Making the most of what we least expected

We human beings love certainty. In fact, we love it so much that we’re more stressed by a 50 percent chance we’ll get an electric shock than by a 100 percent certainty of one!

Maya Shankar is a cognitive scientist whose work focuses on how we respond when our plans, hopes and dreams get derailed. When her plans to be a concert violinist and a mom were upended, she had to create a different future for herself.

This week on The Connection, a conversation with Maya Shankar about her new book, The Other Side of Change. She says we are not very good at predicting how we’ll respond to big changes in our lives. She also says that there can be a place for denial and avoidance when we’re feeling overwhelmed.