Habits Archives - Farther to Go!

12 Years After

April 25, 2024 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

Twelve years ago this month, I headed off on the path I came to call Farther to Go! I was on a path of sorts at the time—well, on a sidewalk, anyway, heading west on Academy, into what I tend to refer to as the (expletive deleted) New Mexico wind—when I experienced a profound moment of ferocious dissatisfaction. It’s true that the wind had something to do with it, but the wind was also emblematic of my then current state of affairs and my feeling about it.

I wasn’t entirely sure where the new path would lead, I had no idea what I would find out along the way or who I would encounter, and there was certainly no inkling of Farther to Go! on the horizon.

During the past 12 years, I’ve read an insane amount of information about the brain and behavior. Many, but not all, of the books are identified on the Reading List page on my website. That list doesn’t include all the articles and other materials I’ve accessed. All my bookshelves and file drawers are maxed out. There’s been a lot of input into the system (me, that is; into my system).

In addition to applying what I learned to my own life, I’ve written hundreds of blog posts, articles, and newsletters, produced countless handouts and exercises, and created workshop and course materials galore. The 36 3-ring binders lined up on the desk behind me can attest to my output.

I was armed with a small amount of knowledge about the brain and behavior when I managed to look up at exactly the right moment to take advantage of the explosion of research in this arena. It was serendipitous to a great extent.

What kind of surprises me now is how well what I’ve learned has held up. Over the course of these 12 years, I have significantly revised my perception of only the four key elements outlined below.

Dopamine

Dopamine was long considered to be the pleasure neurochemical. A “hit” of dopamine was thought to be like a hit of a drug such as cocaine or heroin (more metaphorically than factually). This was still the prevailing view when I first learned about the brain’s reward system. Many people haven’t yet let go of this mistaken idea, which has led to some really silly concepts like dopamine detoxing.

Fortunately, I encountered the work of Kent Berridge early in my exploration and research. He’s an expert on dopamine and rewards and his work set me straight and helped me understand how essential rewards are in regard to behavior, whether we’re aware of them or not.

Dopamine is the wanting neurochemical. It’s associated with anticipation or craving or desire. When we attain what we anticipate, crave, or desire, other neurochemicals referred to as liking neurochemicals are released. Liking neurochemicals such as serotonin, oxytocin, and endorphin generate feelings of pleasure.

Dopamine motivates us to move (physically as well as psychologically), to pursue what we want, to take action. This wanting system is considered to be robust, while the liking system is considered fragile. Our experience of pleasure waxes and wanes, but wanting is always with us. This isn’t a personal problem or a design flaw; wanting is absolutely essential for both surviving and thriving.

Rewards

In The Power of Habit, Charles Duhigg described what he calls the habit loop, which consists of a cue, a behavior, and a reward. This was a bit of a revolutionary idea because we tend to think of a habit strictly in terms of behavior. Duhigg’s research led him to see that all three parts of the habit loop had to be in place in order for the brain to initiate, run, and end the habit.

That means that if we want to create a new habit, we need to determine what the cue will be, what the behavior will be, and how we will reward ourselves. I think this is accurate.

But Duhigg says that if we want to change a habit, we have to identify the reward we’re getting from the current behavior and substitute a new behavior that will give us the same reward. He makes a compelling case in his book. The problem, though, is that as far as the brain is concerned, liking neurochemicals are the reward, while to us a reward is something tangible or meaningful or perhaps symbolic.

Trying to identify a reward we’re getting for an existing behavior is like trying to figure out why we have a tendency to react the way we do to rain or a particular type of music or stray dogs or umbrella thorn trees. We can’t possibly figure that out with any degree of certainty—and even if we could, it wouldn’t make any difference.

In the case of changing a habit, what’s important is to be consistent about providing a reward for the new behavior until the brain takes over the job of releasing liking neurochemicals without the added stimulus.

Berridge is helpful here, too. He points out that our conscious perception of the reward we’re getting is essentially a story that may or may not have anything to do with what’s going on in the brain. The purpose of a reward is to get the brain to pay attention to a desirable behavior we just engaged in to increase the likelihood we will do it again. It’s positive reinforcement, plain and simple. It doesn’t matter if the reward we supply is related in any way to the behavior. It just has to be something we like so the brain will release liking neurochemicals. (I’ve done two consecutive 30-Day Challenges based on the same behavior, each with a different reward. Neither reward has anything to do with the behavior; both rewards have been extremely motivating.)

