This is Hidden Brain. I'm Shankar Vedanthem. Over the past several years, I've explored hundreds of

ideas on Hidden Brain on how we can live better lives and have healthier relationships. Many of these ideas have felt provocative and

insightful to me and as I interview guests and edit stories I tell myself I'm

going to remember to apply these ideas to my own life. I'll follow the advice of

researchers who've discovered how we can have better relationships. I'll become a better

colleague, parent, and citizen.

But in my daily life, I forget to apply these lessons all the time. I'm impatient when I should

be patient. I'm distracted when I should be patient. I'm distracted when I should be focused and I'm harsh with myself when I should be kind.

Psychologists sometimes call this the Insight Action gap. Knowing the right thing to do

doesn't automatically mean we do the right thing. It isn't about hypocrisy

per se, it's that learning something and doing something involve

different sets of brain muscles so to speak. This is a very ancient idea and

something that many religious and spiritual traditions have

explored over the centuries. It's an old idea in art and literature too. In the

16th century William Shakespeare wrote,

I can easier teach 20 what were good to be done

than be one of the 20 to follow my own teaching.

Today on the show, we explore the inside action gap when it comes to our debates with our political opponents.

It's the third episode in our series Us 2.0, where we explore how we can become more effective talking across

our differences.

If you've missed any of the other episodes in this series, please be sure to check them out

in this podcast feed.

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