Why Catchy Songs Get Stuck In Your Head
Article Round-Up: 4.27.25
Enjoy this week’s curated round-up of articles, videos, and more from the web to help you live a healthier, happier life.
Featured Thoughts:
“The Richmond Way”
Takeaway: If you’ve been around, you know Ted Lasso is my favorite TV show. Just just because of the humor and storytelling, but because I think it is the best example of world-class coaching.
Across three seasons, Ted models the impact a great coach can make—whether it be sports, fitness, or life. This video explains why I connect so much with Ted’s style of coaching, and how it mimics what we do inside of our A-Team community.
Published This Week:
Why Some People Stay Fit and Others Feel Like They’re Always Starting Over
Takeaway: When stress hits, we don’t rise to the level of our desires. We fall to the level of our defaults.
Individuals that have healthy coping mechanisms in place will appear to float through life with an easier time staying committed to their health.
Those without those default habits will be pushed further into weight gain and unhealthy practices.
Takeaway: IKEA’s genius business strategy—put the responsibility of building the furniture on the consumer.
The unintended consequence: consumers valued that furniture more.
Anyone who’s missed a step building that IKEA bookshelf knows, it’s a terrible experience. And yet, people assign greater value to those items they struggled for.
Therein lies a psychological truth: we place greater value on things we have to work hard for.
Remember this next time your fitness goals feel hard to attain. That’s the point. That’s a benefit, not a drawback.
The New Fitness Landscape [podcast]
Takeaway: Friends and colleagues Mike Doehla and Jeb Stuart Johnston discuss the current landscape of fitness—the status symbol of being in shape, the impact of weight loss drugs, and more.
Just For Fun:
Why Catchy Songs Get Stuck In Your Head
Takeaway: A lot of interesting science here about how our brains work with music and sounds.
Why songs get stuck — Songs with a simple rhythmic structure, easy-to-remember lyrics, and upbeat tempo are most likely to get trapped on repeat in our brains.
How to fix it — Listen to the song through the end, listen to a different song, or do another cognitively challenging task to distract yourself.
The most interesting thing I learned from this article — even “playing a song” in our head (where no sound is being played) activates the area of our brain that processes sound. Fascinating.
P.S. Grab our new guide + video training on the 5 Laws of Weight Loss—insights pulled from a decade of experience and hundreds of successful transformations. Grab yours for the price of a cup of coffee.