Something You Should Know
How Your Beliefs Drive Success & The Science Behind Keeping Your Brain Sharp
09 Mar 2026
Chapter 1: How much money are Americans wasting on food each year?
Today on Something You Should Know, how you may be throwing away up to $1,500 without even realizing it. Then, how to stop your limiting beliefs from sabotaging your success and happiness.
Many of these limiting beliefs that we have, you know, I'm not a morning person, I'm always late, stress is bad, the world is dying, I'm too old, too young, too fat, it's too late. The hallmark of these limiting beliefs is that they reduce our motivation and they increase suffering.
Also, how to get someone to do you a favor. And is memory loss and cognitive decline inevitable? Not necessarily.
45% of dementia cases in the world can be prevented by addressing 14 factors. And those 14 factors include diabetes, obesity, sedentary lifestyle, air pollution, hearing loss, vision loss.
All this today on Something You Should Know.
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Chapter 2: What are limiting beliefs and how do they affect us?
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Listen to Vulgar History, Regency era, wherever you get podcasts. something you should know fascinating intel the world's top experts and practical advice you can use in your life today something you should know with mike carruthers if you would like to get a raise without asking your boss you might find one in your kitchen
Hi, I'm Mike Carruthers. Welcome to Something You Should Know. The average American household wastes hundreds of pounds of food every year. According to the U.S.
Chapter 3: How can we identify and change our limiting beliefs?
Department of Agriculture, a family of four loses about $1,500 per year on food that never gets eaten. Groceries that sat too long in the fridge or got shoved to the back of the shelf or were tossed out because of confusing expiration dates. And it's not just leftovers. Across the U.S., about 30 to 40 percent of the food supply, the entire food supply, goes uneaten.
It's the result of loss and waste from the farm to the table. It's interesting that we're pretty careful at the grocery store, at the checkout line, about how much we're paying for food. But once that food gets home, these small losses really add up. A wilted bunch of lettuce here, forgotten leftovers there, and all those dollars go straight in the trash.
The good news is being aware of this problem and making some obvious small changes in how you shop, store, and plan your meals can dramatically cut waste and quietly put cash back in your pocket. And that is something you should know. What you believe. Your beliefs quietly run your life.
What you believe about yourself, what you're capable of, what you deserve, what's possible, all shape the choices you make and the risks you're willing to take. The problem is that many of us treat our beliefs like facts, but they're not.
Chapter 4: Is cognitive decline inevitable as we age?
If you believe you're bad with money, you avoid investing. If you believe you're not leadership material, you don't apply for that job. If you believe something is impossible for you, you never even try. And that belief becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. So where do these beliefs come from? Why do we cling to them, even when they limit us? And more importantly, how do you change them?
Nir Eyal has spent years studying the intersection of psychology, behavior, and human potential. He's taught at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and written multiple best-selling books. His latest is called Beyond Belief, the science-backed way to stop limiting yourself and achieve breakthrough results.
And he's here to explain how to identify the hidden beliefs holding you back and replace them with ones that actually move you forward.
Chapter 5: What lifestyle factors can help prevent dementia?
Hi Nir, welcome back to Something You Should Know. Hi Mike, great to be here. So to kick off this conversation, let me just ask you to state your case, state your premise of what it is you're trying to get across to people.
Yeah, my assertion is that beliefs are tools, not truths. Beliefs are tools, not truths. And that most of our interpersonal problems, our personal problems, our political problems come from this misunderstanding of what beliefs are. That beliefs are not facts. Facts are objective truths. They're true even if you don't believe in them.
Beliefs, however, are convictions that are open to revision based on new evidence. And we could live a lot better lives if we held these beliefs lightly and recognized these hidden limiting beliefs that we all carry around with us that hurt us, that hurt our relationships and make the world a worse place.
Chapter 6: How does exercise influence brain health?
And then we would be a lot better off if we turn those limiting beliefs into what I call liberating beliefs.
Great. Well said. So give me some examples of limiting beliefs that many of us may have. that we don't necessarily realize are limiting, but they just are beliefs.
The most common one I hear these days is there just isn't enough time. That's probably the most common one. But I hear, you know, some version of that. It's too late. I'm not good enough. I'm not sure how to do this. This hurts. The world sucks. Exercise is terrible.
Chapter 7: What are the five pillars of brain health?
I have this diagnosis that prevents me from doing it. You know, I'm a Sagittarius. I'm not a morning person. I They're not facts. They're based on belief. I sure don't want to meet that guy. God. Well, this was me, actually.
You're meeting that guy because this is exactly what I have learned over the past several years, that I used to have these beliefs that I thought were facts, and they weren't.
Chapter 8: How can simple changes improve cognitive function?
They were just in my head, and they were keeping me down.
So these beliefs that we have, well, wait a minute. If somebody says some of those things that you just said, like, you know, I have this diagnosis or, you know, it's too late because I'm 85 years old and I don't think I can make the Olympic team. You know, those aren't beliefs. Those are truths.
They can be, they can be, right. But most of our life decisions are not based on these truths, that truths are objective, right? The world is more like a sphere than it is flat. That's a fact, doesn't care what you think. Then we have matters of faith. Matters of faith are convictions that do not require evidence. But beliefs are these things that we base our decisions on.
that don't have fact behind them. They're about something that happens in the future oftentimes. So for example, should I marry this person? Should I take that job? Should I buy this product? These are all things that are decisions we make that are not based on fact, they are based on beliefs.
And many of these limiting beliefs that we have, I'm not a morning person, I'm always late, stress is bad, the world is dying, I'm too old, too young, too fat, it's too late, whatever you might have. These limiting beliefs, a hallmark of these limiting beliefs is that they reduce our motivation and they increase suffering.
Whereas a liberating belief increases our motivation and reduces our suffering. So if most of our life decisions are based on these beliefs, we better get them right. Now, the definition of a belief is that they are open to revision based on evidence. Of course, they are not blind faith. So we do need to take into account what reality tells us.
But for the vast majority of our decisions in life, it is really a matter of belief. And so when I hold a belief, let's take, for example, aging. We know that people who have a negative view of aging live seven and a half years less. Now, to put this in perspective, seven and a half years, this effect of just having positive versus negative beliefs around aging,
That effect of seven and a half years is a bigger impact than the effect of diet, the effect of exercise, or the effect of stopping smoking. But for all we hear about diet, exercise, and smoking, we almost never hear about changing your beliefs. Well, what does a negative versus a positive belief around aging sound like?
A positive belief around aging might sound something like growth is possible at any age. Okay, that's a positive belief around aging. Growth is possible at any age. A negative view of aging might be something like aging involves inevitable decline. Now, which of those is true? They're both true, right? They're both facts.
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