Welcome to The Lost Debate, a show for Politically Ecclectics.

I'm Ravi Gupta.

And today we talk to one of my favorite authors, Charles Duhigg, who is a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and the author of The Power of Habit, which is a book that I used to assign to all the teachers who worked for me at Republic Schools in Nashville Prep.

We talk about that book, and particularly within the context of

New Year resolutions or New Year's. I never know how to say that. So we're going to talk about

what will make a resolution stick. What do we even make of the concept of New Year's resolutions?

And then we talk about his newest book called Super Communicators, which is essentially all about whether it's in your

relationships, your work, or anywhere else, how do you get your point across and connect with

people in the most effective way possible? Love this interview. Let's jump right in.

Charles, welcome to the podcast.

Thanks for having me.

I want to talk about your new book, Super Communicators, but before we do, given the timing of this podcast, I feel like I would be remiss if I didn't ask you about the first work

that you wrote that caught my attention, which is the power of habit,

we're now approaching the end of the year when folks are setting New Year's resolutions.

And I'd love to just get you to talk through with our audience just based on your work.

What do we make of this practice of New Year's resolutions? And if people really want

those New Year's resolutions to stick, how should they think about navigating the next few weeks

and months? Yeah. It's a great question. New Year's resolutions, what we call them as a little

misleading, right? Because what we really should be setting is we should be setting New Year's goals

and then using those goals to establish a plan to achieve them.

So if I say I want to lose 20 pounds next year, my resolution is to lose 20 pounds next year,

that is not going to work, right?

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