System 2

Although he didn’t come up with the terms—and dual-process theory was not a new idea—Daniel Kahneman did popularize the concepts of “System 1” and “System 2” in his best-seller, Thinking, Fast and Slow.

According to dual process theory, the unconscious part of the brain, System 1, is “fast,” meaning it processes 11 million bits of information at a time, while consciousness, System 2, is “slow” by contrast, as it can only process 40 bits of information at a time. There are many other significant differences between conscious and unconscious processing.

Kahneman, who died recently, won a Nobel Prize. He was considered a genius. I think that’s why it didn’t initially occur to me to question this binary division of thinking processes. But doubts started creeping in quite a few years ago. The characteristics attributed to System 2 thinking simply cannot be applied across the board to conscious thought. (There are even some researchers who question whether or not there is such a thing as “conscious thought.”)

After grappling with the problem for a while, I concluded that System 2 is a part of consciousness—a very, very small part of it, one that we access quite infrequently, possibly never. If we use Freud’s iceberg to represent consciousness and the unconscious, with consciousness being the tip of the iceberg, then System 2 is the tip of the tip. I’ve come to refer to the rest of conscious thought as ordinary consciousness. It has some attributes in common with System 1 and some attributes in common with System 2. Most of the time the stream of consciousness just flows through our minds, carrying us along with it.

Ordinary consciousness can be extremely useful and it has a role in creating transformational change, but accessing System 2 is essential for it. If we believe we’re accessing System 2 thinking just by being awake, we’re missing the boat entirely.

Autopilot

It seems hard to believe that the scientific estimate for how much of our behavior is outside conscious control was once a mere 40%—and that 40% was hard for a lot of people to swallow. Neuroscience has now concluded, logically, that 100% of our behavior is generated by our unconscious.

“Autopilot” is the short-hand term for this. It’s somewhat of a misnomer, though, because it was intended to contrast with the supposedly conscious “pilot” that makes intentional rather than automatic choices. But consciousness can’t and doesn’t make moment-to-moment choices.

Accessing System 2 can provide us with some ability to steer our personal ship in terms of determining direction and affecting future outcomes. But it can’t affect the choices we’re making now or the outcomes we’re getting as a result.

Duhigg’s conception of what happens at the end of a habit loop is that the brain is returned to conscious control. This is a perspective from the point of view of ordinary consciousness. It implies, first, that the brain is normally under conscious control, which it isn’t. Second, it fails to take into consideration that the unconscious is attending to multiple things at the same time, which means it is generating multiple action sequences, not just one. So the idea that the brain is “on autopilot” for the duration of a habit and then returned to the control of the pilot is both inaccurate and simplistic.

Habits are a bit different than the rest of our so-called autopilot behavior, but the fact remains that all of our behavior is initiated by the unconscious. If that weren’t the case, we wouldn’t survive long enough to get to the point of contemplating thriving.

Provisional Assessments

There are bound to be other conclusions that will be overturned by the ongoing research into how the brain works. So it’s useful to consider the conclusions we’ve arrived at thus far as provisional assessments. Provisional assessments are essential because they give us something to work with and to test, and they indicate new directions for further examination.

I’m excited to keep learning in this area. I don’t think there is any other exploration as challenging and potentially rewarding as this: humans investigating our own internal operational systems from the perspectives of our internal operational systems. Some contortionism required!

Here’s to many more years of learning—and of overturning.

The Best Mindset for a Fresh Start

December 27, 2021 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

The so-called Fresh Start Effect is based on the idea that we use temporal landmarks—dates that hold significance for us—as motivators for behavior change.* Such temporal landmarks run the gamut from the beginning of a week, a month, or a school semester to the beginning of a new year or a birthday. The brain does appear to take note of temporal landmarks; it’s easier to recall your last birthday than another random day of the month.

As temporal landmarks go, the beginning of a new year is famous for generating resolutions for self-improvement. The fact that most of these resolutions will probably fall by the wayside doesn’t deter us. Nor should it. We can take advantage of the fact that the brain is more open to change at some times than at others, as long as we approach the process from the right mindset.

