Something You Should Know - SYSK Choice: Eat Like an Animal to Lose Weight & Skills for a Healthy Relationship

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Starting point is 00:00:18 That's why there's BetterHelp Online Therapy. Connect with a credentialed therapist by phone, video, or online chat. Visit betterhelp.com to learn more. That's BetterHelp.com. Today on Something You Should Know, what's the first thing you should not do when you get a fever? Then, understanding the science of hunger and how to Use It to Control What You Eat. There isn't a single hunger. You have specific appetites. And if you just think about it, rather than conceiving yourself as being hungry as if

Starting point is 00:00:53 it was a single thing, it's quite extraordinary to watch these appetites working in the natural world. Also, why you probably really need to clean your car's steering wheel and dashboard. And understanding what does and does not make a romantic relationship work. One of the things that we see is that, you know, when people, you know, fall in love, they decide, well, I'm in love, and so this must mean this is the right relationship for me. And love is going to make it work. And it doesn't necessarily make it work. this today on something you should know bumble knows it's hard to start conversations hey no too basic

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Starting point is 00:02:14 Hi, welcome. And we begin this episode of Something You Should Know with a health question. Say you have a fever. What do you do? Or what should you do? In a survey of men, 44% said they would take an over-the-counter fever reducer, and 6% of the men said that they would apply a cool compress to try to bring the fever down. The other 50% said that they would let it run its course. So who did the right thing? Well, according to experts, and this was published in Men's Health, a fever is a good thing most of the time, and you should let it run its course.

Starting point is 00:02:53 An increase of just 1 to 2 degrees in your body temperature boosts the productivity in your immune cells and helps them fight off infection, which is exactly what you want to have happen. So, the general advice is not to interfere with your fever. The exception is you should seek medical help if your fever hits 103 degrees Fahrenheit or higher or is persistent, lasting longer than three days.

Starting point is 00:03:21 And that is something you should know. When you look at animals in the wild, you almost never see overweight animals. Animals generally don't overeat and gain too much weight. They eat enough, just enough. Humans, the supposed smartest species on the planet, can't seem to do that as elegantly and consistently as the animals. Why? Well, maybe there's a lesson there in what the animals are doing. And here to explain exactly what that lesson is, is Stephen Simpson. He is academic director of the Charles Perkins Center and professor in the School of Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Sydney in Australia. He's also author of the book, Eat Like the Animals. Hi, Stephen. Welcome.

Starting point is 00:04:13 Hi, Mike. It's a great pleasure to be here. So what is the message here? It does seem that animals generally don't struggle with weight, but it also seems that finding food is a whole lot harder for animals. So what is it we can learn here? It's the idea that if we were able to do as all animals on the planet do, tap into our fundamental, exquisitely evolved appetite systems and put them in the right food environments, then we, like every other animal on the planet, wouldn't have a problem with obesity and all of the other terrible diseases that are facing the world associated with diet today in the modern environment.

Starting point is 00:04:58 And so what happened? What went wrong? Why are we having such a problem with this? Because people didn't used to have the obesity problem that we have now. We didn't have a lot of the other problems associated with food. So what happened? We've totally lost our way when it comes to our food environment. And I think that's the key point. It's not that we have lost the ability to eat healthily, to eat an appropriate mix of nutrients, a balanced diet. Rather, we've taken the appetite systems that have evolved to allow

Starting point is 00:05:33 us to do that and put them in entirely the wrong food environment. And that's particularly the case since the ultra processing of foods that's occurred, particularly over the last 50 or 60 years. And that's involved as creating a food environment, which isn't even comprised of proper foods. It's deconstructed, manufactured foods that really subvert and if you like, hack our basic biology of appetite. So for example, explain with like real examples what you're talking about. Well, there's a beautiful example. And actually, the example we think has driven and has rather been overlooked in driving the obesity epidemic over the last 50 years.

Starting point is 00:06:21 And that is that if you, as we've done, explore a range of different species in the animal environment, in the natural world, you find that all of them, whether you're a slime mold or a cockroach or a baboon or a human being, have a separate appetite for protein. So we don't have a single hunger. We have appetites for different nutrients, protein, carbohydrate, fat, and two of the mineral nutrients, salt and calcium. And the appetite for protein turns out to be very powerful. And what that means is that your body is trying to get you to eat the optimal amount of protein every day. And it's sending signals to you to do that.

