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The brain is a three-pound supercomputer. It is the
command and control center running your life. It is involved
in absolutely everything you do. Your brain determines how
you think, how you feel, how you act, and how well you get
along with other people. Your brain even determines the kind
of person you are. It determines how thoughtful you are; how
polite or how rude you are. It determines how well you think
on your feet, and it is involved with how well you do at work
and with your family. Your brain also influences your
emotional well being and how well you do with the opposite
sex.
Your brain is more complicated than any computer we can
imagine. Did you know that you have one hundred billion nerve
cells in your brain, and every nerve cell has many
connections to other nerve cells? In fact, your brain has
more connections in it than there are stars in the universe!
Optimizing your brain's function is essential to being the
best you can be, whether at work, in leisure, or in your
relationships.
From my work as a clinical neuroscientist, psychiatrist, and
brain-imaging expert, here are 7 ways to enhance the
functioning of your own brain and enhance your life.
1. Protect Your Brain
Protecting the brain from injury, pollution, sleep
deprivation, and stress is the first step to optimizing its
function. The brain is very soft, while the skull is really
hard. Inside the skull there are many sharp bony ridges.
Several brain areas are especially vulnerable to trauma,
especially the parts involved with memory, learning, and mood
stability. In order to be your best it is essential to
protect your brain from injury. Wear your seatbelt when
you're in a car, and wear a helmet when you ride a bicycle,
motorcycle, or go snowboarding. Make sure children wear
helmets. My eleven-year-old knows that if she rides her
bicycle without a helmet she'll be grounded from it for a
month. One head injury can ruin a life. Along the same lines,
do not let children hit soccer balls with their heads. Soccer
balls are heavy. Repeatedly slamming a child's head against a
soccer ball may cause minor repetitive trauma to the brain.
At this time there are not enough studies to say heading
soccer balls is safe. I encourage my children to play golf,
baseball, and tennis, rather than football, soccer, or
hockey.
Current brain imaging research has shown that many chemicals
are toxic to brain function. Alcohol, drugs of abuse,
nicotine, much caffeine, and many medications decrease blood
flow to the brain. When blood flow is decreased the brain
cannot work efficiently. In one study done at UCLA, cocaine
addicts had 23% less overall brain blood flow compared to a
drug free control group. Those cocaine addicts who smoked
cigarettes had 45% less blood flow than the control group. In
a study I performed on chronic marijuana users, 85% had less
activity in their temporal lobes than the control group. The
temporal lobes are involved with memory and mood stability.
Caffeine constricts blood vessels and has been shown to
decrease brain activity. A little bit of caffeine probably
doesn't hurt much. Unfortunately, many people use excessive
amounts, such as 6 to 10 cups of coffee, tea, or sodas a day.
It is hard to be your best when brain activity is diminished.
Stay away substances known to be toxic or those that decrease
brain activity.
In a similar way, sleep deprivation also decreases brain
activity and limits access to learning, memory, and
concentration. A recent brain imaging study showed that
people who consistently slept less than 7 hours had overall
less brain activity. Sleep problems are very common in people
who struggle with their thoughts and emotions. Getting enough
sleep everyday is essential to brain function.
Scientists have only recently discovered how stress
negatively affects brain function. Stress hormones have been
shown in animals to be directly toxic to memory centers.
Brain cells can die with prolonged stress. Managing stress
effectively is essential to good brain function.
2. Feed Your Brain
The fuel you feed your brain has a profound effect on how it
functions. Lean protein, complex carbohydrates, and foods
rich in omega 3 fatty acids (large cold water fish, such as
tuna and salmon, walnuts, Brazil nuts, olive oil, and canola
oil) are essential to brain function. Unfortunately, the
great American diet is filled with simple sugars and simple
carbohydrates, causing many people to feel emotional,
sluggish, spacey, and distracted.
What do you have for breakfast? Do you even have breakfast?
Today, many children, teens, and adults start the day with
either nothing at all or by loading up on simple
carbohydrates, such as sugar cereals, Pop Tarts, muffins,
bagels, waffles, pancakes, or donuts. In our fast paced
society these foods are simple to prepare for the family
rushed in the morning, but they cause brain fog and lower
performance in many people. Start the day with a healthy
breakfast that includes protein, such as eggs, lean meat, or
dairy products.