Wrong Way: Production Mindset

A majority of New Year’s resolutions tend to consist of habits we want to start or stop: things we believe we ought to do or not do—or do more or less of—because they’re good for us. They’re a reflection of what I call the production mindset, which is focused on:

Being right
Being good
Relieving psychological tension
Interpreting feedback as judgment
Determining objectives
Following rules
Performing

It’s no accident that being resolute is also an aspect of production mindset. This is the mindset of whipping oneself into shape. It’s easy and automatic to operate from this mindset, but it’s a mindset that is not at all conducive to change. Production mindset is a stern taskmistress.

Right Way: Experiment Mindset

Experiment mindset operates from both a more committed and a more detached perspective. The commitment is to a desired outcome—and to mastering the change process—rather than to achieving a specific objective. The detachment allows for curiosity and learning. Characteristics of this mindset include:

Willingness to be wrong
Focusing on getting better
Developing creative tension
Evaluating feedback to adjust course
Identifying desired outcomes
Using guidelines
Discovering

In place of resoluteness, experiment mindset leads to resilience, which is a great asset on the rocky road to behavior change.

Running Experiments

Instead of creating a list of habits to start or change, evidence suggests we’ll get better results by running an experiment or two instead. And less really is more in this case. We’ll get better short- and long-term benefits when we focus on a single habit and successfully start or change it. We can build on that success with another habit. When we give ourselves too many things to work on at the same time—all of which require limited System 2 (conscious) resources—we create multiple opportunities to fail.

Here are some guidelines for running experiments.

Identify your desired outcome (the change you want to create; the experience you want to have).
Determine a minimum of three different objectives that could possibly get you your desired outcome.
Consider how you would structure or conduct an experiment to test each one.
Select one.
Set up the parameters:
> What will you test?
> What data will you track and how will you record or track it?
> How and how often will you evaluate feedback?
> What is the timeframe (beginning and ending dates)?
> How will you measure success or failure?
> How will you reward yourself for following through
Run the experiment.
If you have comparative data available, check it against the results of your experiment.
Decide on your next course of action:
> Continue the experiment.
> Implement the new behavior.
> Run a different experiment.

I find the IAP (Intention/Attention/Perseverance) process useful when conducting experiments. A combination of the eight steps above and the four IAP steps below has led to significantly greater success than I’ve ever had in maintaining a strength training program—and that’s saying a lot considering my numerous attempts and multiple heart conditions.

Intention: Describe in writing exactly what you intend to do, as well as when, where, and how you intend to do it. Be specific.
Attention: Identify how you will keep your attention focused on your intention (post-it notes, phone reminders, calendar notations, etc.).
Perseverance: Decide what you will do when things don’t go according to plan (regardless of the reason). What step(s) will you take to get back on track?
Reward: Identify how you will reward yourself when you follow through. Make it something you know you will enjoy—and then follow through with giving yourself the reward!

A note on rewards: Rewarding yourself when you follow through with an intention activates memory and learning circuits in the brain, which makes it more likely you will follow through the next time. Experiment with rewards, too, to discover what works for you.

Remember that you can use any temporal landmark as a boost to start a new habit or change an existing one. I started my strength training experiment on a random Monday in April 36 weeks ago. I set up a series of 10 three-week experiments, all of which I completed, and I’m still going strong.

*The idea was espoused by Katy Milkman, a behavioral economist, and presented in a 2014 article co-authored by Dai Hengchen and Jason Riis.

Books to Change Your Mind,
Your Brain, and Your Self

September 8, 2021 by Joycelyn Campbell 2 Comments

Here are brief summaries of a dozen books I consider foundational for understanding brain, mind, and behavior. Most of them were published between 2010 and 2012. There are plenty of books that have been published since then—and a couple I’m eagerly awaiting that will be out later this year—but these remain the most salient.

If you were to read all of them, you would see that some cross-reference each other in one way or another. That repetition is extremely useful! You would also get schooled in the extent to which we are wrong, which is also extremely useful.

Each summary includes a quote from the book, my take on what the book has to offer, and a link to a related blog post on my website. The books are listed roughly in order of importance.

Incognito | David Eagleman | 2011

Our brains run mostly on autopilot, and the conscious mind has little access to the giant and mysterious factory that runs below it.

It’s silent and dark inside the brain. So what happens in there to give us the rich visual and auditory perception of the external world we seem to have? How often do we mistake illusions for reality? Is the brain even focused on attempting to accurately represent reality or is it actively making things up? To what extent can you trust your sense of time? Is time real? How confident are you in your answers to any of those questions?

This was the threshold book for me: the book that didn’t just show me why and how the way we think about things is wrong, but also opened up so many possibilities. It left me with a big question: what is the best use of consciousness and conscious attention?

