The Art of the Detour: See Possibility Around Every Bend

"A woman I met in the PTO asked me to help her cold-call executives to invite them to a luncheon. I was good at it—a real surprise—and she offered me a job doing a bit of sales work at a railroad software company. I wasn't sure what it would be like, but I felt open to change."

The takeaway: Unfamiliarity can make us say no to an experience simply because it's beyond our comfort zone. Build a bridge between your past and the opportunity ahead by identifying three ways that it's similar to things you've already done.
—Ellen Langer, PhD, Harvard University psychology professor