Maya Shankar

First of all, I'm one of these people, right?

So one of the reasons that as a cognitive scientist, I'm so interested in studying change is that I myself am afraid of change.

I'm going through something right now and I found myself doing some of that catastrophizing.

And I have to bring myself back to a couple of basic principles.

The first is that

research shows we are very bad cognitive forecasters what this means is that we're terrible at predicting how we are going to think and feel about certain events in our lives and that's actually reassuring in moments like this because when we do catastrophize when we think there's no way i can possibly get through this

Research shows people are often far more resilient than they think on the other side.

It's true that the good stuff is often not as good as you think it's going to be, but the bad stuff is often not as bad as you think it's going to be.

More importantly, one of the biggest reasons why we get this forecasting with these predictions about how we'll respond incorrect is that we ourselves are changing alongside the change experience.

So we tend to think of ourselves as these static entities, right?

current day maya with all of her preferences and values and abilities navigating the full arc of the change but the reality is that when a big change happens to us it also leads to lasting change within us and we

you know, it's interesting, there's a psychological illusion called the end of history illusion, which says that while we greatly appreciate that we've changed considerably in the past, so, you know, I look back at 10 years ago, 20 years ago, I can hardly even relate to that person.

We do tend to think that the person we are right now is done changing, that we're the finished product.

Of course, that's not true.

And of course, a big change in our lives can accelerate internal shifts.

And so

One thing I'm holding onto for myself in this moment is, yes, it feels so daunting.

I don't know if I, Maya, am capable of navigating this moment, but I'm actually going to be a different person as I navigate this experience.

I will be a new person on the other side with different values and perspectives and abilities and ways of seeing the world.

And if I can shape that trajectory for the better, I can actually end up better in all of this.