Blog post: Z Is for Zombie Systems

Thinking, Fast and Slow | Daniel Kahneman | 2011

A mind that follows WYSIATI (What You See Is All There Is) will achieve high confidence much too easily by ignoring what it does not know. It is therefore not surprising that many of us are prone to have high confidence in unfounded intuitions.

Here’s everything you wanted to know about System 1 (the unconscious) and System 2 (consciousness). I sometimes refer to these two parts of the brain as Smart Hamster (S2, the slow thinker) and Strong Hamster (S1, the fast thinker). Kahneman details the benefits and shortcomings of both types of thinking.

He also explains the basis of intuition and when it is—or is not—likely to be reliable, as well as some of the many cognitive biases System 1 uses in order to arrive at its quick judgments and conclusions. Overall assessment: mind-boggling.

Blog post: Intuition: Knowing Without Knowing How We Know

Self Comes to Mind | Antonio Damasio | 2010

The narrative of mind and consciousness that I am presenting here does not conform to the requirements of fiction. It is actually counterintuitive. It upsets traditional human storytelling. It repeatedly denies long-held assumptions and not a few expectations. But none of this makes the account any less likely.

Many of the books on my list contain what’s known as troublesome knowledge; Damasio admits upfront that his is one of them. He takes us on a trip from single-celled nonconscious organisms to us: many-celled conscious organisms with a sense of self and multiple selves.

I put off reading this for a long time, but it was worth the effort to get through the science to get to the issue of what it’s like to live with consciousness. As Damasio says, our conscious deliberation is circumscribed by numerous unconscious processes, some of which we can affect and some of which we can’t.

One surprising conclusion is that the unconscious is capable of making much higher-level decisions than we give it credit for—that is, if we have trained it well.

Blog post: Are You a Fictional Character?

The Ego Trick | Julian Baggini | 2011

The self is a construction of the mind, one flexible enough to withstand constant renovation, partial demolition and reconstruction, but one that can be brought down if the foundations are undermined.

Baggini, a philosopher, tackles a big question: If each of us has an enduring essence that makes us the same person throughout our lives (or even after), where and what is it? He attempts to answer the question via philosophy, neuroscience, psychology, and spirituality.

He says that the self is an illusion but that he does not mean it isn’t real, just that it isn’t what we think it is. That is the so-called “ego trick.” If there is no “true self,” we can, to a certain extent, create ourselves. His emphasis on action and agency make this a must-read, I think, for anyone interested in transformational change.

Blog post: Time to Let Go of the Myth of the True Self

What Makes Your Brain Happy and Why You Should Do the Opposite | David DiSalvo | 2011

I believe that the new wave of cognitive research actually undercuts a great deal of self-help advice, and will continue to do so in the years ahead by showing just how vacuous, groundless, and fraudulent much of that advice really is. We do not need more self-help—we need more science help.

The brain is “happy” when it is avoiding loss, lessening risk, and averting harm. While these protective tendencies can be quite useful, they can also get in the way of creativity, innovation, and living a satisfying and meaningful life.

The brain is also happy when it can connect the dots, whatever those dots may be: experiences, symbols, words, images, sounds. It does not like randomness, but it does like patterns. It doesn’t like questions; it likes answers.

As Disalvo says, we have a big brain capable of greatness with hardwiring for survival. And as I’ve said, learn how to use your brain instead of letting it use you.

Blog post: Are You Living the Good Life?

Stumbling on Happiness | Daniel Gilbert | 2006

Because it is so much easier for me to remember the past than to generate new possibilities, I will tend to compare the present with the past even when I ought to be comparing it with the possible.

We are really bad at affective forecasting (predicting how we will feel in the future or about a future event).

For a variety of reasons, making decisions about what to pursue in life based on what we think will make us happy in the future is largely a recipe for unhappiness. Where and how do we go wrong? Gilbert might say, Let me count the ways. In addition to exposing our wrongheadedness about happiness, he relates a considerable amount of research about a myriad of things we take for granted—and about which we are also wrong.

Note: You can skip the last chapter.

Blog post: Miswanting: The Problem with Affective Forecasting

The Storytelling Animal | Jonathan Gottschall | 2012

We are the great masterworks of our own storytelling minds—figments of our own imaginations. … And like a novel in process, our life stories are always changing and evolving, being edited, rewritten, and embellished by an unreliable narrator.

