees with this perspective? What will they say, and sometimes they are that person and they know it's a contribution to make you aware of that sooner rather than later, because I'll tell you what I know you've had that experience many times too, when you're writing you are going to find out. Point what is wrong with your work and it's much better if you find that out in drafting face a hundred percent, because at some point It's gonna happen like wherever they didn't, wherever people disagree or whether the flaws I like it's gonna, come out,

it was interesting. Also, like you function in these, these two different worlds. You function, the water back at a new approach in the waters relate popular sharing and in the world of academia. These structures then, like you, when you publish, there's a whole peer review process where, before any family lands in a journal it it's been not only vetted but grey, often attack, and not always for constructive reasons. There's a pecking order and a power like structure there, where people are sometimes doing it for status, switch Turning to see that you ve created this in the context of a domain where you have shorter more control and built into that It is not that same level of challenge and pure vetting and you get to choose the people who have the intention that keeps it all positive yeah I mean it. It really grew out of the fair juxtaposition at us. Two worlds: where one of the most beneficial and sometimes least fun parts of academia is no matter how much status your game. You still send your paper for blind review and he still

independent critics who are going to tell you exactly what they think of it, and sometimes they think the best way to impress the editor. to secure the paper, which is why then, an associate journal. I've said: okay, we care about constructive, miss, not obeyed quality of feedback, but I felt like When I became an author and started writing outside of academia. I felt like that structure was missing, obviously I had a letter engine and an editor who provided that feed back and we were encouraged to get friendly reviewers. I dont want friendly reviewers. I pray dont want hostile of yours either, but I want people who are sceptical and an interested in you know and stretching my thinking, and I would love for every profession or every field or every organisation to have a structure like that last, because it can be a lot of work to to build your own challenge network. So if I were running an organization, the first thing I would do is, I would say: alright, let's identify people,

are willing and able to challenge and let's make them available for critical review stages. There in it in the context of an organization and the thinking about this lately, especially if been revisiting been work. I work. I that's a lot harder because, is everybody in the organization has some sort of personal motivation like they're some level of a seeking of status, prestige power elevation within the organization? I would imagine it would be it's like near like finding a jury. You know where yeah. Well, it's a sense, his aunt daily. How do you is no way to actually assemble that group within an organization from people within the organization or where it's just neutral. So it's got to be more bouts were like balancing the intentions and dynamic. I think so. I think why the ways I've seen some workplaces do it is to make this into performance review is no bridgewater would be the extreme example where europe

Oh you waited on whether you disagree with the people above you and, if you're never willing to touch the nerve or stick your hand in the fan or fight for right. Then people think that you're you're putting your own ego or your own image above the mission and the good of the organization. That's a step had liked to see more innovations, experiment with knowing that is good. look different from different cultures, you know there are definitely other kinds of structures, though, that that exists. So in the google acts or just acts now right has has actual kill incentives to shut down, failing projects to try to reverse this tendency to escalate your commitment when you get negative feedback and say, but I've got to prove to myself and everyone else that this is a good idea. We are genius it

rationalizing, and so, if you know you could get rewarded for pulling the plug, it becomes a little bit easier to do that. I think for a lot of organizations and if I've seen this at the pentagon is as well as some private companies, they have murder boards who, at a critical stage, gate in a decision process will come in and say our job is to explain why they should not go forward. and yeah. I. I worry sometimes that people get into a role play mode and they say alright, I'm going to be the devil's advocate. We checked the box. We no longer need to do any rethinking, but I think it's better to have people in that role that not yeah, I mean fully agree yeah it as I'm thinking about all of this richard feynman's famous lines really popped into my head. The first principles at you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool you