Starting point is 00:07:10 And amongst those signals is to increase the likelihood that you're going to choose something that tastes savoury. So savoury flavours, those so-called umami flavours, are associated with protein in natural foods. And when you need protein, you feel like eating those foods. You get a craving for them. Now, in the modern processed food environment, the nearest source of foods that have those sorts of flavor characteristics are likely things like potato chips with barbecue flavor. So they taste like protein. They give you that sort of hit of umami. But all you're delivering to your system is a pile of

Starting point is 00:07:52 unnecessary carbohydrates and fats. Your protein appetite remains unsatisfied and you keep eating. So you're eating until you get your protein target. And in so doing, you're over consuming other calories in your environment that you don't need. And that is the cause, ultimately, of the rise in obesity. So there's one example. Well, that sounds pretty significant. So you're saying that, you know, when we're hungry for protein and we eat something else, we're going to tend to overeat it because we're not getting it satisfied because it isn't protein. That's a big deal. Turns out, actually, we think to be one of the fundamental discoveries in the understanding of why the world has got so large over the last 50 or 60 years. And it turned on its head. And it really,

Starting point is 00:08:49 if you think about it, it turns completely on its head, the conventional explanation that we overeat fats and carbs. And that's what's driven the obesity epidemic. Well, in one sense, yes, that's true. We've eaten more calories in the form of highly processed fats and carbs. Our protein intake has hardly changed. The source of protein, we eat more meat rather than vegetable proteins as a population, that has changed. But the absolute intake of protein at a population level across the world has remained remarkably stable. So it hasn't contributed protein calories to the obesity epidemic. But what we showed was that because we're regulating our intake of protein so precisely, our bodies do that, that drives us to

Starting point is 00:09:41 eat more fats and carbs in environments where fats and carbs are super abundant. And that's where we find ourselves now. Well, here's what's so interesting to me about this is that you can tell people what you just said. You can tell people that you are trying to satisfy your protein hunger by eating fats and carbs. And you're overeating those things trying to get enough protein. And people can understand that intellectually, but the behavior isn't going to change. People do what people do. Yes. And that's in part because I think there's two reasons for that. One is that we don't have the deep understanding

Starting point is 00:10:25 of what's going on. It's hugely empowering if you know, hang on, I have this capacity. I'm not helpless. Like every other animal on the planet, I've got this beautifully designed appetite system. It's still there. It isn't lost, but it's being hacked. I'm being manipulated

Starting point is 00:10:46 for the commercial benefit of the food industry, not for my own health. So that's a pretty empowering piece of understanding. The idea that if you think about it and you listen to your own, quite literally, listen to your appetites. You can tell when you need protein. You can tell when you need fats or carbs. So that's an empowering thing. The other thing is that we're really at the mercy of the super stimuli that are provided by the ultra processed foods in our environment so you take the fabulous example of if you mix sugar and fat and pretty well equal

Starting point is 00:11:31 proportions and then you add let's say you add amyl acetate which is a compound you'd find in nail polish remover but happens to be the signature chemical you find in in banana. You mix that and chill it down and churn it, and you've got industrially produced banana ice cream. It has no nutritional value whatsoever, but it tastes fantastic because it hits what's called the bliss point, the point of mixture of fats and carbs and a little bit of salt, which evokes the most fantastic dopamine

Starting point is 00:12:06 rush in your brain. So we've designed as a society foods that stimulate us to find them super normally palatable and wonderful. And that's virtually impossible to resist. The only way you can resist it is by putting your appetite systems back in a whole food healthy environment. And be aware that these foods are designed to subvert you, to hack you. Why do you think it is so difficult? What goes on in the human mind that makes it so hard to create that environment at home you know the there's the always the advice that you know if you don't want to eat junk don't bring it into the house but people still bring it into the house why is it that we can't not bring it into the house that's such an important question. There's extremely aggressive marketing of these products.

Starting point is 00:13:06 You walk into a supermarket nowadays and instead of there the US, as we did a little while ago, there's a big chunk of the population of the US who are consuming 80 or 90% of their calories in the form of these so-called ultra processed foods. That's an extraordinary number. The average for the population in the US, as it is in the UK and here in Australia, is more than 50%. So 50% of our calories are coming in these manufactured foods where all of the cues that our biology has come to expect have been broken and dislocated. So there's no fiber to give us the break on appetite. There's unnatural flavor combinations that make them taste extraordinary. There are diminished levels of mineral nutrients and protein which drive through our protein appetites over consumption. And I think telling

Starting point is 00:14:19 that story, which is what I guess our 30 years of research has done, is a really important part of this because one of the reasons we find it so difficult to engage properly with our food environment and are therefore prey to finding it so easy and convenient to eat this junk food is that we've just become terribly confused. Well, I think you're right there. I mean, there is a lot of confusion when it comes to what we should eat and what we shouldn't eat and when we should eat it. I'm speaking with Stephen Simpson, and he is author of the book Eat Like the Animals.