Stories permeate both our waking and sleeping lives. We are so addicted to stories that, even when the body goes to sleep, the mind stays up all night telling stories. Why do we find stories so compelling that we easily suspend disbelief? Why are we so compelled to turn everything into a story? And why should we question our—and others’—stories far more than we do?

Gottschall provides many fascinating stories about stories, including the stories of our lives, which are based on that most unreliable source of material: our memories.

Blog post: Consciousness Is a Narrative Process

The Hidden Brain | Shankar Vedantam | 2010

Nearly all our social, political, and economic institutions are based on an assumption of how human beings behave that is at best incomplete and at worst fundamentally wrong. The mistakes are so fundamental to the way we think about the world that we have enshrined them in international treaties and in constitutions.

What are the broader-scale effects of our assumptions, cognitive biases, and other errors in thinking? How do they affect our interactions with others and the ways in which we set up and run our social institutions, such as the criminal justice system?

Vedantam, who is the host of The Hidden Brain podcast on NPR, describes how our erroneous beliefs about the way we operate contribute to so many of the problems in the world. By becoming aware of them, we can begin to mitigate some of their negative effects.

Blog post: Success: Is It Random or Predictable?

On Being Certain | Richard Burton | 2008

To be effective powerful rewards, some of these sensations such as the feeling of knowing and the feeling of conviction must feel like conscious and deliberate conclusions. As a result, the brain has developed a constellation of mental sensations that feel like thoughts but aren’t.

As far as the brain is concerned feeling right is identical to being right. And we are persuaded by feelings more than we’re persuaded by facts. We don’t like being or feeling wrong—or being or feeling uncertain. This matters because the more certain we feel, the less likely we are to question our beliefs, judgments, or conclusions.

Among many other things, Burton talks about how feeling certain might, in some cases, serve an evolutionary purpose, what rewards have to do with certainty, and how seeing—or experiencing—should not equate with believing.

Blog post: I Could Be Wrong

Mind over Mind | Chris Berdik | 2012

Exploring the vast influence of expectations brings up humbling, even frightening possibilities. We might discover just how little contact we truly have with bedrock reality, and how much of our time, effort, and emotion we devote to watching and worrying over shadows. On the other hand, the power of expectations makes our reality coherent, meaningful, and open to the possibility of change, if we put our minds to it.

We can’t not have expectations, although we have often been advised to try. One reason is that our brain is in the business of predicting what’s going to happen next, and we have no control over that. We just go along for the ride.

Berdik explains what expectations have to do with—among other things—the placebo effect, addictions of all kinds, and athletic performance. Not surprisingly, the brain’s reward system plays a significant role in our responses to what are, first and foremost, our brain’s expectations.

Blog post: X Is for eXpectations

The Power of Habit | Charles Duhigg | 2012

Habits, scientists say, emerge because the brain is constantly looking for ways to save effort. Left to its own devices, the brain will try to make almost any routine into a habit, because habits allow our minds to ramp down more often.

From the brain’s perspective, habits are an energy-saving device. Duhigg tells us everything we need to know about them from the science behind them to practical application.

There are three parts to the so-called habit loop: a cue, a routine (the behavior), and a reward. Once a habit gets created, we can’t just eliminate it, but if we identify the cue and the reward, we can change the behavior. Similarly, if we want to create a new habit, we also have to determine what the cue and the reward will be.

Blog post: Is There a Blueprint for Habit Change?

Brain Rules | John Medina | 2014

The brain appears to be designed to (1) solve problems (2) related to surviving (3) in an unstable outdoor environment, and (4) to do so in nearly constant motion.* I call this the brain’s performance envelope.

Medina does in fact provide “rules” (which are more like recommendations) in 12 different areas: survival, exercise, sleep, stress, wiring, attention, memory, sensory integration, vision, music, gender, and exploration. He supports his recommendation with lots of data and examples.

In the chapter on wiring, he states that every brain is wired differently, but goes on to talk about what’s so for everyone (the “experience-independent” parts: much of the structure and function) as well as what’s so for individuals (the “experience-dependent” parts that are unique to each person). Our wiring is altered by what we do and what we learn.

*The book would have made my Top 12 list for this quote alone.

Blog post: 31 Ways to Be Good to Your Brain

31 Ways to Be Good to Your Brain

March 21, 2018 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

Here are 31 things you can do to be good to your brain so your brain can be good to you. It’s the best win-win situation I can think of.

