Nir Eyal
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
The brain hates changing its mind.
Why?
Because what has evolution given us?
Evolution has given us a brain that doesn't want you to flourish.
It doesn't want you to be happy.
It doesn't care about any of that stuff.
All it wants to do is to keep you safe, to keep you alive so you can procreate.
That's it.
So your default state is not to get you to a point where you're fulfilling your full potential.
Now, thankfully, we know how to do better than our hardwiring would indicate.
That in fact, if you just go back to your defaults of, well, that belief served me in the past, so that's what I'm going to continue to believe, where you never do anything great.
Why?
Because everything worth having in life is on the other side of some difficulty.
You want to have a fit body?
I used to be clinically obese.
Let me tell you, it takes work.
It takes some discomfort.
You want to build a family?
I got a 17-year-old and I've been married for 25 years.
It's going to take some discomfort.