Something You Should Know
The Surprising Power of Hope & The Science of Your Sixth Sense
20 Nov 2025
Chapter 1: Why don't more cars have gull-wing doors?
Today on Something You Should Know, why don't more cars have those gull-wing doors like on a DeLorean in Back to the Future? Then, how hope works and why hope is such a powerful force.
When you think of the absence of hope, you realize in that moment how powerful hope is because it doesn't solve our problems magically, but it activates the parts of our minds that help us solve them.
Also, how a single fruit fly can destroy an expensive glass of wine in seconds. And you may not realize it, but you have a sixth sense. It's called interoception.
So our sight and our hearing and our other senses, they are extraceptive. They tell us about the external world. Interoception tells you what's going on inside your own body. So it's kind of the center of our personal universe.
All this today on Something You Should Know.
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So one of the cool and notable things about Doc and Marty's flying DeLorean in Back to the Future is the way the doors on the DeLorean open.
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Chapter 2: What is the extraordinary power of hope?
They open up. They are gull-wing doors. But there aren't very many other cars with gull-wing doors. Why is that? Well, that's the question we're going to start with on today's episode. Hi, I'm Mike Carruthers, and this is Something You Should Know. So over the years, there have been some other cars that have gull-wing doors. There's a Tesla. There's, I think, a couple of Mercedes.
The Aston Martin Bulldog have, like the DeLorean, gull-wing doors that open up instead of out, like on most passenger cars. But since they do look kind of cool, you wonder, well, why don't more cars have them? Well, there are a lot of reasons why more cars don't have them. First of all, they're hard to design well. A door that opens up defies gravity.
They tend to leak in the rain, and there are a host of other design challenges. They're not insurmountable, but they are tough to get just right.
Chapter 3: What is interoception and why is it important?
And a traditional hinge door, like most of us have, gets around all of those problems. Gullwing doors are also annoying to use. Unless they're powered doors, like on the Tesla, you have to reach up and pull them down. If you're a kid or you have short arms, you may not be able to do that, or at least not easily. And then there's the safety issue.
Federal safety standards mandate that doors be designed in a way that it's feasible to open them after a rollover crash. Getting gull-wing doors to comply with that mandate is difficult. But the easy solution is don't have gull-wing doors. Which is why most cars don't. And that is something you should know. Have you ever felt hopeless?
It's one of the worst feelings there is, that heavy sense of despair when you can't see a good outcome ahead. I think we've all been there, and moments like that show us just how vital hope really is. Hope is what gets you up in the morning and what keeps you moving forward, even when things look bleak. But what exactly is hope? How does it work?
And how can we find hope in those situations when all hope seems to be lost? My guest, Dr. Julia Garcia, is a psychologist and a behavioral researcher, and she is author of the book, The Five Habits of Hope, Stories and Strategies to Help You Find Your Way. Hi, Julia. Welcome.
Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be here.
Well, this is so interesting because when I think about hope, I don't think about hope. The only time I think about hope is when I feel hopeless, when it's gone, like you don't appreciate it until it's not there. And I imagine, as I said, that everybody has had that feeling of hopelessness, which feels terrible. And yet when you feel it, you feel like you're all alone.
Yes, 100%. It's like there's a way to get hopeless. There's things that happen. Sometimes people try and steal our hope, right? Like there are things that happen over time. And this compounds, I call these hope blocks. And these things compound over time. They can be external. They could be internal. And when they compound, what happens is it blocks our way to have hope again.
And so it doesn't really discriminate. It could be any time, unplanned. You could just have this feeling of hopelessness. And if we don't have a process to navigate out of it, then that's when it can become concerning.
My sense is that because I have felt hopeless in my life, but it always passes. And it's not that I'm trying to get rid of it. It's just that you have one of those days where you're feeling hopeless and you're struggling and life doesn't seem so great. But tomorrow is... to throw around some cliches.
