Making the most of what we least expected

We human beings love certainty. In fact, we love it so much that we’re *more* stressed by a 50 percent chance we’ll get an electric shock than by a 100 percent certainty of one! Maya Shankar is a cognitive scientist whose work focuses on how we respond when our plans, hopes and dreams get derailed. When her plans to be a concert violinist and a mom were upended, she had to create a different future for herself. This week on The Connection, a conversation with Maya Shankar about her new book, *The Other Side of Change.* She says we are not very good at predicting how we’ll respond to big changes in our lives. She also says that there can be a place for denial and avoidance when we’re feeling overwhelmed.