"Knowledge does not change behavior. We have all encountered crazy shrinks and obese doctors and divorced marriage counselors."

Jerry Sternin

Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard, by brothers Chip and Dan Heath

The biggest obstacle to change is our minds: specifically, their dual nature. Whether you think of it as the emotional self and rational self, we have an instinctive side and a deliberate, analytic side.

The Heaths borrow an analogy from Jonathan Haidt’s book The Happiness Hypothesis which I found particularly useful: the Elephant and the Rider:

Perched atop the Elephant, the Rider holds the reins and...