To Harness Neuroplasticity, Start with Enthusiasm

3. Fuel it the finest.
Our dietary choic­es affect not only the health of our bod­ies but also the health of our brains. In fact our brains con­sume one fifth of all the nutri­ents and kilo­joules we ingest. What we eat has a sig­nif­i­cant impact on our neu­ro­trans­mit­ters (chem­i­cals that car­ry mes­sages between neu­rons across synaps­es), our alert­ness, our mood and our cog­ni­tive functioning.

4. Keep the car­go light.
Obe­si­ty is a major risk fac­tor for dementia.

5. Run the motor.
With­out phys­i­cal exer­cise our brains waste away as much as our mus­cles waste away. Exer­cise actu­al­ly induces the growth of new brain cells.

6. Learn the ropes and keep on learning.
Hav­ing a good edu­ca­tion and engag­ing in life­long, active learn­ing help to pro­tect us from demen­tia and con­tribute to our devel­op­ing “cog­ni­tive reserve”. This reserve acts as a buffer against men­tal decline as we age.

7. Sail to new shores.
Bore­dom and monot­o­ny are poi­so­nous to our brains. We need to get out there, get explor­ing and get out of our com­fort zones. We need to sail to new shores to find rich­es out­side our usu­al bound­aries. We need to change our rou­tines, do things dif­fer­ent­ly and give our­selves ongo­ing challenges.

8. Use it or lose it.
This applies to every func­tion of the brain and body, from study­ing to social­is­ing to sex. In order to main­tain our capac­i­ty for learn­ing new skills, we need to engage in learn­ing new skills on a reg­u­lar basis.  In order to become cre­ative, inven­tive and re-source­ful, we need to give our­selves tasks that require cre­ativ­i­ty, inven­tive­ness and resource­ful­ness. In order to have a good mem­o­ry, we need to make a con­scious effort to pay atten­tion. In order to remain social­ly adept, we need to remain social­ly active.

9. Train it and regain it.
If we lose a spe­cif­ic brain func­tion, all is not lost. Pro­gres­sive, per­sis­tent, goal-focused prac­tice can help us regain the lost function.

10. Charge the battery.
Still­ing the mind is as impor­tant as stim­u­lat­ing the mind. Get­ting ade­quate sleep and press­ing the pause but­ton on our mind chat­ter are essen­tial for peak per­for­mance on a day-to-day basis, as well as preser­va­tion of brain func­tion as we age.

11. Con­nect with fel­low travellers.
Life­long social inter­ac­tion and mean­ing­ful con­nec­tion with oth­ers is vital for a healthy brain.

12. Choose the destination.
The brain is a tele­o­log­i­cal device—it is fed by hav­ing goals to strive for and aspi­ra­tions to work towards. The clear­er we are about where we want to go and what we want to achieve, the more effec­tive the brain is in accom­plish­ing the required tasks. This is anal­o­gous to the cap­tain giv­ing the crew clear instruc­tions about where they’re going and what is expect­ed of them.

13. Com­mand the crew.
Hav­ing decid­ed on what we want, we need to direct our self-talk to sup­port our goals. Our inter­nal dia­logue is a con­stant stream of instruc­tions to the sub­con­scious mind. Uplift­ing, solu­tion-focused self-talk switch­es on brain cell activ­i­ty; neg­a­tive, dis­cour­ag­ing self-talk damp­ens it.

14. Com­mu­ni­cate gratitude.
When we think about what we’re thank­ful for, we wire our brains to con­tin­ue find­ing things to be thank­ful for. Our brains are designed so that we see what­ev­er we’re look­ing for. We are nev­er objec­tive, even when we make a con­cert­ed effort to be so. Sub­jec­tiv­i­ty always enters our per­cep­tions. We don’t see things as they are; we see things as we are. There­fore, by reg­u­lar­ly reflect­ing on things that we’re grate­ful for, we con­struct a fil­ter through which we see the world and we cre­ate more expe­ri­ences for which to feel grateful.

15. Prac­tise perfectly.
When we prac­tise a skill in our imag­i­na­tions, the same neu­rons are fir­ing as if we were per­form­ing the skill in real life! If we see our­selves exe­cut­ing a task per­fect­ly in the mind’s eye, we become bet­ter at it in the real world because every men­tal rehearsal increas­es the effi­cien­cy of elec­tri­cal trans­mis­sions between the involved nerve cells. Men­tal prac­tice tur­bocharges our progress.

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