Your Amazing Brain

An Amazing Gift!

“The human brain is the last, and greatest, scientific frontier. It is truly an internal cosmos that lies contained within our skulls. The more than 100 billion nerve cells and trillion supporting cells that make up your brain and mine constitute the most elaborate structure in the known universe.

 ~ Joel Davis

Your Most Valuable Resource

Some would argue that the structure within our skull is our most valuable resource, and I would agree. Indeed, brains run the world and everything in our lives, yet we spend very little time thinking about it, much less trying to improve it. Even those who are health conscious where the body is concerned often don’t spend much energy in optimizing brain health.

This amazing, energy-hungry organ is only two percent of your body weight (about three pounds) but utilizes twenty percent of the body’s energy consumption at rest, burning even more calories while in concentrated thought. It produces at least seventy thousand thoughts a day and has more connections than stars in the universe! With one hundred billion neurons (cells), our brain can hold all information found on the Internet with room to spare. One lifetime is certainly not enough time to max out the capacity of this powerful organic computer.

You’re Not Stuck with the Brain You Have

As if that’s not impressive enough, the brain is malleable and can be changed. This plasticity has been researched by scientists in recent decades. It was believed that you were stuck with the brain you have, and that it couldn’t be significantly improved, only damaged. Now we know that not only can it be bettered, but learning disabilities, brain damage, memory loss, and a host of other conditions can be improved, and in some cases eliminated.

Neural pathways in your brain are formed or changed every time you do or think something. These pathways are composed of multiple neurons that communicate with one another through synapses. The first time a communication signal crosses from one neuron to another it is difficult, but with each signal the process becomes easier until, finally, it is effortless. We can physically and literally change the pathways of our brain by how we think and feel. If a thought is rehearsed with regularity, eventually it will change how we think automatically, especially if the new thought is experienced with strong emotion. Because of this, anxious and negative thoughts can increase or decrease depending on how a person directs them, whether intentionally or unintentionally. If one believes they cannot help how they think, the unwanted thoughts will likely increase, but if they intentionally practice true and positive self-talk, negative thinking will decrease. This is what much of this book is based on—choosing to act and think in ways that eliminate negative pathways and create positive, healthy ones.

Improving brain health is an understatement of what we are capable of with an optimized brain. From freeing ourselves of depression to aging backward to preventing Alzheimer’s, the list is endless. Statistically, we are suffering from more brain-related issues than ever in history. I hope this will awaken us to the urgent need for taking charge of our brain health.

The good news – it’s never too late to start!