and this is coming from one of the most brilliant, physicists and professors is ever lived and that's the lens he takes surly like we're talking about getting back to that yeah and what what I think is profound about. The feynman observation is as such as that you're the user person before it's that you are the easiest person for you before, so I guess at it. as to the rationalizing animal point bed at one of the biggest. I learned, while writing think again, which is not some had ever thought to do before he came from studying super forecasters who are competing tipperary, future events- and the thing I learned was that the best forecasters when they form an opinion they make a list of conditions where they would change their minds to hold themselves accountable, see the idea that when they encounter new information, they have to go back and say: okay, does this mean criteria that I set out for something that would shift my views and if so, I have a responsibility Jeff, because I know once I have the view. I motive

to avoid or dismissed or disk out that information yeah love that its funding has evolved wondered where I'm more inches as a general rule in developing models and finding answers. And I think, that's a reason wise, because it allows you to be dynamic and and to be responsive to change over time and not wed to assumptions yes vetches. Chris I have never understood before, which is, I feel the same way, may greatest moments of their, not eureka, that of awe or excitement when I'm doing research or writing a book there. There really, when I discover a framework for make sense of something and your right. That's because the framework gives you a lens to keep learning as opposed to it, one question in your done yeah. I completely agree with that.

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they, let you talk about and write about what I was surprised to see in some of the research that you share is that it not necessarily a bad thing to actually have a certain level of this quote impostor syndrome about the way you move into everything yards as I was very surprised by this tier. This comes in the research of one of our former doctoral students. Messina is now at mit, professor and her basic. Finding was that, if you relax the idea that feeling like an imposter is a syndrome, hits sort of a a chronic prepare foul gee that somebody struggles with and you to say, hey you know at everybody has impostor thoughts, moments of self doubt where you say,

maybe I'm not good enough or maybe I've lost it or maybe I don't belong here or maybe everybody's going to find out that I'm just a regular person. What is the impact of having those thoughts and she found when studying investment professionals and medical students that there were not performance costs of having those thoughts were often that actually people who felt like impostors more often tended to perform better and ways, they were more likely to second guess their investment decisions, which actually improve their judgment. They were more likely to follow up and make sure that if they were medical students that not away diagnose the main issue that a patient came in with they had really shown them enough care and compassion, and they were curious about whether there is anything else that was concerning them at the time, and I think I think that you know ok, impostor syndrome is debilitating its especially debilitating. If you're a member of a non dominant group and you're, not you

two people, assuming that you can do it right? So I think it is probably is harder for women, it's harder for people of color to get tennis mindset, but if you can think about those impostor thoughts, lesson debilitating syndrome and more as a beginners mindset, as you called it earlier as a frame of mind, that's oriented tour learning toward saying her maybe this means I meant to be really flexible in my thinking. Maybe this means I have to work that much harder and figure out. A better way to solve this problem, then it becomes a little bit. Less of a liability and a little bit more of an asset yeah, and I mean that makes sense for me and- and I actually am and appreciate you bring up the m the context also year between dominant versus non dominant group and how it just structurally and cultural, If this is a different proposition, depending on on where you lie in that spectrum, and it's it's real, you know it's a very real effect, anything official and people. The other thing that that sort of popped into my mind it

sam. I was learning this research. It brought me back to this research that I think is like a bit old at this point, but where There were certain looking at the d relationship between affect and accuracy and discernment, and a lot of people think all the more up it you're, the more positive you are nor optimistic you are, you know the more you get done them accurate, you are you see the world better, but in fact that wasn't the case. It's not necessarily saying that if you're clinically depressed you know, you're gonna be better and more productive enact. an effective. But people who are a little bit more sober, a bit more towards melancholy were actually much clearer about the way perceived the world around them and could make decisions based on more more objective experiences. About alloy and abramson depressive realism right, yeah, exactly yeah, I I I was so shocked when I first read that research, I I first came across it as a. I guess, there's an undergrad in psychology, and you know it's one of those. It's one of those rethink moments