Many people struggle with energy and mental clarity after
lunch. I have found that eliminating all simple carbohydrates
at lunch (sugar, white bread or other products made from
white flour such as bagels and white pasta, potatoes, and
rice) can make a dramatic difference in energy and focus in
the afternoon. An additional benefit of skipping sugar and
simple carbohydrates at lunch is that most people do not feel
hunger until dinnertime. I also believe taking a 100% vitamin
and mineral supplement is important. Many people do not eat
like they should on a regular basis.
3. Kill the ANTs That Invade Your Brain
The thoughts that go through your mind, moment by moment,
have a significant impact on how your brain works. Research
by Mark George, MD and colleagues at the National Institutes
of Health demonstrated that happy, hopeful thoughts had an
overall calming effect on the brain, while negative thoughts
inflamed brain areas often involved with depression and
anxiety. Your thoughts matter.
I often teach my patients how to metaphorically kill the ANTs
that invade their minds. ANTs stand for Automatic Negative
Thoughts. The ANTs are automatic. They just happen. But they
can ruin your whole day, maybe even your life. For example, I
once treated a college student who was ready to drop out of
school. He thought he was stupid because didn't do well on
tests. When his IQ (intelligence level) was tested, however,
we discovered that he had an IQ of 135 (in the superior
range). He just wasn't a good test taker. I have identified
nine different kinds of ANT species, or ways your thoughts
can distort incoming information to make you feel bad. Here
are four ANT species:
Mind reading --- predicting you know that another person is
thinking something negative about you without them telling
you. I often tell my patients that, "A negative look from
someone else may mean nothing more than he or she is
constipated. You don't know. You can't read minds. I have 25
years of training in human behavior and I still can't read
anyone's mind."
Fortune telling -- predicting a bad outcome to a situation
before it has occurred. Your mind makes happen what it sees.
Unconsciously, predicting failure will often cause failure.
For example, if you say, "I know I will fail the test," then
you will likely not study hard enough and fail the test.
Always or never thinking - this is where you think in words
like always, never, every time, or everyone. These thoughts
are overgeneralizations which can alter behavior. For
example, I have a friend who asked out an attractive woman.
She turned him down. He told himself that no one will ever go
out with him again. This ANT prevented him from asking out
anyone else for over nine months.
Guilt beatings -- being overrun by thoughts of "I should have
done... I'm bad because…. I must do better at… I have to…).
Guilt is powerful at making us feel bad. It is a lousy
motivator of behavior.
You do not have to believe every thought that goes through
your head. It's important to think about your thoughts to see
if they help you or they hurt you. Unfortunately, if you
never challenge your thoughts you just "believe them" as if
they were true. ANTs can take over and infest your brain.
Develop an internal anteater to hunt down and devour the
negative thoughts that are ruining your life.
Once you learn about your thoughts, you can chose to think
good thoughts and feel good or you can choose to think bad
thoughts and feel lousy. You can train your thoughts to be
positive and hopeful or you can just allow them to be
negative and upset you. That's right, it's up to you! You can
learn how to change your thoughts and optimize your brain.
One way to learn how to change your thoughts is to notice
them when they are negative and talk back to them. If you can
correct negative thoughts, you take away their power over
you. When you think a negative thought without challenging
it, your mind believes it and your brain reacts to it.
4. Work Your Brain
Your brain is like a muscle. The more you use it, the more
you can use it. Every time you learn something new your brain
makes a new connection. Learning enhances blood flow and
activity in the brain. If you go for long periods without
learning something new you start to lose some of the
connections in the brain and you begin to struggle more with
memory and learning.
Anatomist Marian Diamond, PhD, from the University of
California at Berkely studied aging in rats. Those rats who
were allowed an easy life without any new challenges or
learning had less brain weight than those rats who were
challenged and forced to learn new information in order to be
fed. New learning actually caused increased brain density and
weight. Strive to learn something new everyday, even if it is
just for a short period of time. Einstein said that if a
person studies a subject for just 15 minutes a day in a year
he will be an expert, and in five years he may be a national
expert. Learning is good for your brain.
