Have you every thought of practicing to be a genius at anything? Several gurus in intelligence, claim that endurance and hard work get higher grades than raw intelligence scores from IQ tests. Do you agree?  Einstein claimed he was no more intelligent than others – but he stayed with problems longer. You?

Ericsson calls this the 10-year-rule. Simply put, it takes 10 years or 10,000 of committed practice to master complex skills. You may remember Anders Ericsson’s work from its reference in the Outliers, which landed in top 10 books of 2008.

Dynamic brainpower yielded by practice makes sense if you consider that each night your brain rewires – based specifically on what you did that day. How does your world shape your brain for benefits – even in tough times? Or how can you learn to expect calm under pressure?

Neuro-discoveries changed life forever, yet it’s up to each one how they will win or lose because of these changes. People complain that youth are losing their love for books. If you consider how brains work, though, you’ll see how it happened over time. You’ll also see how new brain discoveries can work in one’s favor for the future. Think of change here as the tug-of war between a brain’s basal ganglia which is a bit like a backpack and working memory which is more like a wine glass that holds little at any time. How does it work?

Whenever people interact more with technology they rewire for more of that back-and-forth sort of learning engagement, and they likely grow less interested in reading without much opportunity for active exchanges, for instance. It’s the same for anything you do today — the action itself shapes neuron pathways to follow and reconfigures your brain for future interests and actions. It’s wild when you think about a brain shaped differently daily – yet it’s based on your decisions to act. Why so?

Brains rewire through stimulation to the world around you. It’s called plasticity and it’s quite miraculous when you think about it. Simply put, action on your part sparks changes in the brain shape and capacity – and it’s key to note that coach potato passivity yields far less rewiring. Can you see why lectures work against human brainpower, or how multiple intelligences can grow daily?

Highly talented change agents tend to rely more on their working memories, a short term memory system that maintains relevant information in active status, which can be accessed quickly to solve problems. They also create serotonin settings, to avoid the negative pressures that limit others who attempt to create solutions under pressure.

Your working memory rarely receives enough credit for its capability in your day. It’s quite miraculous when used. How so? Tiny as a thimble, it’s in tug-of-war with your basal ganglia which stores boring routines and ruts. Don’t get me wrong, without your basal ganglia, you’d lose your way to work, go naked, and forget how to drive.

Yet it’s your working memory that nudges you to take terrific risks that can change a life. It can grow in size with use, but boring habits hold it back. We store isolated facts in the brain’s basal ganglia til they stink like dead fish, yet working memory plucks them out and integrates with new directions.

The human brain’s equipped to hold ruts and routines up the gazoo – in mental comfort zones – which is why we even bore ourselves at times. Bureaucracy and tenured positions do it best! It doesn’t have to be that way, it has more to do with brain rewiring and we can reboot daily for far more!

Facts fly at brains far too fast to act on all. It’s important to note that facts not acted upon will flee your working memory to make room for new fads flying in. If you knew the power or limits of working memory you’d never encourage one-shot workshops for those who crave lasting change?

Constantly try out new ideas that reshape or replace old worn out practices, and you begin to grow your working memory for creating effective and lasting change. Your basal ganglia refuses to work with new ideas — it’s created to default back to ruts. Know that and you live much more in your working memory. Ignore it and you settle for stagnation.

Your basal ganglia is like the brain’s packrat for all experiences and routines. Live beyond it and risk the discomfort of wonderful new journeys to growth, rather than allow your basal ganglia to snare yet another day. Check out these brain myths stored in basal ganglias to rate your own brainpower to live more in working memory for facing current realities.

When you practice a new skill – you begin to shift fleeting ideas from the working memory into application and a lifetime storage within the basal ganglia.  New knowledge works in your favor on a regular basis when you sustain change and growth as on-going practices to prevent ruts that kill innovation in your life. Ready for the challenge of a lifetime?

Most people hope at some time or another to move from where they stand at that moment, into a better place for their future. Especially if following predictable schedules is holding back personal progress.

Yet have you noticed that strong traditions rarely yield to finer approaches in many workplaces, even when rejuvenated practices prove superior? Or are you aware that stressed brains rely more on habit and remain longer in ruts? There’s a reason this is so, and there are ways to tap into different intelligences for brainpower to move past potholes that hold you back.

Not sure where you’re stuck? Then ask a trusted friend, to remind you what topics you tend to speak about most, and in that place both your ruts or growth edges will likely reside.

If you look at ruts from inside your brain, you’ll likely see how you default to your basal ganglia. Experts call it your mental storehouse. Less sensitive people may remind you it’s where every rigid routine, life failure and annoying habit gathers. Along with every experience you’ve ever encountered, it’s also the place that promotes and prolongs annoying ruts. It doesn’t have to be that way.

The key is to build new neuron pathways that will help you bridge the difference between rigid runnels and rejuvenation. Whenever you operate new parts of the human brain you also trigger your working memory which is that area that helps you learn and do life in different ways.

Ready to ask questions that leap beyond old habits, and open new windows into multiple intelligences? OK, let’s say you’d like to move forward in new directions that add zip to your leadership. It’s simply a matter of engaging your brain’s amazing plasticity to develop, grow, and use new dendrite brain cell connections. You’ll replace ruts with new adventures when you tap into the smart skill tools for asking questions that activate your unique mix of intelligences.

Smart Skill 2 – Question with Multiple Intelligences to Move Past Ruts

1. How would you sequence the top five priorities for an action plan you’ll do this week? Mathematical or logical questions enable you to thread through chains of reasoning to discern where ruts are rooted.