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Chapter 4: How can interoception improve our health and well-being?
who was like a brother to me, we grew up together. He, at 18 years old, I was 19. No, he was 19, I was 18 years old, and he died from an overdose on drugs. And I couldn't change that outcome. I was devastated. I still will always be. And hope doesn't change that hurt. It doesn't make it any more or less painful. But it's given me hope.
a way to repurpose that pain, which is one of the habits of hope. And it has inspired a lot of the work I do professionally with prevention programs and having conversations about issues and building awareness around things. and giving me hope that maybe in all of that pain that I can repurpose it and potentially prevent someone else's life from being taken by drugs.
And so, no, having hope even after devastation and loss, something that can never be changed, it didn't change the pain, but it gave me a path forward through it.
Well, that's great. That's a great story. Well, it's a horrible story, but it's a great story. One of the situations that I have always had trouble with, so I lost both of my parents and was with both of them when they died. I'm sorry to hear that.
And there's that point in the process when someone's dying from a disease where you're hopeful, you're hopeful, maybe this treatment will work, maybe that treatment will work. And then there's that point where nothing's going to work. And I can't make that turn. Like, I keep thinking there's got to be something. And everybody else in the room is thinking, no, there really isn't.
And I can't do it. I can't do it.
You can't not have the hope is what you're saying?
Right. I can't not have the hope. And I cannot join the conversation about, well, he lived a long life, he had a good run, it's his time. I can't let go of the hope and kind of hate that everyone else has.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. Because in that you're still, and I think that this goes back to one of the like debunking the myths on hope is like, you don't have to have like this insane amount of it. You don't have to have a bunch and it doesn't have to make you be happy. You don't have to be happy to have hope. And I hope is about honesty and that's where you're honestly at.
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Chapter 5: How can we build more hope in our lives?
And there's a that being in the digital era is a huge reason why people are isolating more. They're isolating in this comfort, even if they have this innate desire to connect. And that what we can do when we're feeling that way is do basically the hardest thing possible. And it's to have that courageous connection with someone to tap in support. to build our pillars of support around us.
And it doesn't have to be a ton of people. It could be like one or two people. But when we have hope besides each other, it strengthens it. And it also keeps us accountable. And we enjoy the journey a lot more when we can build the relationships that we innately desire.
You know, what's interesting about this is, you know, hope is one of those things like you can't argue with it.
Chapter 6: How do fruit flies detect wine so quickly?
Hope is wonderful. It's great to have hope. But I don't think people see much power in it in the sense that it can't affect the outcome. You can hope something happens. You can hope something changes. But hoping doesn't make it so. And so people think, well, you know, it's kind of nice. But as I said in the beginning, I notice the power of hope when it's gone.
When you feel hopeless, then you realize how powerful hope is.
And I didn't think it was a serious substantial thing at all. I was like, this is a fluffy concept. I couldn't even get behind it at first. But when you think of the absence of hope, you realize in that moment how powerful and important and critical hope is. Because it doesn't solve our problems magically, but it activates the parts of our mind that help us solve them.
It fuels our motivation, our emotional regulation, our ability to plan and strategize and find a way through. It strengthens our emotional habits that make healing possible.
Well, that's brilliant. You said it all right there. So in the final moments here, what's one last thing you want to leave people with about hope?
You know, there have been many times in my life where there's an opportunity for me to not just be hopeless, but to stay there. So my hope is that wherever you're listening from right now, that wherever you're on your journey, that you keep going and you keep growing and you keep building the emotional habits that help you to heal. Maybe that means...
picking up the phone and calling someone and being honest with them. Maybe it means forgiving yourself. Maybe it means taking a chance and being courageous on something that you wanted to do for a long time. But allowing yourself those maybe moments, maybe it is possible, maybe I can accept real love because at the end of the day, no matter the outcome,
I truly believe that we will like who we're becoming when we're courageous and brave and when we have hope. And when we have hope, we can really see what humanity would look like if it heals and what's possible. And that's a journey I feel like would be much more fun to be on.
You know, in all the episodes that we've done on Something You Should Know, I don't think we've ever talked about, just isolated and talked about the topic of hope. And now I kind of wonder why, because it's fascinating. I've been talking with Dr. Julia Garcia.
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