Snack Healthy. Try almonds and blueberries. They lower blood sugar, and the omega-3s in the almonds and the antioxidants in the blueberries keep your brain functioning correctly.
Ballroom Dance. Learning new moves activates brain motor centers that form new neural connections. And dancing calms the brain’s stress response.
Swap Croutons for Walnuts. The omega-3s in walnuts improve mood, calm inflammation, and replace lost melatonin.
Walk Your Dog. Walking for 20 minutes a day can lower blood sugar, which improves blood flow to the brain and, therefore, thinking. If you don’t have a dog, go with a friend—or by yourself.
Become a Tour Guide. Learning new facts and thinking on your feet help to form new neural pathways in your brain, while interacting with others can ease stress.
Try a Different Puzzle. Switch from Sudoku to crossword (or vice versa). When you get good at one puzzle or brain teaser, master a new one to help your brain create new neural connections.
Take a Class. Taking classes, even auditing them, improves and maintains brain functioning. Learning something new is one of the best ways to keep your brain in good working order.
Have a Glass of Wine. Make it a red to get a hit of resveratrol, an antioxidant that may prevent free radicals from damaging brain cells.
Add Cinnamon to Your Oats. The oats scrub plaques from your brain arteries; a chemical in cinnamon is good for keeping blood sugar in check, which improves neurotransmission.
Listen to the Music. Instead of watching TV, listen to your favorite music. Music lowers stress hormones and increases well-being and focus.
Change Your Environment. Rearranging or redecorating can alter motor pathways in the brain and encourage new cell growth.
Engage in a Debate. If you can avoid getting overly angry, engaging in a good debate can form new neural pathways and force you to think quickly and formulate your thoughts clearly.
Get a Good Night’s Sleep. Sleep not only reenergizes the body, it also clears waste from the brain and supports learning and the consolidation of memories.
Join a Book Club. Frequent reading is associated with reduced risk of dementia. And reading literary fiction has a host of additional benefits including improved focus and an enhanced ability to approach and deal with obstacles.
Play a Board Game. Board games (Risk, Pictionary, Scrabble, etc.) not only require you to socialize, they also activate strategic, spatial, and memory parts of the brain.
Engage Your Senses. Go camping or spend some time at a farmer’s market where you can look, touch, sniff, and taste the produce to activate and engage different regions of your brain.
Add Some Strength Training. Even a little strength training can help protect brain cells from damage done by free radicals. It also encourages new brain-cell growth. You can just strap some weights on when you walk or practice yoga.
Take a Nap. Sleep’s boost to concentration and memory happens during the first stage, so your brain can benefit from just a 30-minute nap.
Develop a Hobby. Learning and engaging in a hobby has similar benefits to meditation. In addition, hobbies can act as antidepressants and protect against brain aging.
Eat with Chopsticks. Using chopsticks, if you’re not already adept, will force you to focus on what you’re eating. If you are adept, try using them with your other hand.
Read Aloud. Reading aloud engages the imagination in a different way. Different areas of the brain are activated depending on whether a word is read, spoken, or heard.
Try Something New. Novel experiences trigger the release of dopamine and stimulate the creation of new neurons. Go somewhere you’ve never been or try a cuisine that’s unfamiliar.
Turn off the GPS. Learn how to get around town by reading maps and using your sense of direction. Using your brain instead of your GPS can increase the size of your hippocampus, which stores and organizes memories.
Widen Your Circle. Stimulate mental growth and challenge your current way of thinking by connecting with people who have different interests or who are from different social or cultural environments.
Meditate. Training your mind to be quiet can reduce stress, improve memory and mood, and increase learning ability, focus, and attention.
Shake Your Booty Body. Gently bouncing your knees and shaking out your limbs for a few minutes in the morning and at night reduces levels of cortisol and triggers relaxation and alertness that keep your brain sharp.
Use Calendars & Planners. Taking advantage of tools like calendars, planners, maps, shopping lists, etc. to keep routine information accessible means you don’t waste mental energy on them and you are better able to concentrate on learning and remembering new and important things.
Master Something. Once you become proficient with something, the mental benefit is reduced because your brain becomes more efficient at it. Challenge yourself with the next level of difficulty or learn a related skill.
Take Care of Your Heart. Risk factors for cardiovascular disease and stroke, such as obesity, high blood pressure, and diabetes, can negatively impact your cognitive health. So take care of your heart in order to take care of your brain.
Protect Your Head. Avoid a head injury that could lead to cognitive decline or dementia by wearing a helmet when riding a bicycle or motorcycle and a seatbelt when traveling in a vehicle.
Laugh More. The more spontaneous laughter you have in your life, the lower your level of cortisol is likely to be—and lower stress means better memory. Just thinking about something funny can be beneficial.

