The Amazing Things Your Heart Does & The Power You Have to Change Lives

Speaker 1 Today on something you should know, why giving people unsolicited advice is a colossal waste of everyone's time. Then a cardiologist reveals fascinating things about your heart you never knew.

Speaker 2 Actually holding a heart in my hand, it felt like a super strong tennis ball. This is not a floppy organ.
This thing is solid.

Speaker 2 And when you're holding a beating heart in your hand, the strength that you feel is just mind-boggling.

Speaker 1 Also, what's the difference between a habit and an addiction and how anyone can have a huge impact on someone else's life?

Speaker 3 One of the founders of Head Star Uri Bronfenbrenner said every child needs at least one adult who has an irrational attachment to them.

Speaker 3 And I think Bronfenbrenner understated the case that every person needs at least somebody else who has an irrational attachment to them.

Speaker 1 All this today on something you should know.

Speaker 1 It's time for Black Friday, Dell Technology's biggest sale of the year. That's right.
You'll find huge savings on select Dell PCs like the Dell 16 Plus with Intel Core Ultra processors.

Speaker 1 And with built-in advanced AI features, it's the PC that helps you do more faster.

Speaker 1 From smarter multitasking to extended battery life, these PCs get the busy work done so you can focus on what matters most to you.

Speaker 1 Plus, earn Dell rewards and enjoy many other benefits like free shipping, expert support, price match guarantee, and flexible financing options.

Speaker 1 They also have the biggest deals on accessories that pair perfectly with your Dell PC, improving the way you work, play, and connect.

Speaker 1 Whether you just started holiday shopping or you're just finishing up, These PCs and accessories make perfect gifts for everyone on your list. Shop now at dell.com slash deals and don't miss out.

Speaker 1 That's dell.com slash deals.

Speaker 1 Something you should know, fascinating intel, the world's top experts, and practical advice you can use in your life today.

Speaker 1 Something you should know with Mike Carruthers.

Speaker 1 So I could give you some advice,

Speaker 1 but it probably wouldn't do any good, so I won't. Hi, welcome to something you should know.

Speaker 1 In our desire to help people, it's just natural to offer them advice. Trouble is, people don't usually take it.

Speaker 1 And you know this because people probably tell you how to eat or drink or vote or dress or whatever, and you don't listen to them either. So why doesn't offering unsolicited advice work?

Speaker 1 Research indicates that whenever someone tells us what to to do and how to do it, we get defensive because we want to maximize our personal freedom in decision-making. It's just human nature.

Speaker 1 So, what does work?

Speaker 1 Research on observational learning suggests that while people will resist unsolicited advice, they will follow the behaviors of others, especially when there appear to be good and reinforcing outcomes from those behaviors.

Speaker 1 So, instead of telling people what they should do, model the behavior and just stay quiet. Of course, I just told you what to do, so telling you this completely contradicts what I told you to do.

Speaker 1 But you get the point. And that is something you should know.

Speaker 1 So you know what your heart is, right? It's that pump in the middle of your chest that's pumping blood all the time. And you want that, because when it stops pumping blood, well, that's a big problem.

Speaker 1 but the heart is unlike any other organ in the body because it is somehow all wrapped up with love and emotions we write and sing songs about the heart people get their hearts broken love makes the heart grow fonder love makes the heart beat faster no other organ I mean your spleen doesn't conjure up any particular emotions most likely, nor does your liver.

Speaker 1 But the heart, well, that's something special. And here to tell you things about your heart you never knew, about how it really works and how it all got mixed up with emotion, is Dr.

Speaker 1 Vincent Figuretto. He is a practicing cardiologist, scientist, and professor of medicine.
And he's author of a book called The Curious History of the Heart, a Cultural and Scientific Journey.

Speaker 1 Doctor, welcome to something you should know.

Speaker 2 Thank you very much.

Speaker 1 So this is such an interesting topic because I've often wondered, and I'm sure many other people have, how the heart got mixed up with love in the first place, why we associate love with the heart, and why we still do, even though we now know that the heart really doesn't have anything to do with love,

Speaker 1 but we still write the songs and the poems and

Speaker 1 say the words that make it sound as if we still believe the heart and love go together. So how did this all begin?

Speaker 2 Well, you know, if you go back to millennia ago, you know, ancient ancestors, for them, they understood that that beating heart meant life.

Speaker 2 It would beat faster with fear and love. And when someone died, it would beat no more and the body would cool.
So they thought, well, this. beating organ in the middle of our body,

Speaker 2 it's our furnace. It's what supplies our heat.
And

Speaker 2 it must be where our emotions are, because if we're angry or scared, or if we're

Speaker 2 in love or excited, our heart responds to us. And so that must be where our emotions are and where our being or our soul is.
And

Speaker 2 that held true for millennia, right up until the Renaissance.

Speaker 1 And even though we know now that it's not really true,

Speaker 1 the mythology lingers. I mean, we still write songs and tell stories and talk about my heart yearns for you, but your heart doesn't yearn for anything.

Speaker 2 Yeah, basically, since the Renaissance, you're right. We just view the heart physiologically as a blood pump and nothing more.

