— Power Up Your Brain by Moving Your Body
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If you keep up a regular running schedule, your cortisol will increase less and less during each successive running session and fall more and more every time you’re done.
beginning to see why training is extremely good for anyone suffering from stress and anxiety? It attacks the problem from several sides! Cortisol levels fall after each training session and won’t rise as much the next time. The hippocampus and the frontal lobe—the stress response’s brake pedals—strengthen and become more efficient at inhibiting the amygdala/anxiety engine. Activity in the brain’s GABA brake system is enhanced with more nanny neurons, and the muscles’ ability to neutralize the stress substance increases.
it is commonly said that stress is a reaction to something that happens here and now and that is perceived as a threat. On the other hand, anxiety is worry connected to something that isn’t a threat at present, or to something that has happened, or might possibly happen.
A reward system that is always underactivated will lead people to constantly change their focus and hunt for something that will give them a larger thrill.
Oddly enough, there’s another kind of din in your head, a kind of inbuilt hum that doesn’t originate in the sensory centers. It’s something we all experience, and it doesn’t mean we’re going crazy. It’s probably caused by brain cells activating spontaneously from time to time.
the more strenuous the exercise, the higher dopamine levels ris
nter-gatherers carrying the ADHD-variation of the gene seemed to have an easier time finding food than the hunters without the ADHD gene
e can’t go back to the savanna, but we can go running on a trail or hit the gym. If we do, we’ll be better equipped to handle the world we have changed so quickly, one that puts such high demands on our cognitive abilities.
f someone suffers brain damage—by having a stroke, or taking a hard blow to the head, for instance—the brain seems to pump out BDNF, probably in the effort to save itself.
Theoretically, one could drill a hole in the skull and inject the BDNF right into it, but who would agree to do that?
A great deal of BDNF seems to be generated when the heart’s rate is properly elevated.
The hippocampus is important in how memories get transferred from short-term to long-term status. As we’ve seen, exercise makes the hippocampus cells pump out BDNF, which reinforces the connection among brain cells. If we engage in physical activity before learning, BDNF will be pumped out while the memory changes from short term to long term.
tying your shoe laces, won’t leave a path. The cells hold on to one another for a short while, and then they let go. You
Had it been my guess, I would have ventured that it was a combination of all the factors. Turns out, I was wrong. When the mice only ran on the wheel and didn’t have access to any other stimulus in their crate, the impact in their brain was widespread. It appears that physical activity—running on the wheel—was the principal factor in the creation of new brain cells.
new brain cells were only about a month old, meaning that they had formed while the donor was dying from a serious illness. The brain had still kept on creating new brain cells!
on, a distinction is often made between two kinds of creativity: divergent and convergent thinking. Divergent thinking is the classic brainstorming: coming up with many different solutions to a problem by thinking broadly and using plenty of associations.
Convergent thinking emphasizes speed and logic more than divergent thinking and is more taxing on the brain.
The creative boost is quite short-lived; it increases anywhere from one to a few hours after exertion, and then it wears off.
people who perform especially well on creativity tests for divergent thinking have fewer dopamine receivers in the thalamus, causing them to register unusual levels of dopamine. Consequently, their thalamus lets through more signals, and their thinking is more creative.
it’s only endurance—not strength—that can be associated with higher scores on the IQ test. The muscular recruits did not have better results.
Memory anchors us to our lives, and if our ability to remember disappears, we change as individuals.
Our brain does not shut off when we take a walk—far from it. Many different mental processes are engaged when we walk or run.
When we compare this to working on a crossword, which involves mostly the language center, we realize that the mental labor is greater when we move around than when we sit with the paper.
our brain isn’t vacuum-sealed in our cranium; it is covered in a solution filled with nutrients and growth factors that is extremely fine-tuned and hugely influential on how our brain operates. To provide the brain with the best possible conditions in this bath, our blood pressure must remain stable. Likewise, blood glucose and blood fats should be in balance. The number of free radicals shouldn’t be too high, and the level of inflammation in the body—there is always some level of inflammation in the body—shouldn’t be excessive, either. Today, we know that all these factors are positively impacted when we are physically active, which means that the brain’s environment is ideal in anyone who exercises.
So how active do we need to be to lower our risk of developing dementia? Research has mostly defined the workload to be equal to walking or light jogging for a total of 150 minutes per week, or half an hour five times a week. Running for twenty minutes, three times a week, yields comparable results.
sful aging of the body and brain. Olga Kotelko demonstrated that, from our brain’s perspective, it is never too late to start being physically active. The brain will get stronger no matter how late in life you begin exercising.
It’s believed that the first brain cells were created about six hundred million years ago and that their primary task was probably to coordinate movement in primitive animals. This means that the first brain cells that emerged on Earth had movement as their most important function.
animals with good stamina—those that can run far—have a large brain. Like humans, rats and dogs have good stamina and, like us, they have large brains relative to their body weight.
If it’s so good for us all-around to go outside for a walk or a run, why is it so nice to just lounge on the couch and snack on potato chips? That’s because throughout most of human history, we’ve had to deal with an energy and calorie deficit—not an excess, like we have today.
The brain is programmed to give us a kick of dopamine so we feel better if we move our body, since hunting increases our chances of survival
you need to concentrate and react to the smallest movement to boost your odds of making the kill. That’s probably why you and I become more focused when we move our bodies.
movement has meant that we’ve seen new places and new environments, and it’s important to be especially vigilant when we experience new things. Being sedentary and staying rooted in one spot makes the brain think that we haven’t experienced or seen anything new, so there’s no need to improve memory.
Brain exercise apps have become a multibillion industry. Forget about them—they don’t work.