Professor Pozzulo’s Pick (August, 2026)

 

Professor Pozzulo’s Pick (August, 2026)

Look Again: The Power of Noticing What Was Always There by Tali Sharot and Cass R. Sunstein (2024)


My take:

Have you experienced that initial excitement of great news only to have that positive feeling wane shortly thereafter? Why doesn’t the positive feeling last very long?....habituation! What was thrilling one minute, becomes less thrilling as the hours pass. In Look Again: The Power of Noticing What was Always There, Sharot and Sunstein explore how we can dishabituate and the impact that it has on our well-being and quality of life.

The authors discuss how our brains must prioritize what is “new and different” (e.g., imagine your usual walk in the woods but on this particular occasion a bear is in the distance running toward you) and as a result the brain filters out what is “old and expected”. The book examines how we can “resparkle” the positive things in our life and also re-notice the negative things (e.g., negative habits) so that we can make some changes (I’m going to be re-reading our January 2025 pick, How to Change by Katy Milkman to help with changing behaviour).

The authors’ stated goal for the book is to help you “turn off the brain’s grey scale to see colors again”. There are some evidence-driven exercises and suggestions in the book on how to accomplish dishabituation (as well as when you might want habituation to settle in). Personal favourite: breaking up positive experiences into smaller chunks (e.g., taking mini-vacations over longer ones) and getting through unpleasant tasks in one go (e.g., getting two cavities filled at the same time instead of on two separate occasions).

The book raised my awareness to habituation and got me to notice it happening in my own life. One of the most powerful statements in the book was, “…you don’t habituate to the joy of learning because learning by definition is change” (and change helps you dishabituate). This book makes me want to continue learning, continue changing, and “resparkling” the many things I am grateful for.

Have you noticed habituation happening in your life? Tried any strategies to dishabituate?

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