Speaker 2 And yet, metaphorically, we continue to use it when we talk about our emotions, our love, our memory.

Speaker 2 It's interesting. You know, think about the grandmother sees her grandchild running to her.
Where does she cross her arms over her heart? Where do you point to on your body when you say me?

Speaker 2 You point to your chest.

Speaker 2 When we're on emails and doing texting, we use heart emojis. There's 41 heart emojis.
There's only one brain emoji.

Speaker 2 When we're on Instagram or X, if we like something, we push the heart. If we're at the restaurant, we look for the heart symbol for heart healthy food.
So

Speaker 2 the symbolic heart is is pervasive in our society.

Speaker 2 And, you know, if you ask people, you know, where is your love of family and your love of God? They're going to say in their heart. And yet if you ask them, what does the heart do?

Speaker 2 They say, oh, it just pumps blood.

Speaker 1 Right. Isn't that weird? And nobody says, oh, my pancreas yearns for you.

Speaker 1 I mean, nobody says that. But I think what you said in the beginning, though, is so true that because we can hear the heart, you can't hear your pancreas or your lungs.

Speaker 1 I mean, your lungs work, but it's a very deliberate thing you do with them. But your heart makes this noise

Speaker 1 that reflects emotions, so that's what must be where the emotions are.

Speaker 2 And in fact, there's a term for that. It's called interoception.
And that's feeling things within your body. And the most common one would be the heartbeat.

Speaker 2 And that can have positive ramifications and negative ramifications. When people feel irregular rhythms in their body, it induces panic and panic attacks and anxiety.

Speaker 2 But when they feel that nice, harmonious, regular, coherent beat, it calms them. And the heart actually sends signals to the brain to calm yourself.

Speaker 1 Can you,

Speaker 1 in layman's terms, explain

Speaker 1 how the heart works? Like, is it really, really complicated or is it basically just a pump?

Speaker 2 It's a spectacular pump. It has special muscle cells that besides being able to conduct an electrical signal are spread out in three different orientations.

Speaker 2 So they're horizontal, vertical, and at an angle. And so when a heart pumps, it's not like a balloon deflating.
It's more like you're twisting a wet rag to get all of the fluid out of it.

Speaker 2 And what's amazing is it's pumping one and a half gallons every minute, over 2,000 gallons every day, and over 58 million gallons over regular life.

Speaker 2 And that's equivalent to turning on a kitchen sink full blast for 45 years.

Speaker 1 What's one thing about the heart that you suspect most people don't know that's really fascinating to you?

Speaker 2 So a couple fascinating things about the heart that I've learned over the years was one,

Speaker 2 actually holding a heart in my hand.

Speaker 2 It felt like a super strong tennis ball. This is not a floppy organ.
This thing is solid. And

Speaker 2 when you're holding a beating heart in your hand,

Speaker 2 the strength that you feel is just mind-boggling. A heart in an athlete can increase seven times its baseline output.
So if the heart is beating one and a half gallons a minute,

Speaker 2 a sprinter could increase that seven times to get muscles, to get blood to the muscles, for instance, in the legs.

Speaker 1 Why is it so hard when someone dies and their heart stops beating, why is it so hard to start it back up again?

Speaker 2 It depends on how much time

Speaker 2 takes place. So if a heart stops within a minute, you have a very good chance of getting that heart going again.

Speaker 2 But the longer it takes before someone tries to start it, the more likely it will not come back. And that's, again,

Speaker 2 not getting into the science, but electrolyte shifts within the membranes of the heart that just won't allow you to start the heart beating again.

Speaker 1 When we hear someone has heart failure, what does that mean?

Speaker 2 It means that the heart pump is not functioning normally. And there's generally two types of heart failure.
One is a poor pump, so the pump is no longer working well. That's systolic heart failure.

Speaker 2 Or the pump has become too stiff and can't relax. That's called diastolic heart failure.
Both are dangerous. Both need to be treated or people will not survive.
Sometimes they can be temporary.

Speaker 2 It could be due to an infection or some toxic substance.

Speaker 2 And we can reverse a lot of those. Sometimes it's due to coronary artery disease with poor blood flow.
And after, say, bypass surgery, we can get some return of heart function.

Speaker 2 But basically, it's heart failure means the pump is not working. The result is fluid accumulates in the body, in the lungs, in the legs, in the belly.

Speaker 2 And if that progresses, eventually a person won't survive.

Speaker 1 So we've heard for many years that heart failure or heart disease is the number one killer.

Speaker 1 And that I've, and I remember hearing, and it's always stuck with me, that a common first symptom of heart disease is sudden death. Is it really that like out of the blue?

Speaker 2 Unfortunately, yes, it is. Heart disease has basically been the number one killer, especially in the U.S., since pretty much 1900, with the exception of the years of the Spanish flu.

Speaker 2 And it really peaked around the 1950s and 60s when everybody was smoking.

Speaker 2 With education, treatment of blood pressure, cholesterol, and a decrease in prevalence of smoking,

Speaker 2 heart disease has gone down,

Speaker 2 yet it still remains the number one killer worldwide of both men and women.

Speaker 2 When someone has a heart attack or begins to have a heart attack, up to half of them can experience sudden death, and that can happen long before a person reaches the emergency room.

