Is It Possible to Change Your Entire Personality?

The Michael Shermer Show

Michael Shermer

Dialogue, Science, Reason, Michaelshermer, Natural Sciences, Skeptic

4.4 • 921 Ratings

🗓️ 3 May 2025

⏱️ 79 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Is it really possible to change your entire personality in a year? An award-winning journalist experiments with her own personality to find out—and reveals the science behind lasting change.

Research shows that you can alter your personality traits by behaving in ways that align with the kind of person you’d like to be—a process that can make you happier, healthier, and more successful. Olga embarked on an “experiment” to see whether it’s possible to go from dwelling in dread to radiating joy. For one year, she clicked “yes” on a bucket list of new experiences—from meditation to improv to sailing—that forced her to at least act happy. With a skeptic’s eye, Olga brings you on her journey through the science of personality, presenting evidence-backed techniques to help you change your mind for the better.

Olga Khazan is a staff writer for The Atlantic and the author of Weird: The Power of Being an Outsider in an Insider World. She has written for The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and other publications. Her new book is Me, But Better: The Science and Promise of Personality Change.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to the Michael Sherman Show.
0:16.1	Go to Skeptic.com slash magazine to order your subscription or even any of the back issues all the way back to
0:22.1	1993 when we actually 92 what am I saying when we first began so cool all right my guest today is
0:28.5	olga Kazan am i pronouncing that right kazan i usually say hasan has on oh okay the the k is soft
0:35.6	anyway she's a staff writer for the at and author of Weird, the power of being
0:41.3	an outsider in an insider world. Okay, we'll get to that maybe later. She's written for
0:46.1	the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and other publications. She's a two-time recipient of
0:50.4	journalism fellowships from the International Reporting Project and winner of the 2017
0:55.7	National Headliner Award for Magazine Online Writing.
0:59.5	She lives with her husband and son in Northern Virginia, and here's the new book,
1:02.6	Me, but Better.
1:04.6	She's better now.
1:06.0	The science and promise of personality change.
1:08.9	I really wanted to do this because I think this is a fascinating subject
1:11.7	that I haven't really addressed too much on this show.
1:14.3	So let's get into it.
1:15.4	Olga, how's it going?
1:16.3	Thanks for coming on.
1:17.5	Yeah, absolutely.
1:18.2	Thanks so much for having me.
1:19.1	Yeah, a new book.
1:20.1	So very exciting.
	...

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