Starting point is 00:15:01 Since I host a podcast, it's pretty common for me to be asked to recommend a podcast. And I tell people, if you like something you should know, you're going to like The Jordan Harbinger Show. Every episode is a conversation with a fascinating guest. Of course, a lot of podcasts are conversations with guests, but Jordan does it better than most. Recently, he had a fascinating conversation with a British woman who was recruited and radicalized by ISIS and went to prison for three years. She now works to raise awareness on this issue. It's a great conversation.

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Starting point is 00:16:17 ideas and perspectives. So I want to tell you about a podcast that is full of new ideas and perspectives, and one I've started listening to called Intelligence Squared. It's the podcast where great minds meet. Listen in for some great talks on science, tech, politics, creativity, wellness, and a lot more. A couple of recent examples, Mustafa Suleiman, the CEO of Microsoft AI, discussing the future of technology. That's pretty cool. And writer, podcaster, and filmmaker John Ronson, discussing the rise of conspiracies and culture wars. Intelligence Squared is the kind of podcast that gets you thinking a little more openly about the important conversations going on today.

Starting point is 00:17:03 Being curious, you're probably just the type of person Intelligence Squared is meant for. Check out Intelligence Squared wherever you get your podcasts. So Stephen, given all that you've said about the way people should eat, like the animals, in a very practical way, by doing what? What should we start doing? So the very first thing is to take heart. It's a good news story that we have these appetite systems.

Starting point is 00:17:35 Learn about what they are. There isn't a single hunger. You have specific appetites for these five different nutrients. Learn to listen to them and nutrients learn to listen to them and start list trying to listen to them because they're there and they're trying to tell you things but they're it's it's really difficult to know what to listen for until you attend to them so understanding that is really fundamental the second thing is to take charge of your food environment. Don't try and fight the junk food industries because you'll never win. They've designed, we, humanity, has designed

Starting point is 00:18:13 these foods so that they're unable to be resisted. So the only way to resist them is to keep them out of your food environment. So let your brain ensure that your pantry and refrigerator are stocked with good, wholesome foods. Then let your appetites do the rest. You don't need to count calories. You don't need diet books. If you surround yourself with whole foods, avoid snacking between meals.

Starting point is 00:18:42 Try not to eat overnight. So don't wake up in the middle of the night and confuse your biology by eating then. In that way, in those sorts of ways, you're going to expose this extraordinary appetite system that we have and we share with every other species on the planet to a food environment of which they're able to work their magic. They actually know what it means because that's the environment in which they were designed. And so you talked about these five appetites, different appetites that we all have. And you said that we have this protein appetite and what we often do is grab the barbecue flavored potato chip. So what should we do instead? That's what we're not supposed to do, but what's the advice on what to do? Well, in that case, if you have a protein appetite, if you're feeling like you need to eat

Starting point is 00:19:40 something with those savory qualities, then reach for high quality whole food protein foods. Now, if you're a vegetarian, you can achieve that through eating nuts and lentils and pulses and beans. If you're an omnivore or a carnivore, it will be someone like me who will eat fish and meat then you choose good quality fish meat poultry whatever their sources eggs dairy they all contain high quality protein so how is it okay I don't really have a sense of these different appetites like when I get hungry I think of myself as hungry and I'll go find something to eat. I don't know what it feels like to have a protein hunger versus a carb hunger versus

Starting point is 00:20:31 something else. So can you help me get a better feel for that? Every time you start to think I'm feeling hungry, ask yourself the question, do I feel hungry for something that tastes savory? So, you know, a steak or an omelet or a packet of barbecue chips, that is an example of something that would have those characteristics. Or am I feeling like something a bit more starchy or a bit sweeter or something a bit that has a bit of mouthfeel that would be associated with fat? Or am I craving something salty? That's a very powerful specific appetite that we have for sodium. And if you just think about it, rather than conceiving yourself as being hungry as if it was a single thing, but rather think, well, what sort of hungry am I? Then you'll start to see these things. And in operation, it's just

Starting point is 00:21:33 quite extraordinary to watch these appetites actually working in the natural world. So, for example, David Robenheimer, who's my co-author on this book, has done the most extraordinarily beautiful work in following primates in the wild. And, for example, he and colleagues followed a single chacma baboon in South Africa. And she, over a period of 30 days, they recorded everything that she ate. She ate more than 90 different foods. And it looked like a complete random selection. She was wandering around the environment just eating anything that came to hand.