Speaker 2 So obviously, the point is, let's not get to that point. Let's not have the heart attack.
Let's prevent it.

Speaker 1 We're discussing some extraordinary things about the heart with my guest, cardiologist, Dr. Vincent Figuretto.

Speaker 1 He's author of the book The Curious History of the Heart, A Cultural and Scientific Journey.

Speaker 1 I've learned from experience that hiring isn't easy, even when you know exactly who you're looking for.

Speaker 1 Running a business doesn't automatically make you good at hiring people. It's a skill and it takes time, sometimes too much time.

Speaker 1 That's why I like Indeed. It makes the whole process faster and easier, and the results are better.
When it comes to hiring, Indeed is all you need.

Speaker 1 Instead of struggling to get your job post noticed, Indeed sponsored jobs helps you stand out. Your listing jumps right to the top of the page for the people you actually want to reach.

Speaker 1 And that saves you days, maybe weeks of waiting. And the numbers back it up.
According to Indeed Data, sponsored jobs posted directly on Indeed get 45% more applications than non-sponsored jobs.

Speaker 1 What I like most is there are no monthly subscriptions, no long-term contracts, you only pay for results. And while I've been talking, 23 hires were made on Indeed worldwide.
It's that fast.

Speaker 1 There's no need to wait any longer. Speed up your hiring right now with Indeed.

Speaker 1 And listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at Indeed.com/slash something.

Speaker 1 Just go to indeed.com slash something right now and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com slash something.

Speaker 1 Terms and conditions apply. Hiring, Indeed is all you need.

Speaker 1 Every year around the holidays, we take a ton of family photos and my wife turns them into these beautiful scrapbooks.

Speaker 1 The only problem is once the scrapbook is on the shelf, we hardly ever see those pictures anymore. Which is why I love our Aura frames.

Speaker 1 With Aura, those photos come to life, showing up automatically on the frames throughout the house.

Speaker 1 It's like reliving those great moments every day. Setup takes just minutes.
You download the Aura app, connect to Wi-Fi, and you can share unlimited free photos and videos right from your phone.

Speaker 1 And if you're giving an Aura frame as a gift, you can preload pictures on it before it ships or add a personal message. It's the easiest, most meaningful, and personal gift you can give.

Speaker 1 And every frame comes with a premium gift box, ready to wrap or give as is.

Speaker 1 You can't wrap togetherness, but you can frame it.

Speaker 1 For a limited time, visit auraframes.com and get $45 off Aura's best-selling Carver Matte Frames, named number one by Wirecutter, by using promo code something at checkout.

Speaker 1 That's auraframes.com promo code something.

Speaker 1 This exclusive Black Friday Cyber Monday deal is their best of the year, so order now before it ends. And support this show by mentioning us at checkout.
Terms and conditions apply.

Speaker 1 So Vincent, I'm curious, when people have heart disease and sudden death is the first symptom, is it really so out of the blue?

Speaker 1 Is it really that Bob was fine yesterday and today, we don't know why, but boom, he's just dead?

Speaker 2 No, Bob probably hasn't been fine since he was a teenager.

Speaker 2 If you look at

Speaker 2 autopsy studies of, for instance, young soldiers during the Vietnam and Korean wars, it's remarkable how much coronary artery disease, cholesterol plaque, they have already built up.

Speaker 2 This starts with just these cholesterol fatty streaks as early as our teens teens and continues to build through our life such that there's cholesterol plaque buildup and calcification of our coronary arteries by the time, you know, Bob is 60 years old.

Speaker 2 On top of that, you have other risk factors such as high blood pressure, known as the silent killer, because you don't feel it until it causes you to have a heart attack or stroke.

Speaker 2 And high cholesterol. A lot of people go through life not going to the doctor and not having these things treated.
And so, you know, it really isn't a surprise that Bob suddenly fell dead yesterday.

Speaker 1 What about people who, you know, well, there's a family history of heart disease. You know, his grandfather died at 50 and his father died at 55.
So

Speaker 1 it seems like you're doomed.

Speaker 1 Is it that powerful?

Speaker 2 Yes, it is.

Speaker 2 Family history is extremely important.

Speaker 2 We generally ask about first-degree relatives, mother, father, sister, brother, whether the men had heart disease before 55 or the women had heart disease before 65.

Speaker 2 And if, you know, if they weren't smokers and they did have heart events, then that definitely needs to be taken into account when we risk stratify patients.

Speaker 2 So we'll be more attentive to their cholesterol levels, their blood pressure levels.

Speaker 2 And we can now order tests like a coronary calcium score, which is a quick CAT scan, to see if they already do have cholesterol buildup in their arteries that they weren't aware of.

Speaker 2 And then we would treat them more vigorously.

Speaker 1 If you live long enough, are you, is it kind of, I've heard this about prostate cancer, that men who live long enough, they're going to get prostate cancer.

Speaker 1 It doesn't mean they'll die from it, but they'll get it. Is the same true of heart disease?

Speaker 2 No, there are

Speaker 2 people in their 90s and 100s whose coronary arteries are completely clean.

Speaker 1 Really?

Speaker 2 We always say good, good family genes.

