The Human Need to Matter & The Enduring Appeal of Cats

When you want your family's staycation to feel like and you're confirmed connecting rooms to feel like and your hotel bed to feel like Oh and room service to feel like Choose Hilton because at Hilton hospitality feels like Good morning, enjoy your breakfast It matters where you stay Book now at Hilton.com Hilton, for the stay Today on something you should know how the simple act of expressing gratitude can actually change your brain Then the human need to matter to be significant We all have it and it's powerful After the need for food and shelter it is the need to matter that shapes our behavior People will go to desperate measures to prove they matter even in a negative way Also, home remedies that really work when you have a cold and cats They're aloof, mysterious, yet they're the second most popular pet there is I think that cats fall into this category of what we think of as charismatic species and this is a term that comes out of wildlife biology for animals and in some cases plants that seem to really attract human attention All this today on something you should know So I'm sure you've heard the advice to be thankful for what you have Have gratitude Well, what is that supposed to do for you exactly? Well, I'm about to tell you as we begin this episode of something you should know Studies have consistently shown that intentional gratitude practices like keeping a gratitude journal or writing gratitude letters or just reflecting on what you're thankful for are linked with improved well-being, reduced stress, and stronger emotional health Researchers have even started looking at what's happening in the brain when people practice gratitude Brain scanning studies show that gratitude exercises activate regions in the brain involved in reward, emotional regulation, and social connection and the neural sensitivity related to gratitude can persist weeks or even months after a short gratitude intervention In other words, gratitude doesn't just feel good in the moment It appears to train your brain to notice positive experiences more readily and respond with less stress and more positive emotion down the road Thinking of your brain as having a kind of gratitude muscle that you can exercise through simple activities like journaling or letter writing isn't just metaphorical There's growing evidence that it reflects real changes in your brain and that is something you should know There's a basic human need we almost never talk about but it quietly drives a lot of what we do It is the need to matter, to feel seen, to know what you do and who you are actually counts Most of us will go to surprising lengths to feel that sense of significance We chase it at work, at home, online, in relationships and when we don't get it, when we feel invisible or disposable it doesn't just feel bad, it can lead to real problems from burnout and anxiety to risky behavior and bad decisions So why is the need to matter so powerful? What happens when it's missing? And how do you build a sense of mattering that is not dependent on constant approval or achievement? That's what we're going to explore with Jennifer Braheany Wallace She's an award-winning journalist and author of the book Mattering the Secret to a Life of Deep Connection and Purpose Hi Jennifer, welcome, glad to have you on something you should know Thanks so much for having me So I get the concept, I know what it means to want to matter but you've studied this pretty deeply, so what does mattering mean to you? Yeah, I thought I knew what it meant to matter I had this, you know, it's a word we hear, kicked around but what I found fascinating is that not only do we all have it not only is it a universal human need but that it is the driver of human behavior for better or for worse So what I mean by that is, you know, after the need for food and shelter it is the need to matter, the drive to matter that shapes our behavior When we feel like we matter to each other, to our communities, to our workplaces we show up to the world in positive ways we want to contribute, we want to engage and connect but when we are chronically made to feel like we don't matter which is what we are seeing on a global level today we often withdraw, we become anxious, depressed, turned to substances to try to alleviate that ache, that pain or we can lash out in anger, think of road rage think of online attacks and political extremes people will go to desperate measures to prove they matter even in a negative way And what is the difference? Because I imagine there is a big difference between mattering and feeling like you matter that I imagine a lot of people matter but they don't feel like they do, they don't have any validation of that but they actually objectively really do matter Yes, so mattering is a felt experience so you could matter and not feel like you matter and so as you point out, it is critical that we really create this new social norm where we connect people to the impact that they have so the reason people often feel like they don't matter is because no one tells them that they do no one sort of circles back, they offer advice to someone but they don't know if that advice was taken they believe, you know, they might even be going through the world with a deep sense of purpose but if their efforts are never acknowledged that sense of purpose can fade and actually lead to burnout so it is important to matter but perhaps it's most important to feel like you matter and I will say it, we are not necessarily dependent on others to connect to our impact Yes, as social creatures, we are, you know, we crave that social proof that we matter, that who we are and what we do make a difference but there are everyday ways that we can connect to our impact that could help us feel like we matter if we are questioning it So can you give me an example of that, of how do you make yourself feel like you matter when you don't feel like you matter? I could tell you something that I've started to do in my own life I hate to journal, I'll admit it, as a