Starting point is 00:22:19 But when you analyzed it, she was tracking like a nutrient-seeking missile a precise ratio of protein to fats and carbs. And she was choosing those foods unknowingly. She doesn't have a diet book or a dietetics degree or a computer or an app. She's doing this as a result of these appetites working together in their environment to guide her to a healthy diet. We are in a world where we've confused those appetites and we need to start really going back to listening to them. And so that's the first thing, knowing they're there. So from this conversation, Mike, you can go back and really ask yourself the question every time you feel hungry, what do I feel hungry for? There's something important being told to you there. And so once again, very quickly, the five hungers are what? Protein, carbohydrate and fat, so they're the three so-called macronutrients, and sodium

Starting point is 00:23:28 or salt, and calcium is the other one. And do they all show up the same, at the same level, or do we feel one more than the other? I'm thinking maybe the protein is the one we feel most often? Protein is the strongest of the five appetites. And if you force your appetites to have to compete, it will win. If you allow them to work together, they'll all work together to guide you to an optimal diet. Well, I think we've all heard before about the importance of the environment, the food environment in your home, the old saying of, you know, if you don't want to eat junk, don't bring

Starting point is 00:24:11 it into your house, and then you can't eat it because it's not in your house. And this really seems to speak to that. Now, as you said, that that ain't as easy as it sounds in the modern world. But putting yourself in the right food environment is something over which you really do have control. It's much harder to fight your biology than it is to work with it. Well, it's a really different and unique and empowering way to look at food and how we eat it. And you've got the science to back it all up. Stephen Simpson has been my guest. He is a professor in the School of Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Sydney in Australia.

Starting point is 00:24:56 And his book is called Eat Like the Animals. And you will find a link to that book in the show notes. Thanks for being here, Stephen. Thanks so much, Mike. I really appreciate it. I've enjoyed the chat very much. Thank you. Do you love Disney? Then you are going to love our hit podcast, Disney Countdown. I'm Megan, the Magical Millennial. And I'm the Dapper Danielle. On every episode of our fun and family-friendly show, we count down our top 10 lists of all

Starting point is 00:25:22 things Disney. There is nothing we don't cover. We are famous for rabbit holes, Disney themed games, and fun facts you didn't know you needed, but you definitely need in your life. So if you're looking for a healthy dose of Disney magic, check out Disney Countdown wherever you get your podcasts. Hey everyone, join me, Megan Rinks. And me, Melissa Demonts, for Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong? Each week, we deliver four fun-filled shows. In Don't Blame Me, we tackle our listeners' dilemmas with hilariously honest advice. Then we have But Am I Wrong?, which is for the listeners that didn't

Starting point is 00:25:56 take our advice. Plus, we share our hot takes on current events. Then tune in to see you next Tuesday for our listener poll results from But Am I Wrong? And finally, wrap up your week with Fisting Friday, where we catch up and talk all things pop culture. Listen to Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. I imagine everyone who goes into a relationship or a marriage goes into it with the best of intentions, a hope of good things to come, a blissful, compatible partnership. And yet, it often doesn't work out that way. Things go wrong, people drift apart, relationships sour. So how do you prevent that? And how do you fix it if

Starting point is 00:26:46 it happens? Well, here with some insightful advice is Joanne Davila. She's been studying and speaking about romantic relationships for some time. She's a professor at Stony Brook University and author of a book called The Thinking Girl's Guide to the Right Guy. And she has a great TED Talk on the skills for healthy romantic relationships. Hi, Joanne. Welcome to Something You Should Know. Thank you. It's so nice to be here. So I think there are people who are in relationships and other people who have gotten out of relationships who look at those people who have been in relationships for a long time,

Starting point is 00:27:26 and they still look so happy and lovey-dovey. And they look upon those people with envy. Like, how do they do it? Why does it seem so easy for them? One thing is that people often look at others and think that so much is better with them. But that may not always be the case. It's easy for us to just look at others and say, oh, that looks so terrific. Why can't I have it? That said, we do need to examine what we're doing in our relationship to see if we're really being skillful and to actually make sure we've picked the right person.