2. What would a log of your winning ways over one week tell about your best plan to raise a favorite strength or two up to new levels? Verbal linguistic questions include reading and discussing communication trends, as well as writing a plan for new growth, and perhaps even proposing it to your mentor.

3. What musical selection you play or compose would show where you’d most like to be in one month? Musical or rhythmic questions enable you to expand life through personal or experts’ compositions.

4. What visual would most inspire your next adventure? Spatial questions invite investigations through images, graphs, or visual portrayals that diminish ruts simply by illumining inspired visual possibilities.

5. How would a long walk alter your answer to the question – “What could you do differently this week with life-changing results? “ Bodily-kinesthetic questions engage you in movement, or building in ways that deepen understanding about past and future challenges as well as opportunities for new directions.

6. What would a respected friend or colleague suggest that you do next to move ahead in a dynamic new direction? Interpersonal or social questions would help you to discern and respond well to insights of different people as they relate to your change question.

7. What advice would your teenage self offer you now, about your best options for change that could  transform the coming week? Intrapersonal or introspective questions tap into your self-knowledge, integrity and discrimination for good or bad choices that relate to you.

8. Where in nature does your highest dream reside and what does it look like? Naturalistic questions give you mental tools to draw on patterns and designs in nature as a way to see real world problems and propose nature-related solutions for growth.

In each question you’ll generate opportunities for responses from different areas of the brain. Ask three or four two-footed questions listed here, or create your own multiple intelligence questions to move past ruts. Whether you go after new directions as detailed here, or other ruts you face, expect mental barriers to fall, and get ready for a new shot at your dynamic journey ahead. It cannot help but happen when you ratchet up brainpower through diverse questions. Which intelligence will launch your next trek?

Related posts:

Smart skill 1 = Question to Refuel Finances Past Media Fears
Smart skill 2 = Question to Leap Over Life’s Ruts
Smart skill 3 = Question with the Brain in Mind and Move
Smart skill 4 = Question Research to Create Cutting Edge Tools
Smart skill 5 = Question Myths and Reboot Brainpower
Smart skill 6 = Question Ahead for Grandparent or Family Roles
Smart skill 7 = Question to Know How You are Smart
Smart skill 8 = Question with Two Feet to Spark Curiosity
Smart skill 9 = Question Broken Systems with Solutions in Mind
Smart skill10 = Question Brainpower Through Growth Surveys

To learn new skills, move past distractions, or take risks, research shows that  it pays to draw on more working memory.  Ready to propel your life and leadership to new heights? Then it’s time to tap into the wonder of  working memory. How so?

This unique mental capability not only increase focus, it also offers you the brief facts you need most at any given moment. While it takes skills to use it well, it holds two types of short-term memory. On one hand, it’s a notepad of sorts, with key verbal and spatial hints written there when you reach for them.

Don’t be deceived by its small size when you working memory offers you only one bit at a time, because its mental capacity holds that key fact while you solve complex problems.

Several hot spots in working memory can easily detract from its advantages unless you realize where these lie, and deliberately avoid them.

Watch those at work today who win in tough times, and you’ll see amazing solutions illuminated by their working memories in action, while losers see mostly problems.

Do you operate from a business-as-usual approach, or do you expect  wonders that come daily to those who use more working memory?

Check out recent research at Monitor on Psychology to see why working memory problems and possibilities are hot spokes in intelligent circles. Do you lead with the working memory in mind?

If you find yourself protecting your turf or stuck in a rut with boring routines, you’ve likely defaulted to your basal ganglia. No need to stay there, once you see how your brain can create neuron pathways beyond these potholes. Probably you’ve observed how static lives come from dull daily routines where people settle into the cortisol that comes with status quo, and no longer seek adventure.

But have you recognized the brain’s way to regenerate to a better place?

Here’s how it works. At the center of most ruts,  lies your brain’s basal ganglia. Experts call it your  mental storehouse for  habits, routines and every lifetime experience you’ve encountered. It’s also a place to promote and prolong cynicism or other annoying ruts.

It’s a bit like a tug-of-war where the basal ganglia tugs for tradition and familiar, and working memory pulls for innovation. Have you seen it?

Risk-takers and people who surf the cutting edges of possibilities, simply override the brain’s basal ganglia default daily.  In surprisingly straightforward ways, they engage in mental fitness within their working memory and learn to release brain chemicals that override mental ruts. How so?

Use more working memory and you’ll also keep your brain fueled and rolling forward. Whenever you engage your multiple intelligences in new ways, for instance, you also override your basal ganglia’s ruts and rigid routines.

Which side of the chart below do you live daily? Do you act more from basil ganglia – to the left?  Or is your day fueled more by working memory to the right of the chart?

Basil Ganglia Routine – Working Memory Adventure

It’s quite phenomenal if you think about an average brain’s ability to rebound from ruts, and reboot for rejuvenation.

The working memory’s capacity is tiny,  and holds fewer details than you can count on one hand. It can grow in size, but your working memory displaces current facts with newer details as fast as doughnuts disappear in Monday morning staff rooms. It’s a terribly uncomfortable place, that keeps one alert while always unfamiliar and rarely competent since details constantly change.

Interestingly, it was discovered recently that working memory, small as it is,  can literally expand with use. Consider the following facts about basal ganglia and working memory, before you chart new neuron pathways beyond their reach - toward success today.

Compare the basal ganglia’s much larger capacity and see how easily it stores lifetime habits, regular routines,  and experiences that last a lifetime there. You likely see why basal ganglia workers remain quite comfortable in this seemingly secure place.

Can you also see how new neuron pathways can help to bridge the difference between mental rejuvenation and stubborn ruts. Will brain facts about your  working memory that overrides basal ganglia ruts,  make any difference to your day?