Speaker 2 But yeah,

Speaker 2 there are people

Speaker 2 that

Speaker 2 go into their 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, 100s without significant coronary artery disease. Generally, those people led a very healthy life and they had a good family history.

Speaker 1 What about this advice that

Speaker 1 seems to come and go about taking a low-dose aspirin every day?

Speaker 2 People who are at risk should be on low-dose aspirin. And those are people who have evidence of coronary artery disease, have had

Speaker 2 events such as a heart attack or unstable angina that led to

Speaker 2 a stent being placed in or bypass surgery.

Speaker 2 Someone with a lot of risk factors, a smoker with diabetes and high cholesterol, I would recommend that they be on a baby aspirin.

Speaker 2 But in general, we don't recommend it for healthy people without a lot of risk factors or evidence of coronary artery disease.

Speaker 1 Because what does that aspirin do?

Speaker 2 Well, the good part is the aspirin keeps the blood from clotting, keeps the platelets from causing a blood clot.

Speaker 2 When a person has cholesterol plaque buildup in their coronary arteries, those plaques can crack open. And when they do,

Speaker 2 the platelets attack. because it's a rupture, it's an opening, and they want to prevent it from opening further.
And that leads to a blood clot and aspirin prevents that from happening

Speaker 1 um the downside is aspirin uh can irritate the lining of the stomach and and can result in uh in gi bleeds i've heard it said though that i've heard it recommended by heart doctors that There's nothing wrong with everybody taking a low-dose aspirin because there's very little harm that it could do.

Speaker 1 And if you have heart trouble, it could help.

Speaker 2 We used to say that in the past. More recent studies have suggested that the risk can outweigh the benefit in people who do not have high risk for heart disease.

Speaker 1 Can people die from a broken heart?

Speaker 2 Yes, people can die from a broken heart. There's two examples of that.
One is

Speaker 2 something that we call broken heart syndrome.

Speaker 2 It's also called stress-induced cardiomyopathy. What happens is there's a sudden overwhelming event and an emotional event.
Say

Speaker 2 you see your child playing soccer and they are hit and they're unconscious or you see

Speaker 2 someone get hit by a car or

Speaker 2 you're informed that your sister died and this sudden emotional event causes a huge surge in epinephrine or adrenaline in your body and it can actually damage the bottom of the heart and induce what looks like a heart attack even though the person's coronary arteries are perfectly fine.

Speaker 2 We call this broken heart syndrome. People do die from it.

Speaker 2 I'll tell you another example.

Speaker 2 If your soccer team loses a penalty shootout in the World Cup final

Speaker 2 or in the Super Bowl, your team loses on a last second pass. A lot of those people can develop broken heart syndrome or stress-induced cardiomyopathy.

Speaker 2 Fortunately, most of them recover, but some do die. The second example is more chronic.

Speaker 2 A good example is the couple, the 85-year-old couple that's been married since they were 16 years old, and one of them passes away.

Speaker 2 It's amazing how most of the spouses of those people people pass away within the year.

Speaker 2 And it's probably due to the depression and the sadness of missing that lifelong partner.

Speaker 2 And we typically see those people go into hospice within months after the other has passed away. And then they pass on as well.

Speaker 1 Where's the technology with heart? transplants and you know where's heart science going

Speaker 2 It's advancing rapidly. You know, at the beginning of the 20th century,

Speaker 2 we finally figured out what a heart attack was, but the only treatment was morphine, bedrest, and a priest.

Speaker 2 By the end of the 20th century,

Speaker 2 we're doing bypass surgeries, coronary stents, pacemakers.

Speaker 2 We can now repair and insert new heart valves.

Speaker 2 uh with a catheter instead of open heart surgery we're implanting artificial heart assist devices in people with broken hearts to bridge them to transplant or to allow their heart to heal.

Speaker 2 We're replacing broken hearts with a completely artificial robotic heart. We have one person who's lived over seven years with an artificial heart.

Speaker 2 Soon we're going to be doing xenotransplantations. That's transplanting the heart of another animal into a human.
Many animal hearts have been tried. Probably the most likely,

Speaker 2 and it makes me laugh, is the pig heart is most closely associated with the human heart.

Speaker 2 In fact, a recent recipient lived several months with a gene-modified pig heart. So given the shortage of human donor hearts around the world, I can see in 10 years xenotransplantation occurring.

Speaker 2 We're now starting to grow heart muscle to replace lost heart cells. We're not salamanders.

Speaker 2 We can't reproduce heart cells in our body, but with stem cell studies, we're learning how to rebuild lost heart muscle. Maybe someday we'll be able to rebuild a whole heart.

Speaker 2 We're developing vaccines to prevent future heart disease, looking at people's genetic makeup and determining whether they should get that vaccine early in life.

Speaker 2 We're using 3D printing to create, for instance, a perfect heart valve match to a patient.

Speaker 1 Someday someday maybe we'll be uh do a 3d uh printing of a an actual whole heart to replace someone's broken heart well i really like how you've approached this topic of the heart really through two lenses the the medical lens of what the heart really is and what it does but also the cultural part of it of how we tie the heart with emotions this was really fun i've been talking to dr vincent figueretto he is a practicing cardiologist and he is author of the book the curious History of the Heart, a Cultural and Scientific Journey.