everybody who teaches so hey, wait a minute you now seeing the world through rose. Colored, glasses is not always a good thing and I think it's a bit of a paradox because to your point, if you're, not careful, it can become a self fulfilling prophecy right that that seeing the world only it is can stand in the way of imagining how it could be, and yet, if you develop, a pollyanna already have optimism and you can't can reality. Then you're gonna miss a lot of threats that are actually gonna stand in the way of creating the very world that your imagining and the Only way that I have known to think about this is to understand it as a collective phenomenon right, so we we do now. That you can learn to become more optimistic. You can learn to become more realistic, but it's a pretty wide spectrum. It scares me whenever I go no workplace and everyone is an optimist right. I wonder what problems they are sweeping under the rug

It also concerns me when I walk into an organization, and everybody takes pride in being not just a sceptic but a cynic, and I think ok, they're, so many possibilities. There not seem air, and so I guess for me adjust it underscores the importance of of diversity, not just of of background, experience, but also of of cognitive styles, and I think this also leads into you- know some of them. flourish, neuron collector rethinking right because having allowed times, but we do want to and type of person around us and we so tend to enter a lot of thought processes in and points of view in a binary way, and that's just not the reality ever know now. This is, I love the robber benchley line that there are two kinds of people in the world: those who see the world in two

If the two kinds of people and those who doubt and at such oppression, foreshadowing of of what psychologists now call binary bias, which is that just a distinctively human tendency to take a complex continuum and oversimplifies, in the two categories and anytime, I see somebody now in an us versus there or my side verses other side conversation, I wanna just step above it and say well, it's possible that one side is right, we're often than the other, but what's more likely is there are two sides. look at this. You know not like a heads or tails of a coin, but as the many lenses of a prism and say it an issue like on rights. You have people who are passionate about freedom to bear arms or the right to bear arms. Young people who are passionate about gun safety or gun can and it seems like there are only two camps there actually very

Few people are in one extreme camp or the other right. Most people are somewhere in the middle agreeing on things like universal background checks, which have enormous bi, partisan consensus, and I think that if we can resist these binaries and see the continuum or at least a lot of kind of nuanced categories in between it's a lot easier to have a a reasonable time- station about poor as issues- and I know that you part of the process that that you share is there's really interesting shift you speak to, which is the difference between perspective taking verses perspective seeking which I think really ties into this it does it does you know it If such a thing is this is this is another one of those moments. You can't write a book about thinking again without rethinking a lot of things. You thought were true:

and it was actually part of the reason I was excited to write. Think again was I knew it was going to force me to rethink some things that either I hadn't thought to question or that I had been hesitant to question and one of them was I've talked for years about the value of perspective. Taking for years, I've loved the jack handy observation, the deep thought that before you criticize someone you should walk them. in their shoes, because that way, when you criticise them, you're a mile away- and you have their shoes, wrote and mrs is such a fine way of capturing the importance of of perspective taking for me, and I always thought that, when p and understand someone it's because they were too anchored in their own view and not really considering what. How does this looked? The other person and then I read this research over twenty five different experiments, showing that, on average perspective taking did not improve. Your understanding of somebody who is different from you did not increase your empathy for them.

In some cases, it actually backfired because the further someone is away from what you believe that more wrong. You are about what their perspective looks like and so you end up just guessing in ways that do disservice to their actual opinions, so that the recommended alternative to perspective taking is perspective seeking to reach out to people and find out what their perspective actually is. Crazy idea right, complicated, but but to me there's a a big knowing doing gap there. We know that we can learn more from people by talking to them than we can from imagining what their thinking. But how often do we act on that knowledge? Yet not enough Whenever saw that Iraq's chaytor dangle but original yoke, working, ineffective forecasting, say Not only do we not know what other people are thinking we we even know what we think, like you like, just a short while down the road. Interesting dynamic. It is,

