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Brain Rules – #1
Amidst a stumbling pandemic that has thrown even the most “prepared” individual off course, I wanted to bring to your awareness a wonderful book that might help us ground ourselves in our needs as human beings.
Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home and School is a fantastic read by John Medina. Medina is a developmental molecular biologist who takes the science and research of the brain and puts it into easily digestible anecdotes so that we can put it into practice.
If you don’t have time to sit and read a whole book because you’re just trying to survive – then tune in each week as I break down the chapters into a blog post. It’ll be a one-chapter-a-week 12-part series. I’ll take the easily digestible and make it super paraphrased so that you can take that 3 minute coffee break to soak in his wisdom.
This content is important as it provides concrete ways to ground yourself in a time where you are feeling stuck, isolated, sluggish, distracted and above all off-balance.
Let’s get started!
Rule # 1 – Exercise
This isn’t a plug for gyms (because well, we can’t). This isn’t a plug for diet culture (because, nope nope nope). This is a RULE. Back to basic human evolution, before we were culturally set into cubicles and chairs we moved! We had to move in order to survive: to find food, shelter, each other.
“The human brain became the most powerful in the world under conditions where motion was a constant presence” Medina says, describing primitive and developing ancestors. And it’s true, obviously. Data shows that people who incorporate moderate movement for 30 minutes, 3 times per week are cognitively sharper and in more optimal shape than sedentary counterparts.
Moderate movement a.k.a aerobic exercise even has in its name aerobic which means requiring free oxygen… it brings oxygen into your system, supports your heart and your blood and your braaaaain.
Sum up:
“Exercise boosts brain power”
Our brains and bodies were built to walk
You need to MOVE to build those thinking skills
Movement gets blood to your brain to support making neural pathways and connections
That blood getting to your brain also brings energy and oxygen to expend toxic elections
Aerobic exercise even just 2 times a week significantly (50% to 60%) decreases your chance or Alzheimer and dementia respectively.
Movement decreases anxiety and depressive symptoms
Rule # 2 Next Wednesday
