How to Shape Your Identity & Goals | Dr. Maya Shankar

About this video

Cognitive scientist Dr. Maya Shankar discusses how identity and goals shape each other. Huberman notes Dr. Shankar trained at Juilliard to become a professional concert violinist before a career-devastating injury forced her to reframe her life plans and identity, and she later served as a senior advisor to the White House and founded its Behavioral Science team. Dr. Shankar shares research on identity, goals, motivation, and plans, including how to assess goals as they appear on paper, such as school, job, salary, or spouse, against the deeper feelings that indicate whether a goal is right to keep pursuing. She also discusses what feelings can and cannot tell us and when they should serve as a compass. In the excerpted segment, she describes fighting her way into research classes as a freshman and discovering she enjoyed the process of testing hypotheses, with curiosity and human connection bridging violin and cognitive science.

Key takeaways

• Dr. Shankar discusses how identity influences goals and goals influence identity.
• Dr. Shankar shares how a career-ending violin injury forced her to reframe her plans, Huberman notes.
• Dr. Shankar teaches assessing paper goals against deeper feelings about pursuing them.
• Dr. Shankar discusses when feelings should and should not guide decisions.
• Dr. Shankar describes curiosity as enjoying the process of testing new questions.

Episode details: published July 24, 2023 · 1.3M views · 2:33:56 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. The science and protocols described are Andrew Huberman’s, presented for education — not medical advice. Consult a qualified professional before changing your own health practices.

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