The Sunscreen Mistakes Most People Make
Welcome to Effective Habits, a weekly newsletter where I share evidence-based strategies and tools to help you live a happy, healthy, and productive life.
Today at a Glance:
How to Pay Attention and Care Deeply in a Chaotic World
Lots of People Apply Sunscreen Wrong. Here’s How to Do It Right.
Rebuilding Motivation
“Whatever inspiration is, it’s born from a continuous ‘I don’t know’.”
How to Pay Attention and Care Deeply in a Chaotic World
David Epstein & Brad Stulberg
🔦Lights, Camera, ...
Modern life gives us more information, entertainment, and ways to fill our time than ever before, but our capacity to pay attention has not grown with it. The result is a strange kind of abundance: we can be constantly stimulated while barely engaging deeply with anything. Attention is more than a productivity tool; it is the raw material of a life. What you consistently give it to—your work, relationships, interests, or a glowing screen—determines what gets depth, what improves, and ultimately what matters to you. Caring deeply is the other half of the equation: choosing something worthy of that attention and being willing to throw yourself into it without holding back. That makes you vulnerable—failure hurts more when you genuinely care—but it also gives work, relationships, and experiences their richness. You cannot build mastery, intimacy, meaning, or memorable experiences while remaining half-engaged. A fuller life requires deciding what matters, giving it your attention, and caring enough not to hold back.
🎬Action!
Protect your attention, then spend it on what matters. Pick a small number of things you genuinely care about: the work you want to get better at, the relationships you want to deepen, or the pursuits that make life feel meaningful. Reduce the inputs that fragment your attention, create blocks of time where you do one thing at a time, and use simple rituals to help you transition into focused work or presence. Then commit fully: put in the reps, accept that caring makes failure sting more, and resist the temptation to stay detached just to protect yourself. Your attention is finite; treat where you place it as a decision about what kind of life you are building.
Lots of People Apply Sunscreen Wrong. Here’s How to Do It Right.
Rose Maura Lorre
🔦Lights, Camera, ...
Sunlight may feel harmless in the moment, but ultraviolet (UV) radiation quietly accumulates damage in your skin over a lifetime, contributing to premature aging, sunburn, and skin cancer. The two main types that reach us are UVA and UVB: UVA penetrates more deeply into the skin and is a major driver of wrinkles, discoloration, and long-term skin damage, while UVB is more strongly associated with sunburn and direct DNA damage. Both can contribute to skin cancer, and exposure adds up even when you never visibly burn. Important to note: UV can still be significant on cloudy or cool days, and UVA can penetrate window glass, so visible sunshine and temperature are poor measures of your exposure. Sunscreens protect against this radiation using either mineral filters such as zinc oxide and titanium dioxide or chemical (organic) filters such as avobenzone. The distinction is less dramatic than the names suggest: both primarily absorb UV energy, although mineral filters also reflect and scatter some light. Chemical filters absorb UV photons, briefly enter a higher-energy state, and then release that energy harmlessly—mostly as heat—before they can absorb another photon.
SPF is also widely misunderstood. In standardized testing, SPF 30 means protected skin requires about 30 times the UV dose to produce the same sunburn as unprotected skin; SPF 50 requires about 50 times the dose, assuming the sunscreen is applied at the tested amount. Another way to visualize this is that SPF 30 permits roughly 1/30 of the sunburn-producing UV dose through, SPF 50 about 1/50, and SPF 100 about 1/100. So higher SPF does improve protection, but with diminishing gains in the percentage filtered: roughly 96.7% at SPF 30, 98% at SPF 50, and 99% at SPF 100.
🎬Action!
Buy the right sunscreen. Choose broad-spectrum SPF 30+; SPF 50 is a useful choice for prolonged outdoor exposure or imperfect application. If swimming or sweating, choose 40- or 80-minute water resistance. Mineral and chemical sunscreens both work, so choose one you’ll apply generously and consistently.
Use enough. Most adults need about 1 ounce—roughly a shot glass or 2 tablespoons—for exposed skin on the whole body. Cover commonly missed areas such as your ears, neck, hands, feet, and hairline.
Apply before going outside. If the UV Index is 3 or higher, use sun protection even if it’s cloudy or cool. Apply an even layer of sunscreen about 15 minutes before sun exposure, rather than waiting until you are already in the sun.
Reapply when exposure warrants it. When outdoors, reapply about every two hours, and sooner after swimming, heavy sweating, or towel-drying. Hours spent indoors away from meaningful UV exposure do not automatically require the same two-hour schedule.
Use sprays and sticks generously. With a stick, make about four passes over each area and rub it in. With a spray, spray until your skin glistens, then rub it in. Never spray directly onto your face or intentionally inhale the mist.
Protect your scalp and lips. Use a hat when practical, sunscreen on exposed or thinning scalp and, and an SPF 30+ lip balm on your lips.
Rebuilding Motivation
Dr. Anne-Laure Le Cunff
🔦Lights, Camera, ...
You know the feeling: the to-do list is ready, the coffee is made, the document is open, and three hours later, you still haven’t started. That doesn’t necessarily mean you’re lazy or undisciplined; motivation isn’t a personality trait or stable resource you either have or don’t. It rises when your brain can see a worthwhile payoff, believe your effort can produce it, and feel some sense of interest or progress along the way. Research on intrinsic motivation points to three especially useful ingredients: self-efficacy (believing your actions matter), curiosity (wanting to close a gap in what you know), and competence (feeling yourself improve). When a project feels vague, overwhelming, or disconnected from any immediate reward, those signals can disappear even if you genuinely care about the outcome. The useful takeaway is that motivation often doesn’t need to be summoned through sheer willpower; it can be rebuilt by changing the conditions around the work so the reward feels clearer, the next step feels achievable, and progress becomes easier to see.
🎬Action!
Reset your state before forcing the work. If you’re mentally drained, pushing harder can make the task feel even worse. Take a short break: walk, meditate, stretch, or talk to someone, then return with a clearer head.
Make progress visible. Track something concrete: words written, workouts completed, problems solved, or days you showed up. Visible progress reinforces the feeling that your effort is working and makes it easier to keep going.
Add a little accountability. Tell someone what you plan to do or share your progress with a friend, colleague, or community. A small external commitment can help carry you through days when internal motivation is low.
Turn the task into a question. Instead of thinking, “I have to finish this,” ask something like, “What happens if I try it this way?” Approaching the work as an experiment creates curiosity, which can make an otherwise heavy task easier to engage with.
TOOL TIP
Merlin Bird ID: Cornell’s free app identifies birds from their songs, photographs, or a few simple observations. Its sound and photo identification can also work offline.
FUN FACT
Some Roman concrete could repair its own cracks. Calcium-rich lime fragments reacted with water and recrystallized inside cracks. In experiments, Roman-style concrete completely sealed deliberate cracks within two weeks.
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Disclaimer: The information provided in this newsletter is for informational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice. Please consult a medical professional for advice, diagnosis, or treatment. We are not liable for any risks or issues that may arise from using this information.
