Today’s Brain Booster is: Yearn to learn.
In order to powerfully boost your brain through learning, look for something that fulfils the following criteria:
- It’s something you genuinely love doing, it keeps you intrinsically motivated, and it makes you lose track of time.
- It requires effort, and pushes you to learn new rules, acquire new skills, or continuously stretch your abilities.
- It takes you to new environments — whether that’s a natural wilderness, historical site, art gallery, museum, mathematical landscape or creative mind frame.
Anything from mastering a foreign language, playing a musical instrument, birdwatching, digital photography, quilting, or navigating the intricacies of astronomy, will help you build cognitive reserve and lower your risk of dementia. (This is by no means an exhaustive list.)
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Today’s Health Headline is: Your brain has the power to heal, recover and improve after a concussion, traumatic brain injury, stroke or diagnosis of ADHD, Parkinson’s or dementia. Don’t believe anyone — health professional or otherwise — who says there is nothing that can reverse your condition. What they’re saying is there’s nothing THEY can do for you. But there’s plenty that YOU can do for YOU.
When you break a bone or tear a muscle, they can heal with the right treatment and strengthening exercises. When you have a glitch in your brain, it can also work around the problem and restore functioning with the right treatment and strengthening exercises. The difference is that the treatment is not yet mainstream so it has to come from you. Tune into today’s podcast to discover how you can stimulate your brain to heal.
Even if you haven’t had a brain injury, your brain is a bundle of untapped potential. Your brain holds a treasure trove of possibilities waiting to be unlocked. And there’s the rub. Those possibilities need to be unlocked.
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What’s missing from modern medicine is an easily implementable prescription for optimising our brain health on a daily basis.
So I’m going to give you a prescription now. Here are the 3 underlying PRINCIPLES.
- Seek out NOVELTY. Novelty forces your neurons to fire in new patterns, which physically changes the structure of your brain. Routine, in contrast, means your brain is operating on autopilot, using existing, well-worn neural pathways. This does not lead to growth. Navigating a novel situation also releases DOPAMINE, which sharpens your focus, enhances memory, and boosts overall motivation. Switch hands for tasks you routinely do with your dominant hand.
- Seek out NEW CHALLENGES. When we’re challenged, we release my favourite chemical messenger, Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF), which is a protein that acts like fertiliser for our brain. It supports the survival of existing neurons, and encourages the growth of new ones. A fun at-home challenge is learning to juggle.
- PUSH YOUR BOUNDARIES. This builds a denser network of neural connections, which acts as a buffer against cognitive decline. Find a new word in the dictionary at the start of each week and use it in conversation as often as you can over the next seven days — even if it’s just talking to yourself!
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Today’s Whether Report answers a question I’m asked at every presentation: Can you tell me whether doing crosswords and Sudoku helps to keep my brain sharp, and lowers my risk of dementia?
The short answer is: crosswords and suduku are good for your brain, only IF you’re not good at them! Whether crosswords and Sudoku boost your brain depends entirely on your current skill level. If you’re already an expert at them they DO NOT build significant new neural connectivity.
But if you find them genuinely difficult, they will help create new neural pathways. Tune in for more details.
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Click here to watch the episode on my YouTube channel, or listen to Healing with Dr Helena on your preferred podcast platform. I’ll publish a new episode every Monday, and you’ll receive an email notification that morning. Please subscribe to my podcast or YouTube channel so that you don’t miss an episode, and send your whether questions to: podcast@drhelenapopovic.com
If you’re happy for me to play your voice on my podcast, you can provide an audio file. Otherwise, you can type your question for me to read out.
I very much look forward to answering your questions, and exploring how we can all build a smarter brain, stronger body and deeply fulfilling life.
Please share this Health-e-Byte with anyone who is interested in birds or brain health! You’ll understand why birds when you listen to my podcast.