Starting point is 00:27:55 Well, how do you pick the right person? How do you know if you've picked the right person? What's the process for finding the right person? And is there one right person, do you think? That's a great question. There's one interesting study that was done that looked at newlywed couples and they asked them right when they had gotten married if they had any reservations about their partner and about going forward with it. And then they followed these couples over time. And it turns out that the couples or the partners who said they had reservations at the time were the ones who were least happy and most likely to get divorced

Starting point is 00:28:38 eventually. So studies like that really tell us that we need to pay attention to our intuition early on before we really make a commitment if we're not exactly sure. And yet, how often have we heard the advice, you're being too picky. You're waiting for the perfect person to come along and they're never going to come along. You need to find someone and settle down and that flies in the face of what you just said. Yeah, that's totally true. And people are always saying those kinds of things. And I think they're two different problems. And I think in today's world, particularly where we have access to online dating and these kinds of things, there are some data that suggests that people have the sense of, oh, there could be something better. Let me just keep looking and keep looking.

Starting point is 00:29:28 So that's one problem. But the other problem is that sometimes people get in a relationship and then they just stay in it no matter what. One of the things that we see is that, you know, when people, you know, fall in love, they decide, well, I'm in love, and so this must mean this is the right relationship for me. And love is going to make it work. And it doesn't necessarily make it work. Well, it's always interested me that there seems to be like a flaw in the process. The things that attract us to people often have nothing to do with whether or not they would make a good long-term partner. You know, you hear that women who are attracted to bad boys are men who will overlook a lot

Starting point is 00:30:12 because they're attracted to a woman's looks. And these things don't have anything to do or very little to do with whether or not they would be a good partner for a long time. Exactly. People often pay attention to the more superficial or surface-level things in the attraction phase. You know, what does the person look like? What kind of job do they have? You know, things like that.

Starting point is 00:30:42 You know, you ask people, what do you want in a relationship? And those are the kinds of things they'll tell you. Oh, I want somebody who's this height or who looks this way or, you know, has this kind of job. And not that those things aren't important. Obviously, we need to be with people that we're attracted to and that, you know, fit those kinds of criteria. But what we really need to be looking for are the more underlying qualities that are going to be able to tell us whether someone's actually going to meet our needs and treat us with respect and allow us to feel safe in a relationship and, you know, be able to support us when we need and, you know, those kinds of things that lead to a more long-term, sustainable relationship.

Starting point is 00:31:27 In the case of being in a relationship that you want it to go well, or you want it to get better, or maybe it's kind of gotten less than good out of neglect, where do you even start? Where's the starting point to fix something like that? Well, one important thing is that people really need to pay attention to their relationship before it gets to that point. This is a lot of what we see in couples therapy. By the time people come to couples therapy, things are so bad that they hate each other, they hate each other. They're blaming each other. They're not sure they want to be in the relationship.

Starting point is 00:32:08 And so now they're at a point where repairing is pretty difficult. I mean, fortunately, we have some good couples therapies that can work. But I always say that we need to pay close attention early on so we can start to, like, take care of our relationship in a more preventative way, just the way we might go for prevention checkups to the doctor or make sure we're getting our teeth cleaned before they fall out of our mouth, something like that. We want to pay attention to our relationship so that we can be working on it, strengthening it, checking in on it all along

Starting point is 00:32:42 so it doesn't get to that sort of point of no return. But once it's there, what in a day-to-day, very practical way can people begin to repair what might have gone wrong? Yeah. Well, so one of the things that I've been studying and that I work on a lot is the idea that we can bring a set of skills to relationships that we can then use broadly as a framework to help us think about how to approach our relationships differently. So I call these skills insight, mutuality, and emotion regulation.

Starting point is 00:33:18 And insight is the kind of skill that lets us really start to look and think carefully and reflect and try to understand our own behaviors and our partner's behaviors. Mutuality is another really important one. That's basically the idea that there's two people in this relationship and both people have needs, and we've got to pay attention to both people's needs. And then emotion regulation is about managing your feelings in response to the things that happen in relationships. And if people can start to become insightful and take their partner's perspective as well as their own and start to deal with some of their intense feelings that they may have about what's going on in their relationship, these are the kinds of skills that I think can really help people manage in good times and in bad times.