writer I do not feel like journaling after a day of writing and so I have this 30 second exercise Before I go to bed, I have a small notebook next to my bed in my top drawer and I write in it, I answer two questions When did I feel valued today and when did I add value today even in a small way? Right, those days when I am working, you know, 12 hours in writing and sort of sequestered alone in my office I don't always necessarily feel like I'm adding value So those days it might be that I was in the parking lot at the supermarket and it was my turn to get this great spot but I waved somebody else to let them get it So even in that teeny tiny way, I mattered I made somebody's day a little easier, I made them smile So it just takes pausing and creating a habit of seeing big and small ways that we make an impact on the world around us So I would imagine somebody's done a survey If you were to ask people, do you feel like you matter? Is it the majority of people do, the majority of people don't? I mean, where does that play out? I think it depends on life stages So our sense of mattering, mattering matters throughout the lifespan It starts from the earliest of days and it matters right up until we pass But there are certain times of life when our sense of mattering can take a hit So the adolescent years, when we are building a sense of self and we are searching the world for messages that we matter or we don't matter When we go through life transitions, getting a new job, relocating or even, you know, especially perhaps negative life transitions, grief, getting fired Empty nesting, these are times when our sense of mattering can really take a hit When the roles that used to provide a sense of value and meaning where it was clear where we were adding value When those roles change, we can really be left wondering, do we matter now? Can you talk about and explain what you call the ingredients of mattering? Yeah, so I have put them together into a kind of framework that I call the said framework So it's easy to remember Yes, stands for significance, a feeling of importance And what I mean by that is, not necessarily the importance you feel at a milestone birthday when people are toasting you or when you receive an award at work What struck me the most in interviewing hundreds of people about mattering was that they felt significant in the small moments of life when someone remembered something about them when their preferences were remembered So importance and significance, it's really about mattering in the details mattering in the mundane things of life, feeling like you are remembered Appreciation is the next ingredient That is feeling appreciated for who you are inside, not just what you do So, for example, if you have a friend who buys you a sweater you can say to them, thank you for this beautiful sweater or you can feed their sense of mattering by appreciating them for who they are Thank you for always being the most generous and thoughtful friend I am so lucky to have someone like you in my life The next ingredient is invested in It's the idea that there are people in our lives who are invested in our goals and who are there to support us through setbacks And the last ingredient is feeling depended on or relied on Are there people in your life who depend on you? We live in such a hyper-individualistic culture that we often don't signal to people how much we rely on them or depend on them And so what I would say to anybody listening is to let the people in your life know that you rely on them And you can do it in simple ways You could send a simple text to someone saying, if it weren't for you, dot, dot, dot If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have had the courage to go for that job interview Thank you for believing in me before I could even believe in myself So the SED framework really narrowed in on the main ingredients to mattering We're talking about the need to matter in the world And my guest is Jennifer Braheene Wallace, author of the book Mattering A Secret to a Life of Deep Connection and Purpose So Jennifer, I imagine everybody has times in their life where they feel like they don't matter to anybody in particular They just feel matterless But you also have to keep in mind that you may feel like you don't matter But are you showing the people in your life that they matter? That those people are important to you? And you also caught up in our own feelings of not mattering We forget to remind other people that they matter to us That's exactly right The fastest way to feel like you matter again is to remind someone else why they do I think about this litmus test When I'm feeling like I don't matter or my sense of mattering is taking a hit I ask myself this one question I say, am I letting people in to see me and know me for who I am deep inside? Am I leaning on my people? Am I opening up? Or do I feel like I need to go through whatever struggle or whatever I'm going through in the busyness of life on my own? People often don't want to invite people into their lives when they're going through something hard But there's research that I love called the beautiful mess effect Which is the idea that we often overestimate how much people will appreciate us opening up to them That opening up, revealing a bit of our struggle to others actually makes us look more authentic And it actually brings people closer to us So if you're feeling like you don't matter, ask yourself, do you have one or two or three people in your life who know you for who you are deep inside? And if you don't, think about ways that you can start to invite those people into your life I don't think anybody gets through life without feeling at some point like they don't matter or that they matter less than they used to I mean, it does seem to come and go depending on your life situation That's exactly right. I mean, mattering is not some sort of trophy that we win and we put up on our shelves It is fluid and there are moments in life when we feel almost like we matter too much I mean, that's the other end of the spectrum