Add life-changing brainpower through 25 recent facts from the brain sciences:
1. Boredom is more a habit formed in brains, and shaped by your choices, than a reality.
2. Environment counts, and a healthy setting helps people transform problems into solutions.
3. Well being comes partially from and is fueled and extended by serotonin chemical hormones.
4. Anger, fear, and frustration are fueled and extended by cortisol chemical hormones.
5. Venting is bad for the brain and creates new neuron pathways to much more of the same.
6. Dendrite brain cells use the outside world and take shape, or grow based on what you do.
7. Music changes brain wave speeds in ways that impact moods and alter productivity.
8. Lectures and talks work against listeners’ brains and benefit speakers’ intelligence mostly.
9. Hebbian workers rewire their brains to kill incentives, limit focus or even shrink their brains.
10. Diversity training commonly works mentally against benefits because of its deficit model.
11. Brain waves can bring either sleep or peak performance, based on how you activate them.
12. Hook even difficult facts onto one thing you know and learning increases in less time.
13. Basal ganglias store facts and create ruts, working memory holds few facts and leads change.
14. Multiple intelligences are common to all, used by few, and can be more developed daily.
15. Cynical mindsets literally block creativity, impact talent, and stomp out innovation.
16. Memory can be outsourced to help people remember, and to free the mind for focus.
17. Plasticity enables people to rewire the human brain in ways that keep it younger and smarter.
18. Encouragement can change the chemistry of a brain through raised serotonin.
19. Meta messages destroy relationships through implications different from what is said.
20. It often takes an integration of hard and soft skills to solve problems with the brain in mind.
21. Stress literally shrinks the brain, and tone in communication acts as a silent killer.
22. Greet a person through speaking that person’s name, for a spike in personal awareness.
23. Inspire creativity and invention through teaching others at the same time you also learn.
24. Create new neuron pathways each time you add a solution to any problem you encounter.
25. Women’s and men’s brain differ biologically and intellectually in ways that few optimize.
What insights do these facts hand you about your brain? How could they increase your brainpower in ways that improve your situation?
on Sep 26th, 2008 at 4:46 pm
Your post is very valuable, thanks
on Oct 7th, 2008 at 10:01 am
What a fascinating list, Ellen! You’ve definitely given us a great deal to think about — and implement! I find it quite interesting to learn that “venting is bad for the brain and creates new neuron pathways to much more of the same.” For so long, we’ve been told that it’s good to “get it off our chest.”
on Oct 22nd, 2008 at 11:57 am
Dr. Ellen,
This is great stuff! Would it possible to post the article on my website, http://www.brainbequick.com?
Of course I will list you as the source and provide a link back to this site.
May your brain continue to be quick!
Gene
on Oct 22nd, 2008 at 1:40 pm
Thanks for your kind words, and for stopping by Gene! It was great to also discover your site! It’s fun to find others who do the same work in different ways!
Thanks for the kin — it would be my honor! I will bookmark your site and look forward to further exchanges on cool topics. Keep doing it with excellence! Ellen
on Oct 29th, 2008 at 10:29 am
[...] myth has it that aging should be gracious living, but rejuvenating brain facts favor voracious curiosity. [...]
on Nov 4th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
[...] shifted me to her pre-set line to answer my question, and by so doing gave me a larger dream for what government could become, with more of the brain in mind. What have you learned from government [...]
on Nov 10th, 2008 at 8:46 am
[...] Celebrates humility in ways that affect his leadership positively, How so? Barak Obama rejuvenates his own brain, in ways that add life-changing brainpower to improve his own and others’ [...]
on Nov 17th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
[...] Why not tap into dividends stored already in your dendrite brain cells, check out these 25 dynamic facts that rejuvenate your brain, and wait for your prompt today to unleash that creative person you’d like others to see in [...]
on Nov 18th, 2008 at 7:53 am
[...] find good neuro research to back these trends that cannot co-exist. Then, why choose an approach or two from the heap for [...]
on Nov 20th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
[...] basically why I like to shop at Christmas with the brain in mind. What’s your best moment of Christmas [...]
on Nov 23rd, 2008 at 9:26 pm
[...] can we settle for in-fighting, and foster myths that hold teens back, when there are so many cutting edge brain facts that could land US secondary schools back on the stage with a competitive edge. We owe it to our [...]
on Dec 10th, 2008 at 10:10 am
[...] In response to poor tone that portrays people who differ, for instance, you too begin to vent. Your own pessimistic communication in turn rewires your brain further by creating new neuron pathways toward more venting. It can be different - as people begin their days by communicating with the brain in mind. [...]