Starting point is 00:34:06 And so how do you, but how do you do them? How do you, on a very practical day-to-day level, what is it that you do differently than you're doing now to apply those skills? Yeah. Well, one of the things that I think you need to do is you need to sort of stop and observe what's going on. We act very automatically in our lives in general and in our relationships. So we get into patterns where it's just, you know, something happens and the pattern just starts and we just go with it. And without stopping to think like,

Starting point is 00:34:39 wait a minute, what's happening here? What's my part in this? What am I doing? What's my partner's part in this? Are we getting what we want out of this interaction? Can we step back and think about is there a different way to do this? So I think that's really important, and that's kind of the insight piece of things. Because ultimately what we want people to be able to do is instead of being blaming of each other and sort of stuck on opposite sides of problems, we want to help them to be able to say, all right, you know what, we're in this together. Let's step away from this.

Starting point is 00:35:17 Let's actually look at the problem as something outside of us that we have to deal with as a couple rather than blaming each other for everything that's going on. And these things are really hard to do. Sometimes couples can't do them without, you know, help from a therapist. But if they start to think more about like, you know, hang on, it doesn't have to go this way. How can I stop? How can I think about this differently? How can I see my partner's side? That might be a good step in helping them change things. Well, and how hard is that to say, if you've been blaming your partner for everything that's gone wrong, it's kind of hard to say, well, let me look at it from your side.

Starting point is 00:35:56 Oh, I see. Super hard. Yeah. That's why I think we need to teach people these skills before, you know, early on, so that they understand the idea and they can go into relationships, That's why I think we need to teach people these skills before, you know, early on, so that they understand the idea and they can go into relationships thinking about being, you know, skillful in these ways and create relationships based on that, rather than just having to try to implement them when it's really difficult to. You use the phrase, and I've heard this very often in discussions about relationships,

Starting point is 00:36:26 about getting your needs met. And I wonder if people even know what that means, what their needs are, what it means to meet the needs of someone else. It's a very catchy phrase that gets used a lot that I think doesn't mean anything to almost anybody. I agree with you because people have very different ideas about what that might mean, and oftentimes they don't even know what their own needs are. So one of the things that I like to try and help people do is really try to figure that out. And so in my work, I've come up with a list of some core needs that I like to try and teach people about them. Not that they'll be right for everybody or everybody will want every one of those needs met in their relationship, but at least if they start with some core ones, like security and safety is a really core need.

Starting point is 00:37:25 If you're in a relationship where you don't feel safe physically or emotionally, that's a real problem. You know, being authentic is an important need in most relationships, particularly like long-term committed ones. Being able to like really show yourself to that other person and have them do the same. So I like to get people, I like to try and teach people what some of these core needs are so they can start to say, hey, is that happening in my relationship? Do I want that? Rather than just leaving it up to them with this idea of whatever their needs happen to be. You also use the term authentic, to be authentic in your relationship,

Starting point is 00:38:07 and I think that's another thing people struggle with, because, I mean, I'm being authentic with you right now, but this isn't how I am with my kids. I'm being authentic with them, but it's very different than how I talk to other people. So what does it mean to be authentic? It could mean to be vulnerable with somebody, to be able to show who you really are deep inside. And we know from couples therapy that the ability for partners to really show what they're feeling in a vulnerable kind of way, what that does is it lets the other person understand them in a way that reduces blame. If, you know, if I see, you know, my partner is just being a jerk because of how they're behaving, but then they reveal something vulnerable about how, you know, it's actually that they're really afraid and they're afraid because of some, you know, early experience they might have had in their family where they felt abandoned. I'm going to feel much more empathic, right?

Starting point is 00:39:18 I'm going to, that's going to increase mutuality. That's going to make me think, wow, you know, this person isn't a jerk. They're actually struggling. And so I'm going to come to the situation in a much more open way, in a much less angry way. So I think that's one of the ways that being authentic can be really important in relationships. What about when it's a couple that things have been kind of withering on the vine for so long that there really isn't a whole lot of motivation to fix anything? Because it's going to take some effort, and the thinking is, well, we've tried this before. It's never worked, and so it is what it is, and it sucks, and that's just it.