Speaker 1 And there's a link to that book at Amazon in the show notes. Thank you so much, Vincent.
This was great.

Speaker 1 With the weather getting colder and the holidays upon us, I just want my wardrobe to be easy. Things that look sharp, feel great, and last season after season, which is exactly what I get from Quince.

Speaker 1 I reach for my Quince cashmere sweaters constantly. They're 100% Mongolian cashmere and somehow they're just 50 bucks.
Soft, warm, and the kind of everyday luxury that doesn't feel overdone.

Speaker 1 And their denim is another favorite, great fit, easy to wear, and it holds up beautifully. And if you're looking for a holiday gift to give without the big price tag guilt, Quince is perfect for that.

Speaker 1 Those cashmere sweaters I just mentioned, they make great gifts. And their wool coats, you got to check them out.
They're stylish and durable and their quality is top of the line.

Speaker 1 It's amazing how many people have found Quince and love it. What I love is how Quince works directly with ethical factories and top artisans cutting out the middlemen.

Speaker 1 So you get premium quality at half the cost of other high-end brands. It's luxury without the markup, which means you can give something nice this season or keep it for yourself.

Speaker 1 Give and get timeless holiday staples that last this season with Quince. Go to quince.com/slash sysk for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns.
Now available in Canada too.

Speaker 1 That's quince.com slash sysk free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com slash sysk

Speaker 1 you know my mornings used to be a scramble coffee breakfast trying to remember what supplements to take it was a lot to juggle And now I start every day with a single scoop of AG1 and it's made my morning so much easier and better.

Speaker 1 In one mix, here's what I get. I get nutrients from real whole foods plus prebiotics, probiotics, and enzymes that support my digestion and gut health.

Speaker 1 After just a few weeks, I mean, I can tell it's working. My energy feels steady all day.
I don't have to think about juggling five different pills or powders.

Speaker 1 And what I love is that AG1 isn't just another supplement. It's a daily micro habit that supports whole body health in one scoop.
It's simple, it's consistent, and it fits easily into my routine.

Speaker 1 One scoop, shake, drink, done. And I know I've done something good for myself before the day even starts.
It's become a small ritual that sets the tone for the entire day.

Speaker 1 AG1 helps me stay one scoop ahead. Head to drinkag1.com/slash slash something to get a free welcome kit with an AG1 flavor sampler and a bottle of vitamin D3 plus K2 when you first subscribe.

Speaker 1 That's drinkag1.com slash something.

Speaker 1 Every important situation you find yourself in can cause you to question things. Questions like, can I do this? Do I belong here? What will people think of me?

Speaker 1 How you come to the answers to those questions can have a significant impact on you. It's probably something you haven't thought about a lot, but you're going to find this really enlightening.

Speaker 1 I want you to listen to my guest, Greg Walton. He's co-director of the Dweck Walton Lab and a professor of psychology at Stanford University.

Speaker 1 His work has been covered in major media outlets including the New York Times, the Harvard Business Review, the Wall Street Journal, and many others.

Speaker 1 He's author of a book called Ordinary Magic, The Science of How We Can Achieve Big Changes with Small Acts.

Speaker 1 Hi, Greg. Welcome to Something You Should Know.

Speaker 3 Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 So explain in more detail what this ordinary magic is and how it works.

Speaker 3 The big picture is that all the time in life, we're walking into situations where we face what I call existential or defining questions. Questions like, who am I?

Speaker 3 Can I do it? Do I belong in the spaces that matter to me? In a relationship context, it might be, do you love me? Can I trust you?

Speaker 3 And those questions are pejorative. They're often negatively valenced.

Speaker 3 And when they pop up in our lives, when the situation puts them on the table for us, we tend to see the world through that pejorative lens and we tend to see the negative.

Speaker 3 And that makes us spiral down. And so, interventions like this, this kind of ordinary magic, it's a way to,

Speaker 3 when you can see that question, it's a way to begin to help people to develop better answers to that question so they can set it aside and come to develop their belonging in a space, come to become the kind of person that they're trying to become.

Speaker 1 So, give me an example of that in action, in real life.

Speaker 3 The single best example that I can think of is one from our work on lifting the bar. This was an intervention that is in a very particular problem space.

Speaker 3 And so it might seem kind of removed from people's lives, but I think it's actually really important and applicable.

Speaker 3 This was an exercise that we developed to help kids as they come back to school from juvenile detention

Speaker 3 and to succeed in that process of re-entry.

Speaker 3 And basically what it it is, is that we ask young people who are in this circumstance to tell us about who they are as a person, the values that they have, like to be a good role model for a younger brother or sister, to make their parents proud.

Speaker 3 And then at the end, this is about a 45-minute experience soon in that transition. We give kids a platform.

Speaker 3 We ask them, who's an adult in school who isn't yet, but could be an important source of support for you?

Speaker 3 And what would you like that person to know about who you are as a person, your values, your goals, and challenges you face that that adult could help with?

Speaker 3 And then we take that content and we put it into a letter to that adult. It's a one-page letter, but what that letter says is, all kids need strong relationships with adults to succeed.