In the Groove

December 8, 2017 by Joycelyn Campbell 2 Comments

Having managed to survive what just might have been the worst month I’ve ever had, I have a couple of things to report about habits and knowing what you want. (To fill in the blanks first, I was over-prescribed an antiarrhythmic medication that has a number of debilitating side-effects and a half-life of 58 days—which means that although I stopped taking it five and a half weeks ago, I still have a few more weeks to go before half of it is out of my system.)

Here’s what I’ve observed during the past couple of months.

The Value of a Compelling Habit

Last year, I wrote about the two sets of four things that I aim to do every day—things I want to do. They can’t be strung together into a routine, so for quite a while I attempted to get them done by putting them on my to-do list. But, as I wrote:

In the moment, at any given time, the unconscious part of the brain, which is focused on immediate gratification, can almost always find something more interesting or enjoyable for me to do.

I solved the problem by rewarding myself with a small star sticker on the calendar in my bathroom each time I completed the four things. My goal was to earn both stars every day. I see this calendar whenever I leave the bathroom, since it hangs above the light switch. Observing the day-by-day accumulation of stars was very satisfying. And I found that my self-talk, which had been encouraging me to delay or blow off one or more of the activities, turned into a cheerleader encouraging me to do them so I could get the star sticker.

This system has been in place for a while and had been quite successful until this past September, when I stopped being physically able to do two of the things (walking and stretching) twice a day. For a while I just lowered my sights and aimed for one star sticker a day. But more often than not, I couldn’t even aim that high.

But I have been very gradually feeling better and stronger the longer I’m off the medication. And I noticed that the calendar—with or without star stickers—has become a cue for me to resume those activities, which I have now been able to do for 10 consecutive days.

It doesn’t matter whether I look at each of the four things as a separate habit or at the group of them as a single habit. They are united by the star stickers on the calendar as well as in my mind. And not only does doing them make me feel better, resuming doing them is an indicator—in multiple ways—that I am better.

Although I hadn’t been doing the four things regularly for two and a half months, as soon as I was able to do so I got right back on track and my self-talk got right back in line. That’s because this set of habits is very compelling for me. I really, really want to do them. And I did them long enough in the past to create a well-defined track or groove that was easy for me to find and get back into.

The takeaway is that creating a groove is the most important part of developing a habit. If there’s something you want to do every day, first create a groove for doing it once or twice a week. If there’s something you want to do multiple times a day, first create a groove for doing it once a day.

If you try to be perfect out of the gate and fail (which is the most likely outcome), you’ll never gain any traction. You’ll have to continually keep starting over. But if you have a groove, even if it isn’t all you want it to be, it will be so much easier for you to find your place when you lose it. And you will lose it. That’s the nature of things.

The Value of Identifying What’s Most Important to You

There’s a little bit of irony in the fact that I identified vitality as the thing that’s most important to me two months before I was diagnosed last year with multiple heart conditions, including one that results in fatigue and decreased energy. On top of that, one of the most prominent side effects of the antiarrhythmic drug I took recently is insomnia. This is not a recipe for vitality.

But the fact that I can’t have the level of vitality I used to have and that I would much prefer to have doesn’t mean it isn’t still important to me. I haven’t decided to replace it with something else because my circumstances have changed. I’m clear that no matter what, vitality is still what I’m aiming for. That means I have to determine the best actions to take so I can achieve the highest level of vitality possible at any given time.

That makes it hard to feel defeated or powerless. My personal agency may be limited, but I can identify the agency I do have, the actions I can take, the difference I can make. In fact, aiming for as much vitality as I can get makes decision-making a breeze. Instead of basing decisions on what I should do or what I would prefer to do, I simply ask myself if doing or not doing something is likely to increase or decrease my vitality.

The takeaway here is that you may not be in a position to achieve as much of what’s important to you as you would like to achieve. That doesn’t mean you should write it off. (It doesn’t actually mean anything at all.) Don’t sell out. Don’t give up. Don’t let it go. Go after as much of it as you can get at this particular point in time!