Handling Difficult People, Healing Breakups, and the Science of Talking to Strangers Shankar Vedantam

Practical strategies for navigating difficult relationships and building new connections. Shankar Vedantam is host of the Hidden Brain podcast and radio show, where he explores the hidden patterns that drive human behavior. He is the author of the books, The Hidden Brain: How Our Unconscious Minds Elect Presidents, Wage Wars, Control Markets and Save Our Lives , and Useful Delusions: The Power and Paradox of the Self- Deceiving Brain . In this episode we talk about: How to stop trying to change your partner Useful tools for overcoming conflict The challenging practice of "eating the blame" The concept of "useful delusions" How to manage a breakup (of any kind) The real secret to finding closure The value of micro interactions with strangers And more Related Episodes: The Surprising Upsides of Self-Deception Get the 10% with Dan Harris app here Sign up for Dan's free newsletter here Follow Dan on social: Instagram , TikTok

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Handling Difficult People, Healing Breakups, and the Science of Talking to Strangers Shankar Vedantam is an episode from Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris by 10% Media, LLC.

This episode is 56:39 long.

This episode was published on Mar 23, 2026.

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