Speaker 3 This child has chosen you. Here's what they would like you to know about them.
Please help them in their transition, help them in their experience. Thank you very much for your work.

Speaker 3 And we found in an initial randomized controlled trial that this actually reduced the rate at which kids recidivated back to juvenile detention by 40 percentage points from 69% to 29 percent. Wow.
And

Speaker 3 yeah, and just as important is that it completely shifts the experience for the adult. So this is really an intervention that's designed to unleash the best.
possible self of an adult.

Speaker 3 Imagine you're teaching, you know, English 10th grade, for example, and you get told by the assistant principal that you've got some kid coming back to school, coming back to your class from juvenile detention.

Speaker 3 And what are the thoughts that might course through your mind? Like it's very easy to see. Like you might think, what problems is this kid going to cause? Is he going to cause me difficulties?

Speaker 3 Is he going to disrupt my class? Maybe he might even be violent. And those are not the thoughts that a teacher needs to have when they're interacting with a kid who's in a difficult circumstance.

Speaker 3 And so this is a way to give a kid a platform and say, here's who I really am.

Speaker 3 Here's who I want to be, here's who I want to become. And then the two people can work together to begin to chart a path of growth towards that person.

Speaker 3 So it's a one-page letter, but it transforms the relationship, how both people see each other, and it ultimately transforms the young person's life.

Speaker 1 But this whole idea applies not only to kids in the juvenile justice system, but this applies to everybody

Speaker 1 in life, right?

Speaker 3 Yeah. So one of the founders of Head Star, Man man who is one of my intellectual heroes, Uri Bronfenbrenner,

Speaker 3 said every child needs at least one adult who has an irrational attachment to them.

Speaker 3 And I think Bronfenbrenner understated the case: every person needs at least somebody else who has an irrational attachment to them.

Speaker 3 So, one of the things that we see in close relationship contexts, like romantic relationships, marriages, dating relationships, is that the course of these relationships can vary greatly depending on whether or or not the partners really have an idealistic image of each other.

Speaker 3 In the very best relationships, your partner has this image of you as this, you know, wonderful person, funnier, kinder, more attractive than anybody else

Speaker 3 has, even than you have. And also that image is fitting for you.
It's fitting for who you want to be. And in a relationship, in a very good relationship, you have that image also for your partner.

Speaker 3 And you're each kind of trying to become that wonderful person together. That's the theme in the movie Jerry Maguire.
In the beginning, Jerry Maguire, played by Tom Cruise, is a sports agent, and he

Speaker 3 decides to leave the company that he built, the sports agency that he built. He sees it as a god-forsaken business.
He walks out and he wants to build something honest and true.

Speaker 3 And he invites anybody who'd like to join him to join him. And only one person joins him.
That's the character played by Renee Zelweger.

Speaker 3 And their story is a love story, but it's a story of kind of love in becoming. So Renee Zelwiger's character says to her sister at one point, I love him.

Speaker 3 I love him for the man he almost is. I love him for the man he can become.
I'm paraphrasing. And then at the iconic climax of the movie, he says to her, I love you.
You complete me.

Speaker 3 And that's when the relationship fully coheres. And it's this dynamic in which he's trying to become a better person.
He's trying to become a good person. And she sees that trajectory in him.

Speaker 3 She sees that image of who he could become. And her having that image allows him to realize that.
And it's the same thing in the juvenile justice context.

Speaker 3 If both people start with mistrust and conflict, they're not having a good image of each other.

Speaker 3 But what our intervention does, what that ordinary magic is, is it is an opportunity for a kid to begin to show that image of the good and successful person they hope to become.

Speaker 3 The teacher can then hold that image and hold it up. for the young person as they're going through the challenges of school.

Speaker 3 So for example, in one little detail from that work, we ask teachers, well, imagine that you were in this circumstance and the kid acted out, like not in a big way, but they just fell asleep in class and they refused to do their work.

Speaker 3 What would you do?

Speaker 3 And we find that when teachers get that lifting the barred letter, they're more likely to say things like, I would remind the student of his goals, of the kind of person he's trying to become.

Speaker 3 So you have this kind of image between the two people

Speaker 3 that is a wonderful and beautiful image or is a terrible and nasty image.

Speaker 3 And part of ordinary magic is helping people construct that image that's positive that can help them become the kinds of people individually and together that they want to be.

Speaker 1 Do you think most of us have had an ordinary magic kind of moment on the receiving end of it? Like you said, everybody needs one of these irrational people. But

Speaker 1 have we all experienced it, do you suppose?

Speaker 3 Well, let me ask you this.

Speaker 3 I mean, have when you were a younger person, when you were thinking about who you wanted to become, was there an adult in your life who had a vision of the kind of person you could become before you even had that?

Speaker 3 Maybe at a time when you were struggling or weren't there yet?

Speaker 1 Yeah, I mean, I think my parents filled that role pretty well.

Speaker 3 I hope everybody has that experience and that experience at the right time and in the right way for them.

Speaker 3 I think it is something that a lot of people have, but I also think it's something that some people don't get and don't get at the right time.