When you are a busy parent or a caretaker, you can feel like you matter way too much But that too is not a true sense of mattering That is almost a false sense of mattering True mattering is about feeling valued and adding value to others but also feeling valued and adding value to ourselves So in those moments when either I feel like I matter too much or maybe I'm not feeling like I matter at all One thing you can start to do to turn that around is to really focus on mattering to yourself in small ways So I'll talk about it from the perspective of a busy parent I am the parent of three children And I often felt like it was my job to meet everybody else's needs And if there was time left at the end of the day, maybe I could meet a need of my own But often weeks went by when none of my needs were met But what I found was that that burned me out I wasn't thriving when I was allowing that to happen And so advice that I would give anybody who is in that sort of struggle of mattering too much Is to think about every day one small need for yourself that you could fill So that you can show up as your best self for the people who rely on you And it might be something small, it might be, you know, I want to sit for a half hour and read my book Uninterrupted Sipping My Coffee Or for another woman that I interviewed who had two small children For one hour a day, she would take a walk Which was a kind of meditative walk It wasn't for exercise, it was simply to come back to herself And to show herself that she was a priority too So if you are struggling with feeling like you don't matter I would say start with mattering to yourself again Finding, getting in touch, tuning in to what you need So that you can show up as your best self, that's number one And then number two, I would say ask yourself if you are investing in your friendships Finding one or two people in your life that you can open up to That you can be vulnerable with and who will be vulnerable with you Those relationships feed our sense of mattering They remind us that we matter for who we are You mentioned at the very beginning that a symptom of feeling like you don't matter Might be something like road rage Which doesn't seem on the surface to be connected So connect it for me Yeah, so mattering is a deep human need That we inherited from our earliest ancestors It's an evolutionary need We need to know that we are valued by our band or our group So when we are made to feel like we don't matter We will act out in ways as if to say, oh I don't matter I'll show you I matter And that is what road rage is, right? Somebody feels cut off, either literally or figuratively And so they are asserting their sense of mattering Oh, I will show you I matter So it's almost like demanding attention So you're not getting it Once you see the world through the lens of mattering You cannot unsee it You will see that when people are rude to you in civility These are signs that they are struggling with a sense of mattering themselves I'm not saying to let people off the hook But I'm saying instead of getting furious and judgmental when people are acting out You might get curious Are they feeling like they don't matter? What might be going on in this person's life? And again, I'm not saying that you have to excuse it But instead maybe you can meet it with a little bit of compassion There are so many people today struggling with this unmet need to matter And it shows up in anger, it shows up in loneliness, it shows up in disengagement at work These symptoms that we often look at as kind of separate things Are really rooted in mattering, in feeling like I don't matter You know what I'm wondering is this lack of mattering that you're talking about that people feel Is this a contemporary problem, do you think? Or has this always happened? Has this always been going on? I think that is a great question And what I will say is it was first studied mattering in 1981 So I don't have data before that day But I could be pretty assured that back 50 years ago People struggled with mattering less And here's why, here's why I believe that is There were ecosystems, there were neighborhoods, close-knit neighborhoods People had a social contract at work Where if you worked and you were loyal for 40 years you would be rewarded with a pension People felt more connected, there were, you know, we were a more religious society And all the major religions talk about this idea of unconditional worth, unconditional value So what has happened over the last several decades is that these ecosystems That used to deliver mattering, religious institutions, neighborhoods, workplaces, communities Those have eroded And so when we are struggling with feeling like we don't matter We feel it so personally We do not have backup systems to remind us of our worth So instead it makes us feel even more isolated So I do think, and by the way, I think tech has fueled this erosion of mattering and magnified it Tech has, you know, when you go to Silicon Valley All of the companies, the startup tech companies talk about a frictionless experience That they want the customer to be able to press a button and get their food, get their product Things should be easy. This frictionless life that tech is trying to deliver for us Has really lowered our tolerance for friction in our everyday lives And what are relationships? They are friction makers, right? Humans create friction And so sitting on our couch and sending a text or sitting on our couch and scrolling Instead of putting on our clothes, going out in the cold Having dinner with a friend where there might be some awkward conversation Or they may say something that disappoints us That it is very easy to escape relationships in technology But what it is doing, it is making us feel lonely and like we matter less And so all of these things, these ecosystems that no longer exist Tech, you know, selling us this idea that life should be frictionless They really pulled us away from relationships that once delivered pretty regularly This sense of mattering for us So I do think it's a