“our lives are shaped for better or worse, to move forward along largely unmapped terrain. to what extent can you direct your own life when you can see only so far and the weather change quicker than you can say?”

“Your choices of which clothes to wear or which soda to drink, where you live, which school to attend and what to study, and of course your profession all say something about you, and it’s your job to make sure that they are an accurate reflection of who you really are.But who are you, really? The imperative “Just be yourself!” seems straightforward enough. (What could be easier than being who you already are?) Yet we often end up blinking in its headlights, perhaps frozen in place by the concomitant notion that we might, if we are not careful, turn into someone else. It’s difficult to move forward when each step could move us further away from the “authentic” self, and so we dither.”

“Changing our behavior purely for the sake of appearances may seem to conflict with the need to be authentic and consistent, but in many ways it is actually a result of those needs. After all, resolving the tension between standing out from the crowd and becoming isolated requires finding our niche in the world. But what would happen if we weren’t accepted in the place where we felt we belonged? For others to see us as a “poseur” or as “delusional” would be painful. Even worse, what if they were right? The social consequences and self-doubt that follow when our self-perceptions conflict with how others see us can be just as destabilizing to our identity as conflicts between our own self-perceptions and actions.”

“What you see determines how you interpret the world, which in turn influences what you expect of the world and how you expect the story of your life to unfold.”

“The mere exposure effect explains many facets of our lives, such as why it’s so hard to find someone who can prepare our childhood favorites like Mom did, and it also holds when we see the latest fashion trends prominently featured in stores, catalogs, and finally on people we know.In addition, when a trend emerges, it sends the message that it’s becoming increasingly accepted. When we see the supplies of multiple independent retailers simultaneously shift in one way, we assume the demand has shifted as well. Of course, the change may actually be driven by the prediction of a future shift in demand, which may or may not materialize, but it still affects people’s choices.”

“We do the same thing in our own lives, embracing information that supports what we already prefer or vindicates choices we previously made.After all, it feels better to justify our opinions rather than challenge them, to contemplate only the pros and relegate the cons to the back of our minds. However, if we want to make the most of choice, we have to be willing to make ourselves uncomfortable. The question is, if we are willing, how exactly do we go about fortifying ourselves against these biases?”

“Recommendations and categorization are both useful features to seek out when trying to make a difficult decision, because they can benefit our choices in two ways. They make the decision in question easier by allowing us to borrow the knowledge of experts or crowds, and they also help us to develop our own expertise more rapidly than we would if we chose without assistance. Learning what others consider good and relevant provides us with a general overview of a given field, catalyzing our understanding of it and the development of our preferences within it.”