Speaker 3 And I think that the juvenile justice example is one example of a particularly terrible circumstance where that's difficult to have.

Speaker 1 What do we do with this? I mean, this is really interesting. And I think it makes people kind of reflect on

Speaker 1 their relationships and how they've dealt with people and how they've been dealt with. But is this then a philosophy by which to live by, or is this something to just notice when you see it?

Speaker 1 Or what do we do with this?

Speaker 3 Yeah, I think

Speaker 3 there's a lot of different kinds of things we can do with this.

Speaker 3 One thing to say is that often when we have experiences of self-doubt, when we ask ourselves icky questions like, maybe you failed at a, maybe somebody said, oh, that's the score you got on that test.

Speaker 3 And you have this shiver of ickiness in your spine, or when you're feeling like, maybe I don't have any friends here.

Speaker 3 Maybe I don't belong in a workspace or a community space or a school space that is important to me. I think the first thing to say is that those questions are typically reasonable.
They're normal.

Speaker 3 They don't need to mean that there's something wrong with you. At the same time, those questions

Speaker 3 need not necessarily be true.

Speaker 3 And sometimes by accepting that you have that question and that it's a reasonable question, you can put it on the table and then you can decide what it really means, how you really want to think about it.

Speaker 1 What are some likely times in life

Speaker 1 that this might pop up? That this is, you know, the more you're aware of it, the maybe the more you could engage with it. But like, like, when would be a, when would be a good time to do that?

Speaker 3 Yeah, so one is definitely challenges. Like you fail a test and then you think, maybe I can't do this.
You get excluded and you think, maybe people like me don't belong here.

Speaker 3 Another time is transitions. So you're going into a new space, like you're going back to school or you're starting a new job, for example.

Speaker 3 When you're in transitions, you're thinking, what is this place? What is valued here? Who am I here? How will I be received here?

Speaker 3 Will I be able to do what I want to do and be who I want to be in this space?

Speaker 3 And then the third has to do with identities and the way that stereotypes can predefine people in different kinds of identity groups and create these anxieties.

Speaker 3 So, in the juvenile justice context, these kids are almost all boys. They are

Speaker 3 largely African-American or other students of color, and they've literally all been incarcerated.

Speaker 3 That's an intersection of stereotypes that is very palpable in our society, and it creates this image up there in the world, in the air,

Speaker 3 that defines who you are and how you might be seen by other people. And so,

Speaker 3 you know, when people are have stereotypes, when the stereotypes are on the table, when people are going through transitions, when there's challenges, these are

Speaker 3 particularly kind of fraught moments.

Speaker 1 And when I'm in one of those fraught moments of, you know, do I belong here? Can I succeed here?

Speaker 1 Then what? What do I do with that?

Speaker 3 Yeah, I think the first thing to do is accept the question.

Speaker 3 Don't try to suppress it. Suppressing it's not going to help.
Accept that you're having the question and presume that that question is a normal and reasonable question.

Speaker 3 And presume that probably other people experience that question, maybe more than you think.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 then start to think about like, what would it mean for me to have growth in addressing this question over time? So, for example, how could I build my belonging in this space?

Speaker 1 And when you do that, what tends to happen?

Speaker 3 So often in our culture, we have the phrase spiraling down,

Speaker 3 but we can also spiral up.

Speaker 3 So if you can think about, for example, building your belonging in a space, then you can ask yourself, what would be communities in this environment that I'd like to get to know better?

Speaker 3 What would be relationships I would like to build? I'll try this.

Speaker 3 In a close relationship context, If you're asking the question, does my partner truly love me? Am I respected by my partner? And then you go into a conflict conversation.

Speaker 3 If those are the questions on your mind, that conflict conversation is going to be difficult to have.

Speaker 3 Your partner says something, you might react

Speaker 3 in a negative way. You might lash out.
You might withdraw. But if you're able to get back to a feeling of basic security about

Speaker 3 that relationship, you can be more pragmatic in addressing the challenges that have come up in the relationship.

Speaker 3 So, for example, one lovely study by a woman named Denise Marigold, who is at the University of Waterloo, had couples in dating relationships think about a compliment their partner had given them immediately before having a conflict conversation.

Speaker 3 And the conversations went vastly better.

Speaker 3 That people were more productive and constructive. There was more love, more humor, less of those kinds of really toxic things that can happen.

Speaker 1 Just by giving a compliment first.

Speaker 3 Not giving a compliment.

Speaker 3 So each member of the couple reflected on a compliment that their partner had previously given them oh it's just like a little yeah at any time it was just like a it was just like a timeout like a way to take a breath before the conversation to get back to the basic security of the relationship and feel that security so that when you go into the conflict conversation, you don't have in the back of your mind, even at an implicit level, some little voice saying,

Speaker 3 maybe this person doesn't truly love me. Maybe this person doesn't truly respect me.
Maybe this person is taking advantage of me or whatever it might be.

Speaker 3 So you can get back to a base level of security. And once you have that base security, you can say something like, hey, Mike, you're always late.

Speaker 3 Like it really bothers me that you're late all the time. Can we talk about how to work through that? And

Speaker 3 it's not a blaming conversation.