5. Make Love For Your Brain
In a series of studies by Winnifred B. Cutler, PhD and
colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania and later at
Stanford University it was found that regular sexual contact
had an important impact on physical and emotional well being
of women. Sexual contact with a partner at least once a week
led to more fertile, regular menstrual cycles, shorter
menses, delayed menopause, increased estrogen levels, and
delayed aging. Brain imaging studies at UCLA have shown that
decreased estrogen levels are associated with overall
decreased brain activity and poor memory. Enhancing estrogen
levels for women through regular sexual activity enhances
overall brain activity and improves memory.
In Dr. Cutler's study the occurrence of orgasm was not as
important as the fact that sex was with another person.
Intimacy and emotional bonding may be the most influential
factors in the positive aspects of sex. As a psychiatrist I
have seen many people withhold sex as a way to show hurt,
anger, or disappointment. Dr. Cutler's research suggests that
this is self-defeating behavior. The more you withhold the
worse it may be for you. Appropriate sex is one of the keys
to the brain's fountain of youth.
6. Develop A "Concert State" For Your Brain
Optimal performance is best achieved when a "concert state"
exists in the brain. By "concert state" I mean "a relaxed
body with a sharp, clear mind," much as you would experience
at an exhilarating symphony. Achieving this state requires
two simultaneous skills: deep relaxation and focus.
Deep relaxation is easily achieved by most people through
diaphragmatic breathing exercises (learning how to breathe
with your belly). This is the most natural, efficient way to
breathe. Have you ever seen how a puppy or a baby breathes?
They breathe almost exclusively with their bellies. A quick
way to learn belly breathing is to lay on the floor and put a
book on your belly. As you breathe in make the book rise as
you fill your lower lungs with air. As you breathe out make
the book fall as you use your belly to exhale all the air out
of your lungs. Take slow, deep breaths, less than 7 a minute.
One of my patients told me that it was impossible for him to
be anxious or mad when he breathed in this way.
Use music to help develop concentration skills. In a famous
study at the University of California at Irvine, students who
listened to Mozart's Sonata for 2 Pianos (k448) increased
visual-spatial intelligence by about 10 percent. Another
recent study demonstrated that students who play a musical
instrument scored higher on average on the SAT than children
who did not play music. Music can either help or hurt
concentration. In a recent study from my clinic, we had 12
teenagers play the game Memory while they listened to
different types of music: rock, rap, classical, and no music.
Rap was associated with the worst performance. The rock group
also scored poorly. Interestingly, the group did slightly
better with classical music than no music at all.
Another technique for developing clear focus is the "One Page
Miracle." On one piece of paper write down the following
headings:
relationships,
work/school
money
physical health
emotional health
spiritual health.
Next to each heading write down what you want in each area.
For example, under relationships, "I want to have a kind,
loving, connected relationship with my children." When you
finish writing all of your goals make multiple copies of it
and prominently display it where you can see it several times
each day. Frequently ask yourself, "Is my behavior getting me
what I want?" This exercise helps to keep you focused on the
things that are most important in your life.
Work to develop a "concert state" by relaxing your body and
developing mental clarity.
7. Treat Brain Problems Early
Many people sabotage themselves by denying they have brain
problems until significant damage has been done to their
lives. Most psychiatrists feel that there is a significant
brain component to depression, anxiety problems, attention
deficit disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, substance
abuse problems, and even violence. Unfortunately, the stigma
associated with seeing a psychiatrist still prevents people
from seeking help for obvious problems.
Clearly, the earlier people seek help for these problems the
less negative impact they will have on their lives. If you
struggle with any of these problems you are not alone.
According to the National Institutes of Health 49% of
Americans will have a psychiatric illness (depression,
anxiety, ADD, OCD, substance abuse problems, etc.) at some
point in their lives. Successful people have problems, they
are smart enough to seek help. The earlier the better.
Your life can only improve with an optimized brain. |
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