that's actually a great case for who hide rethinking, is so important that how many. Citizens have we made in our lives what college to go to what career to pursue? What person to date where we assume that we knew who we were gonna, be five years down the road or ten years down the road, and we doubts. I don't know when I take a job at what what I'm gonna be interested in five years. I don't know I joined an organization whether the values that Looking for today are going to be important to me in ten years, and I I don't know. How is that jargon of freight is that industry slogans. Just how is that organization going to change as the culture going to fall apart? I I just I yeah. I think the failures that we we all experience in affective forecasting and being wrong about our future. Emotions should make us very cautious about locking

two plants, a hundred percent monster to come full circle. There is one question want to sneak in, which is we ve been talking about the value of rethinking in all different contexts, your personal community. collective- is their value in not rethinking like you is there, but a moment or or a time where rethinking really should stop instinct, is yes, I sort if you like, I should be read. thinking that, in the spirit of the conversation, but he I think I mean we if you start a play out what happens if we all rethought everything, we never do anything. I could be we'd, be permanently trapped in analysis, paralysis, and I think you Jonathan, you really know some but who probably rethink more often than they shed in there always second guessing themselves. Having most Thus, there are probably hurrying to find the other end of the spectrum and were to go to justify the choices we ve already made were too good at clinging to the opinions that we ve already formed.

As this is this is a case like you described it for balance I too, to find the optimal range in the middle of that german one of things I really struggle to do and when I was right in this book, was to quantify what's the ideal time to rethink and how much rethinking is enough and- I think it's, it's so situational, it's so individual right there. The area, precedes there are almost impossible to two begins to catalogue, but I I was encouraged by the data super forecasters which showed that the average forecaster when trying to predict and event over the next few months, when they were changed her mind twice or they would update their protection twice and the super forecasters the very best protectors of future. That's the updated about twice as often just four times, and so I'm not saying you have to rethink nine hundred opinions right in this. The killer judgment you're, making just saying doing a little more rethinking will probably leave you with fewer regrets.

Yeah, you almost wonder where there is an exponential effect. You know with just a little bit more rethinking actually has an exponentially. Greater effects are like more and more generalised way. I can see that I think well, I don't I don't know how this would play out, but my my working hunch, which which is awaiting better data is theirs, about starting the process of rethinking and make a commitment to. It then becomes a habit and one of the places I saw this was with my challenge network, where my favorite groups to bring in challenge network get work, is the students who have challenged me, the most in class, and so last year, when I was finishing up think again, I gave a draught of ever chapter to a group of about twenty students who join me in this impact, lab that I've been running for a long time and their jobs to tear apart the book and to object to everything that they disagreed with or that they thought was wrong. Or

no not well thought out, are not convincing, and one of the interesting things that started happening is that group gathered is people they would start to make comment and then somebody else was question would question it because of course, we're here to do. Rethinking so we're all gonna be bought into this process, and I saw several of them start to say things like. Oh maybe this is a time rethink. Oh, maybe this is a moment for rethinking and they started it. It is a learning opportunities, as opposed to a nuisance or a threat, and I found the same thing happening to me- that you know them eerie moments when I would have said no, I I'm really I'm really attached to this belief like whoa. This could be. This could be a chance. This could be an occasion for thinking again and I think the more you practice it, the the less upset It becomes and the more I guess this is dear brutus, point the more attached you get to detachment. Yet I love that give pleasure

It should come full circle as well. I have asked you this question in the past, but it's been a number of years now someone ask it again because it tends to shift as we sit here in this container of good life project. If I offer up the phrase to live a good life, what comes up. I think what I would say now is that to live a good life is to lead a life of integrity and when I think about integrity, I think about having a set of values that are worthy that serve people beyond you and also living by those values. Right, as opposed to you. I guess this is this is something that that I have rethought over the past couple of years. Since we last talked, I used to think integrity was practicing. What you preach and now I think preaching is overrated ass, a general rule, but if you are going to preach that you should only preach what you already practice. I love that replaced wrap up. Thank you.

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