modern phenomenon And with the advent of the AI, I think it's only going to get worse If we don't stop, name this need that all of us have And understand how to meet it for ourselves and for the people in our lives that we care about Right, yeah. Not only do we need to feel like we matter But we need to remind other people they do too because they may not feel like they matter Yes, exactly Well, anybody listening, I think, understands now the importance of mattering And probably always did But we never talk about this And I don't think we've ever had this conversation, this topic on the show before And I appreciate you coming on and bringing it to the surface so we can understand it better Jennifer Braheanie Wallace has been my guest The book is called Mattering, The Secret to a Life of Deep Connection and Purpose And there is a link to her book at Amazon in the show notes It was great talking to you, Jennifer, thanks Amazing, thanks so much So, I'll admit something right up front here I'm a dog person I've had dogs most of my life I've had cats too I had one really cool cat when I was younger But overall, I've just never really gotten cats They seem aloof and independent They're not especially impressed by humans And yet, millions of people absolutely love them Cats are one of the most popular pets in the US With tens of millions of households owning them There are upwards of 90 million pet cats roaming around American homes So, I'm clearly missing something Which raises a bigger question Why do humans bond so strongly with an animal that doesn't seem to need us At least not the way dogs do Where did this relationship with cats come from? And why has it lasted for thousands of years? That's what we're digging into today with Jerry Moore He's an archaeologist, writer and professor emeritus of anthropology At California State University, Dominguez Hills And he is author of a book called Cat Tales, A History Alright, Jerry, so help me understand cats here Starting with how they became pets in the first place Yeah, that's one of the most interesting And improbable events that I know of in my studies of archaeology I mean, it's one of the least likely events Because on the one hand, what happens is that Every continent, with the exception of Australia and Antarctica Has a small, wild cat that you would think would be suitable for domestication But in fact, all of our domesticated cats are derived from one species of cat That was found in North Africa and in the Near East And then not only domesticated, but then spread around the world And in many places with terrible consequences But the process by which that transformation from an absolutely wild animal To one that's curled up at your feet Is one of the most enigmatic events in human prehistory Because on the one hand, it takes place when humans start not only raising their own food But more particularly raising grains and storing them to be used throughout the year So you have like large storage of harvests But the ironic thing is that that sort of process occurs in different places around the world Including for example, in ancient Mexico and Guatemala, Mesoamerica or the Andes And in those places also, there are wild cats that you would think Well, maybe they would have been attracted to the pests that occupy storage bins of corn and things like that But they weren't because there's this other bizarre thing that happens Is that it's not just the fact that people are raising grain, particularly wheat and barley in the Near East And then storing it, but at the same time, what we think of as the house mouse, Mus musculos Begins expanding out of the Himalayas of all places Westward into the Near East and the Middle East And that animal goes into the storage bins, starts reproducing And creates enough of a dietary basis to attract the wild cats in to eat those mice Okay, so let me recap here. So humans raise grain and store it And basically mice find out about the grain and they like grain, so they show up And they start eating all the grain that's been stored And there's enough mice that the cats show up and start eating the mice that are eating the grain But do cats show up naturally or people who are raising the grain bring them in to help fight the mouse problem? As far as we know, they come in naturally at first Because they're sitting out or they're looking for this dense food supply But very quickly, human beings not only begin to try to control the breeding of cats Which is a virtually impossible thing to do until you have modern veterinary medicine But they are treating cats as pets and we can tell from very early on So we've got, for example, 10,000 year old burials on the island of Crete Where a young man in his 20s is dead, has been buried, and he's buried next to his pet cat And we know that the cat is a pet because it's got a necklace around it It shows no evidence of trauma, so it's been kind of painlessly sacrificed to be with this young man And so that's a pretty interesting transformation that takes place But in addition to being pets, if I'm remembering this correctly, cats have also been deified I mean, it seems like in ancient Egypt cats were thought of spirit-like or god-like creatures, right? Oh, absolutely, absolutely And so, for example, in the New Kingdom of Ancient Egypt There was a goddess, Bubatas, who was a goddess of fertility and other sorts of things And she was frequently envisioned as being a cat And large numbers of real cats were mummified and offered in her honor And buried in massive cemeteries on the banks of the Nile So massive, in fact, that some of those cemeteries were looted in the late 1800s And the mummified animals that were there, cats and other animals, were shipped to England to be used as organic fertilizer So cats have been coming into people's homes for how long now? Oh, I would put, you know, every time an archaeologist say, oh, it only occurred at this time There's going to be another site that's found that's slightly older But I would say that somewhere in between, you know, 10 to 15,000 years ago in the Near