Starting point is 00:40:04 Well, if couples can't or don't want to change, then we can work with them on acceptance. And oftentimes that's a very real situation that people say, like you said, this is it. And if that's the case, then the question would be, well, can you accept this? Can you live with this? Without wishing that it would change magically somehow or secretly hoping that one day, you know, you'll wake up and your partner will be a different person, right? That's not acceptance at all. That's sort of a, you know, fantasies about what could be. But true acceptance is about saying, you know what,

Starting point is 00:40:41 this is what I got. This is who this person is, this is who I am, and we are going to agree that we're just going to go with this. And, you know, for some couples, maybe couples that have been together a long time or who are financially dependent on each other, you know, have children, maybe that's a decision they want to make, but they need to make it consciously and realistically without living in some fantasy about how it might actually be different. In your work, if you had to, and this probably isn't really a fair question, but if you had to summarize why relationships go wrong, what path they go down, where they turn off the main path and head down to trouble?

Starting point is 00:41:29 Where is it? When is it? What is it, if it is? Yeah, that is a very tough question, because there's not one answer about that. Things can go wrong at lots of steps along the way, but the more important thing is to really prevent things from going wrong as soon as we can. So to be paying attention early on to little indicators of when you start to get angry at something and you just, you know, decide, I don't even want to talk about that, or when, you know, a partner does something and, you know, you have a fight about it and then you just don't follow up and talk it through. So being proactive,

Starting point is 00:42:13 really trying to resolve things before they go so far down the road that it's really hard to return from it is really very important. Don't you wonder sometimes, so many relationships, you know, we hear about half of marriages end in divorce, so many relationships have so many problems. Is it really, why do we keep doing this? Why don't people say, you know, and I guess a lot more people are saying, maybe that's not for me. Maybe I don't want to be married to, and I guess a lot more people are saying, maybe that's not for me. Maybe I don't want to be married to one person for the rest of my life. A lot more people are making that choice.

Starting point is 00:42:52 We have so many choices about what kinds of relationships or non-relationships we can have these days for the very reason that you're talking about. But the fact remains that for most people, we crave and we need connection with someone else. Social relationships are such a key part of the fabric of our society and our lives, and they really help us and sustain us. So we need them. But I do think we've put so much emphasis on, you know, one type of relationship and how it should be the end-all and be-all and give us everything in our lives that we could possibly need or want, and I think that's unrealistic. I think that if we thought about relationships in a broader way and really recognized what different kinds of relationships could give us, it would actually take the pressure off, you know, our romantic relationships and our romantic partners

Starting point is 00:43:51 have to be everything for us. Well, I don't think there's a person in the world who's ever been in a relationship who hasn't struggled with managing it and making it happy and getting it to go right for everybody. So it's good to get your insight into this. Joanne Davila has been my guest. She is a professor at Stony Brook University. She's author of the book, The Thinking Girl's Guide to the Right Guy. And she has a great TED Talk on the skills for healthy romantic relationships. There is a link to her book and to the TED Talk in the show notes

Starting point is 00:44:25 for this episode. Did you know that you have millions of other passengers in your car you didn't invite? Bacteria. According to research by microbiologists from Aston University in Birmingham, England, the steering wheel, geararshift, and dashboard are crawling with germs. And if you have kids, imagine all the germs crawling around the seats and other surfaces. So when you wash your car, make sure to clean all the surfaces where germs could be lurking. And if you tend to keep your windows closed to keep the elements out, don't forget to let some new air in from time to time. And in between cleanings, you might want to give your interior a once-over with a disinfectant spray,

Starting point is 00:45:12 or at least wipe down the steering wheel, gear shift, and dash. And that is something you should know. As a listener to Something You Should Know, one of the best things you can do to help us continue to grow our audience and keep putting out episodes is to tell someone, just one or two people that you know that would like this podcast and let them give a listen. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager, but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced. She suspects connections to a powerful religious group.

Starting point is 00:46:02 Enter federal agent V.B. Loro, who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law, her religious convictions, and her very own family.

Starting point is 00:46:19 But something more sinister than murder is afoot, and someone is watching Ruth. Chinook, starring Kelly Marie Tran and Sanaa Lathan. Listen to Chinook wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Jennifer, a founder of the Go Kid Go Network. At Go Kid Go, putting kids first is at the heart of every show that we produce. That's why we're so excited to introduce a brand new show to our network called The Search for the Silver Lining, a fantasy adventure series about a spirited young girl named Isla who time travels to the mythical land of Camelot. Look for The Search for the Silver Lining on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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