on Dec 25th, 2008 at 8:32 am
[...] to reach across differences, gather hidden and unused talents, and learn from differences. As brain facts change, we move into change mode. MITA approaches have us moved daily to question possibilities, [...]
on Dec 26th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
[...] out recent facts from the brain sciences that foster clarity. The human brain’s hardwired, for instance, to latch onto familiar parts [...]
on Jan 26th, 2009 at 8:11 am
[...] life-changing facts about your brain that help to power-up invention on a daily basis. The opposite is also true. Rarely does invention [...]
on Feb 8th, 2009 at 11:00 am
[...] Tonight 20/20 reports how Wall Street leaders paid top prostitutes with your hard earned money. Well, they charged thousands monthly to corporate accounts and called it contract work paid for, in order to deduct false expenses from taxes - so you decide whose money paid most. In heated response, some will write salacious reports about proof of horrors already known. Others will vent about feeling duped yet again by leaders they trusted with future finances. I wanted to add a brain based challenge based on neuro-discoveries - to rebuild when leaders we trusted fall. How will you tame your brain’s amygdala to reflect and respond mentally for a reconfigured future? [...]
on Feb 22nd, 2009 at 1:38 pm
[...] long I saw similar busts in bureaucracies that cry constantly for more money, and ignore brainpower potential they already possess. Have you seen [...]
on Mar 15th, 2009 at 12:23 am
[...] politically correct) and healthy democracy. Consider these words less from common usage, but from a brain based perspective, and you’d likely redefine these [...]
on Mar 15th, 2009 at 11:01 am
[...] neuro-discoveries changed playing fields yet some faculty cling to sage-on-the-stage mentality. Poor faculty see [...]
on Apr 1st, 2009 at 9:54 am
[...] to taint its power to change, improve, or refresh practices in any workplaces. That’s from facts innate to the high-performing brain. Could these mental realities inspire your next brainstorming session? It’s also why the [...]
on Apr 4th, 2009 at 10:37 pm
[...] spite of compelling evidence between brain facts and learning or leading practices, for instance, it still takes risk to tackle even the most tired traditions. Then when a lifetime [...]
on Apr 10th, 2009 at 7:31 am
[...] top leaders around the world for many years, it still surprises me how few people ever discuss the proven wonder of the human brain. Fewer yet take time to apply extravagant benefits of their brain to ratchet up daily business [...]
on Apr 15th, 2009 at 7:10 am
this is an interesting list. Thanks
I have a question.
over the last 3 years, since I joined the current place I work at, I have realized that I have become more cynical, discouraged and lost a lot of confidence I thought I possessed. It happens to be because of the way I am seeing the overall processes at the workplace not helping me realize any kind of job satisfaction.
In my past 12 years of work life, I had only heard of the phrase - blind with rage. In the first year with this workplace, I actually lived that phrase, and have become frustrated the way people here treat others under the pretext of getting work done.
Am I not being able to make myself see more positivity through the situation or am I choosing to see the negativity?
Is this something to do with my inherent inability of some kind?
could this cynicism and negativity lead to further damage of overall personality and approach to my daily way of being?
on Apr 15th, 2009 at 7:48 am
Thanks Shrikant - Your question is so significant that it invites a full post in response. That’s just what I plan to bring by way of my own 2-bit offering to a great question!
Today I will blog one possibility and hope you and others will also toss in your wisdom!
on Apr 15th, 2009 at 8:35 am
[...] often ask as one commenter questioned here How can a person survive cynics’ toxins at work, and maintain a sense of hope and adventure [...]
on Apr 18th, 2009 at 9:44 pm
[...] that shape secondary schools melt away at the feet of renewed universities and learning progress built on human brainpower, rather than on tired traditions or broken benefits. Can you see [...]
on Apr 19th, 2009 at 6:15 pm
[...] curious leaders-in-training await straightforward solutions. Who will lead a higher education built on human brainpower without confusion or disadvantages across entire [...]
on May 3rd, 2009 at 10:32 am
[...] new brain facts would transform your mental barriers into brilliant stars to follow where you work? Ready to tackle the delights and challenges that [...]
on May 11th, 2009 at 11:46 am
[...] Would you apply new brain facts that benefit more [...]
on May 18th, 2009 at 9:17 am
[...] discouraged workers who stay stuck in myths with miracles that come with a few brain facts tossed into the ring to rejuvenate an ordinary day at [...]
on May 29th, 2009 at 5:47 am
[...] you visit and enjoy looking around. If you really want a place to get started, try here 25 Facts to rejuvenate your brain, or here: Multi-Task for Bottlenecked [...]
on Jun 14th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
[...] Two-footed questions, open pathways to curiosity and attract more high performance minds into the brainpower [...]