East We certainly had interactions with cats So the statistic I read is that there are about 90 million pet cats in the United States Do you know how many cats in the United States there are that are nobody's pet? And I don't mean, you know, like bobcats, but I mean what look like house cats But are just feral cats roaming around? The estimates for the United States, feral cats in the United States, it's estimated between 50 to 70 million feral cats in the United States What? Um, yeah, yeah, it's an enormous number And in other places in the world, for example, just last year, New Zealand was in the news Because they had to, they organized a nationwide hunting of feral cats Because the feral cats are destroying any native wildlife in the area Lizards and squirrels and things of that sort And are the feral cats in the United States, are they naturally occurring or are they escaped runaway pet cats that somehow managed to adapt to the outside world? Most of them are domesticated cats that get abandoned or have, you know, been allowed to roam and then their owners lost track of them So that's mostly what it is and I want to distinguish, when I'm talking about feral cats, I'm not talking about wild cat species like bobcats or mountain lions or things like that When I talk about feral cats, I mean these kind of house cats gone wild Wow, I had no idea there were that many, because I assumed wrongful assumption that those cats wouldn't be able to survive by themselves That domesticated cats don't have the skills necessary to find food for themselves or whatever Now they do, they do They have impacts on bird populations, rodent populations, which most of the time we approve of that, but no, they have those skills So what is a bobcat? Because we have one in our neighborhood, maybe more than one, but we see it on our ring camera all the time, walking across the driveway And I wonder, what is that? What is a bobcat? You know, I don't know very much about bobcats as such, I've seen them, I've seen them hiking in the Sierra Nevada But they tend to be pretty isolated animals, they don't really pose any kind of threat to humans the way that a mountain lion or something like that might But so many of us, especially here in California, but also in places like Colorado and elsewhere, we live in what we think of as suburbs or cities, but we're not that far away from either actual wild lands or mixed strategy uses So for example, one of the places where we see a lot of, not just bobcats, but mountain lions and animals like that are on the edges of large golf courses that are adjacent to mountain systems Whether it's in California or in Colorado, because those golf courses have water and they have grass that attract deer that attract mountain lions Has the domestication of cats at all changed their appearance? Does a cat today look just like a cat did in ancient Egypt? The similarities are striking enough that you would have no problem recognizing them But beginning in the late 19th century, early 20th century, cat fanciers here in the United States and in Europe began to selectively breed cats so that you would have different varieties of cats Those differences, whether it's a Siamese or a Maine Coon, are largely only visible in terms of fur and coloration They're not really noticeable in terms of their skeletal remains And so the basic form of the animals was not really selected for as much as their appearance was So I'd like to get your take on this since you've studied cats A lot of us who are not big cat people kind of don't get it Because cats are aloof and seemingly don't really care all that much about us except that we feed them And yet the appeal of having cats goes back as you've pointed out, you know, centuries And why is that? What's the appeal, unlike say a dog, who, you know, is always happy to see you? I think that cats fall into this category of what we think of as charismatic species And this is a term that comes out of wildlife biology for animals and in some cases plants That seem to really attract human attention And so these are the animals that show up on your advertisements for World Wildlife Fund or for your local zoos and things like that It turns out that they don't put tapeworms up there as their icons They put up animals that are charismatic And there's been a lot of research on this by advertisers and others And we know what the top 20 charismatic species are And of the top 10, I think it's four or different varieties of cats Lions, tigers, cheetahs, leopards, etc. And as well as elephants and things like that And what's really interesting is that when we go back and look at cave art that was made 15 to 20,000 years ago And painted on the walls of caves in Europe during the Paleolithic, like at Chauvet Cave The animals that are depicted there are not just some random depiction of animals that ancient peoples ran into They are the same charismatic species They are cave lions, they are cave bears, they're mammoths, they're rhinocerites And it's really interesting to see that kind of continuity Between someone who's making cave art in the Upper Paleolithic And a modern designer who's saying, okay, who would be a good animal character for the next Disney cartoon? And they're likely to choose the same charismatic animals You know, I'd never really thought of it that way before, but you're so right that, you know, they don't put really ugly... Really ugly animals up, it's always the cute ones, and who can resist the kitten? I mean, what's cuter than that? Right, and you know, I've often toyed with the idea, I mean, what would a Disney film based on Tammy the tapeworm look like? I don't know, and I'll never know because I wouldn't go see it, so... Neither would most people, so... Exactly, exactly But this idea that you were speaking of earlier, that there are people buried with their cats, I don't get that, because why? Because of the affinity between people and their animals This is something that you should realize that here in the United States, as well as elsewhere in Europe, for example, in the United