Speaker 3 It's a productive, constructive, like

Speaker 3 let's work this out kind of conversation.

Speaker 1 Just reflecting on that compliment just sets that

Speaker 3 tone. Yeah, but at the right time, right at the right time in that case, right before the conflict conversation.

Speaker 1 A lot of this seems to have to do with prejudging, prejudging situations, prejudging other people, prejudging ourselves in those situations,

Speaker 1 that we don't walk into a situation with a clean slate.

Speaker 3 Yeah, and I think that that happens a lot for everybody. There was one study, for example, where a colleague approached Asian American students on a college campus and asked them a single question.

Speaker 3 That question was, do you speak English?

Speaker 3 And then she subsequently gave them a questionnaire in which she asked them how many American TV shows from the 80s they could remember.

Speaker 3 And what she found was that when she asked that question, the Asian American students listed a whole bunch more U.S. TV shows.

Speaker 3 It's like they're saying, you think I'm not an American when you ask that question, but I'm an American.

Speaker 3 And so I think all the time we're walking around, sometimes we're more aware of it, sometimes we're less aware of it, where there are these images that exist about us, that predefine us, that

Speaker 3 might be negative or might put us in a box. And people are trying to contend with that.

Speaker 1 And so the takeaway from this is what is it you want people to get from this?

Speaker 1 It's really fascinating and something no one really thinks much about. But when the dust all settles, what should I do with it?

Speaker 3 Yeah, I mean, I think that these existential questions like literally define the course of our lives. Like questions like, who am I and how am I seen? Am I going to be able to do what I want to do?

Speaker 3 Am I going to be able to belong in the spaces that are going to matter for who I want to be? Am I going to be able to have the kinds of relationships that I want to have? And if we can be

Speaker 3 honest and direct in recognizing those questions when they come up, not to suppress them, but to understand that they come from the context, then that equips us to say, how do we want to think about this?

Speaker 3 What's going to be a productive way to think about this question that I can use to become the person I want to be? I think that can make our individual lives better.

Speaker 3 I think it can make our communities stronger and healthier. And I think it can ultimately bring us together more as a society.

Speaker 1 Well, as I said in the beginning, this isn't the kind of thing you think about a lot.

Speaker 1 But after hearing you talk, I can think about people that I've spoken with, situations I've been in where this kind of ordinary magic could have really come in handy.

Speaker 1 I've been speaking with Greg Walton. He's co-director of the Dweck Walton Lab and a professor of psychology at Stanford.

Speaker 1 The name of his book is Ordinary Magic, the science of how we can achieve big change with small acts. And there's a link to his book in the show notes.
Greg, thank you. Appreciate you coming on.

Speaker 3 Thank you, Mike. I wish you all the best.

Speaker 1 A question that has come up from time to time on this podcast is, what is the difference between a habit and an addiction?

Speaker 1 A habit is not the same thing as an addiction, but it can be just as hard to stop.

Speaker 1 Well, Charles Duhigg, who is author of a very popular book called The Power of Habit, says cigarette smoking is the perfect example.

Speaker 1 We know from research that nicotine addiction lasts 100 hours after your last cigarette. After that, you are no longer truly addicted.

Speaker 1 But plenty of smokers quit for longer than 100 hours and still go back to smoking. Why? Because smoking becomes a habit, and a habit consists of three parts.
Triggers, the behavior, and reward.

Speaker 1 For many smokers, the triggers are things like drinking with friends or that mid-morning cup of coffee or watching TV. Doing those things triggers the desire for cigarettes.

Speaker 1 If you avoid the triggers, it makes quitting much easier. Charles Duhigg says, once you develop a habit, you can never really destroy it.
The best thing you can do is replace it with something else.

Speaker 1 In fact, the research shows that if you just try to stop a habit without replacing it, you are far more likely to fail. And that is something you should know.

Speaker 1 If you will write a review of this podcast and post it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Castbox, wherever, I'll read it. We'll all read it.
And your reviews really help us make a better show.

Speaker 1 So please post a review and give us a rating. Five stars would be the most appreciated.
I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know.

Speaker 3 Ah, the sounds of an Etsy holiday.

Speaker 3 Now that's that's special. Want to hear it again? Get original and affordable gifts from small shops on Etsy.
For gifts that say, I get you, shop Etsy. Tap the banner to shop now.

Speaker 4 Oh, the Regency era. You might know it as the time when Bridgerton takes place, or the time when Jane Austen wrote her books.

Speaker 4 But the Regency era was also an explosive time of social change, sex scandals, and maybe the worst king in British history.

Speaker 4 And on the Vulgar History podcast, we're going to be looking at the balls, the gowns, and all the scandal of the Regency era.

Speaker 4 Vulgar History is a women's history podcast, and our Regency Era series will be focusing on the most rebellious women of this time.

Speaker 4 That includes Jane Austen herself, who is maybe more radical than you might have thought.

Speaker 4 We'll also be talking about queer icons like Anne Lister, scientists like Mary Anning and Ada Lovelace, as well as other scandalous actresses, royal mistresses, rebellious princesses, and other lesser-known figures who made history happen in England in the Regency era.

Speaker 4 Listen to Vulgar History wherever you get podcasts.