Trust Your Mind: Embracing Nuance in a World of Self-Silencing
Virtual Event with Author Jenara Nerenberg
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Why has trusting our own mind become so challenging in the world today? In her groundbreaking new book, Trust Your Mind: Embracing Nuance in a World of Self-Silencing (HarperOne; May 2025), Jenara Nerenberg unravels this complex issue.
Nerenberg exposes that self-silencing is rooted in a detrimental culture that stifles individual thought and diversity. She delves into how the digital age, with its echo chambers and social media algorithms, has amplified this issue and often leads people to doubt their own thoughts and judgment. Trust Your Mind boldly confronts issues like the dangers of groupthink, negative impact of cancel culture, and restrictive nature of labels in our society. Armed with expertise in journalism, psychology, and public health, Nerenberg provides a critical examination of an increasingly polarized world⸺from workplaces and schools to the media and everyday interactions.
In these demanding times, Trust Your Mind guides us to think freely, be confident in our judgments, and embrace the power of our minds.
Author Bio
Jenara Nerenberg lectures widely on rhetoric, psychology, and diversity of thought. She is the bestselling author of Divergent Mind and the new book, Trust Your Mind: Embracing Nuance in a World of Self-Silencing, about the psychology of groupthink. Her work explores self-censorship, free speech, and viewpoint diversity and her writing has been featured in TIME, NPR, the BBC, CNN and elsewhere. She was a staff writer at Fast Company magazine and now contributes to the UC Berkeley Greater Good Science Center magazine. She is an alum of the Harvard School of Public Health and speaks internationally at universities, libraries and organizations. She splits her time between Asia and the United States; read more about her work here.
Advance praise for Trust Your Mind
“How have we fallen so deeply into groupthink, even in institutions that are meant to facilitate an exchange of diverse views like college campuses? In this highly accessible book, Jenara Nerenberg explains how we got into cul de sacs of dogmatism, and how we can get out of them.” (Eboo Patel, founder and president of Interfaith America and author of We Need To Build: Field Notes for Diverse Democracy)
“Trust Your Mind is a deeply human book that masterfully addresses one of the great problems of our times: how to thrive in an age where the threat of being “cancelled” leads people to self-silence in ways that stifle innovation and threaten authenticity. It not only explains the complex stew of social psychological forces that have gotten us to this point, but also provides readers with a science-informed blueprint for skillfully navigating the cultural headwinds they face. Compelling, lucid and timely, this book should be required reading for anyone who values the ability to speak their mind without fearing the consequences of doing so.” (Ethan Kross, International Bestselling Author of Chatter)
"Trust Your Mind is a bold call to think deeper and speak truer. Jenara Nerenberg shows how self-censorship holds us back from authentic connection and how to combat our habit of self-enforced silence for better conversations, a stronger society, and more personal resilience.” (Kurt Gray, author of OUTRAGED and director of the Deepest Beliefs Lab at UNC Chapel Hill)
“Jenara Nerenberg's Trust Your Mind creatively weaves together diverse developments over recent decades to illuminate the causes and impacts of the reduced free speech and increased groupthink that now plague public intellectual life. Her book should inspire renewed appreciation of and engagement in the critical thinking and open discourse that are so essential for the flourishing of individuals and society alike.” (Nadine Strossen, former president of the ACLU)
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