Kingdom We have explicit laws stating why animals and humans cannot be buried together And in part, those laws exist in order to make sure that folks who love their cats and dogs don't get interred with them So this is a cultural barrier that we've got, in fact, one of the reasons that people are attracted to having their cats cremated is so that they can have the cat with them after the animal has died which they otherwise would not be able to do given our state laws about cemeteries and burials But if you are buried with your cat, that means you took your live cat and killed it in order to bury it Yeah, and with that, there's an implication, generally, that there is an afterlife that you are going, both going into and you don't want to go make that journey alone Yeah, that's weird. I mean, that's hard to get your head around because it just because it seems so bizarre But I didn't know there were laws that you couldn't be buried Like if you and your cat were killed in a car accident together, you couldn't bury the cat with the person? That's correct And I know that's true in California And in fact, one of the interesting things here in Carson is we've got a human cemetery just down the street from our pet cemetery and that's as close as someone can get to being buried near their cat What's one thing or two things about cats that I probably don't know that would fascinate me or surprise me? Well, the first thing is that cats actually are trying often to communicate with us And this is something that I've been living around cats for a long time and I only learned this recently that when a cat, a domesticated cat approaches you and its tail is up, that's a symbol signifying, yeah, I want to interact with you So the tail up is actually a symbol. That's one thing The second thing I think that's really fascinating and kind of unexpected about cats is just how smart and curious they are That in and of itself is kind of a fascinating mystery, isn't it? I wouldn't say that about a goldfish, for example I don't think there's a little, you know, complex mind that's paddling around in that fishbowl And, you know, this is not something that I'm gerrymore just making up I mean, we see this in different cultures, in different traditional cultures and we see it throughout the western tradition. I mean, there is a reason why in Alice in Wonderland, Louis Carroll did not write about the Cheshire dog Yeah, well, I mean, cats are, with a dog it seems like you get, what you see is what you get That a dog is very much an open book, whereas cats seem so mysterious And, you know, I've told this story before on a previous episode, but I used to have a cat and our family moved overseas for a year and gave the cat to the neighbor, but of course the cat didn't know that and so it kept going back to our house, which was rented out to people who didn't want it So eventually the cat just ran away and we came back and I think it was two years later the cat just showed up, just came back home and went right to where its dish was like, well, where's dinner? But he's been gone for three years and like, where have you been? And it's very Right, now they have remarkable spatial memories and I think one of the things about that that's important is that it's not just remembering a place They're also remembering an interaction that that cat had with you and your family in that particular place and that's really remarkable, isn't it? Yeah, well, yeah, it didn't just come home and sit on the steps, it came in where its bowl used to be and waited for something to eat So it was remembering or something, it was remembering an experience of time for dinner Right, right Well, I appreciate you explaining all this because I think for a lot of us the appeal of cats as a pet is a bit of a mystery just because they seem so detached and aloof, but I understand it a little better now I've been talking with Jerry Moore, who is an archaeologist and writer and he is author of a book called Cat Tales, A History and there's a link to that book in the show notes Jerry, thanks, you know your cats Okay, thanks very much for your interest in this project When you get sick, it's tempting to reach for a home remedy, but do any of them actually work? Well, according to Consumer Reports and other recent medical reviews, some classic remedies really can help ease the symptoms even if they don't cure the illness Honey, for example, has been shown to soothe coughs and sore throats and in some studies, it performs nearly as well as over-the-counter cough medicines Warm drinks, especially tea with honey, help lubricate the throat, promote saliva production and thin mucus which can reduce irritation And chicken soup really earns its reputation It helps with hydration, it loosens congestion and may even reduce inflammation, making you feel better faster Supplements like vitamin C and zinc, mixed evidence there, vitamin C might modestly shorten colds and zinc taken early may reduce the duration at least it did in some studies, but the evidence is not uniform Now these remedies don't cure a cold, but they can make the experience more comfortable while your immune system does the rest of the work and that is something you should know You know, we try to cover a lot of interesting topics on this show and today, for example, we talked about mattering and cats if you know somebody who's feeling like maybe they don't matter or you have a cat lover in your life that might enjoy it I hope you'll share this episode with them I'm sure they'd appreciate it and it helps us grow our show I'm Micah Rothers, thanks for listening today to something you should know Our History is a women's history podcast and our Regency Era series will be focusing on the most rebellious women of this time that includes Jane Austen herself, who is maybe more radical than you might have thought 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 Listen to Valker History wherever you get podcasts Listen to all about T.R.H. podcasts on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen, new episodes weekly