1201. Having control over your thoughts and feelings is a key skill in enhancing mood and emotion. When you allow your thoughts to run wild in your brain, you may set off a panic attack, with your heart racing, chest pain, and blood pressure spiking;
1202. When your partner holds something warm, such as your warm hand, he or she trusts you more and feels closer to you and more giving. Cold hands have the opposite effect;
1203. Holding warm things may actually make people view others more favorably and may also make people more generous;
1204. Physical warmth can make us see others as warmer people, but also cause us to be warmer–more generous and trusting–as well. At a board meeting, for instance, being willing to reach out and touch another human being, to share their hand, those experiences do matter although we may not always be aware of them;
1205. When holding your partner’s had, imagine warm, loving energy going from your hand to hers. With each exhale, send warm and intentional thoughts of love and gratitude. Do this for just a few minutes a day and soon you will begin to notice a positive difference in your relationship;
1206. Excessive alcohol use causes red blood cells to become enlarged and inefficient;
1207. Drinking large amounts of alcohol–four or more glasses of wine or the equivalent in hard liquor on a daily basis–raises the risk of dementia. New research shows that even moderate amounts of alcohol have negative effects on the brain. One study found that people who drink three times a week have smaller brains than do nondrinkers;
1208. In a study appearing in the Journal of Psychiatric Research, researchers showed that heavy marijuana use among young adults and adolescents may affect normal brain development, interrupting an important process called myelinization. With myelinization, brain cells are coated with a protective sheath that increases the brain’s processing speeds. The process, which isn’t completed until about age twenty-five, starts at the back of the brain and works forward, making the PFC the last area to gain the protective covering. This explains why the subjects in this study showed abnormalities in their PFC and temporal lobes, the areas of the brain involved with decision making, attention, executive functioning, memory, and language;
1209. Researchers around the world have demonstrated that meditation enhances activity in the brain’s PFC, even to the point of boosting the number of brain cells. The better your PFC functions, the more focused and energetic you feel;
1210. Green tea is a potential energy booster. It has about half the caffeine as coffee, plus theanine, which helps people feel focused. There is scientific evidence that green tea helps keep weight off, boosts exercise ability, helps muscles recover faster from workouts, and improves attention span;
1211. People who are sleep deprived eat more simple carbohydrates than people who get adequate sleep;
1212. When people slept only five and a half hours, they consumed an average of 221 more calories in high-carbohydrate snacks than when they got eight and a half hours of sleep;
1213. People who consistently slept five hours or less per night had on average 14.9 percent more ghrelin (which stimulates appétit) and 15.5 percent lower leptin (which tells your brain you are full) than people who slept eight hours night;
1214. Cell regeneration is a process during which old, dead skin cells are replaced with fresh new cells. This process goes on at all times within the body, but it happens more quickly at night so you generate more new skin cells while you sleep than at any other time. As we get older, cell replacement slows down, which makes sleep even more crucial if you want to delay the thin, saggy skin that comes with age;
1215. As we sleep, the brain regulates the body’s hormones, including androgens, which stimulate the production of sebum, or oil, in glands located in the skin. When hormones are balanced, sebum production is regulated to help keep skin looking clear and smooth. Hormonal imbalances can cause too much sebum production, which can lead to acne;
1216. People who get less than seven hours of sleep a night have lower activity in the prefrontal cortex and temporal lobes, which are involved in memory and learning. This limits the ability to pay attention, learn, solve problems, and remember important information;
1217. Research shows us that sleep deprivation impairs motor function, which makes you less coordinated. Reaction times are slowed. The reduced cognitive function associated with lack of sleep means that you may not make the best decision. Plus, you tend to feel tired faster because sleep deprivation negatively affects glucose metabolism;
1218. Studies show that decreased motivation due to poor sleep makes you more likely to skip family events, work functions, and other recreational activities. Social connection help keep the brain young, so missing out on get-togethers and events due to fatigue can dampen your mood and prematurely age your brain. This can be especially troublesome for seniors because a lack of social connections and bonding can speed up the brain’s aging process;
1219. Growth hormones are typically generated as we sleep. If youngsters don’t get enough sleep, they may not produce enough of the hormones to fuel growth;
1220. In a sleep study with healthy volunteers, those who got only 5.5 hours of bedtime experienced insulin resistance and impaired glucose tolerance–two precursors of diabetes–after just two weeks;
1221. Individuals who had experienced stressful events tended to look older than their siblings who had led more stress-free lives. For example, twins who were divorced looked almost two years older than their siblings who were married, single, or even widowed;
1222. According to a 2009 study of 647 women, the physical effects of chronic stress were found to be similar to the effects of smoking, being obese, or being ten years older than their actual age. The study looked at the association between perceived stress levels and the length of telomeres, the protective caps located at the ends of chromosomes. The longer the caps are, the more protection they provide. Telomeres naturally shorten over time as we age, eventually becoming so short that they trigger cell death. In this study, the women with higher levels of perceived stress had shorter telomeres than women with low-level stress, indicating premature aging;
1223. Short-term stress temporarily boosts immunity, but chronic stress weakens the immune system, making people more vulnerable to common ailments and serious diseases;
1224. Exposure to chronic stress early in life makes you even more vulnerable to a depressed immune system throughout your lifetime;
1225. Chronic stress combined with a high-fat, high-sugar diet leads to abdominal obesity in mice due to a neurotransmitter called neuropeptide Y (NPY). The brain releases NPY directly into the fatty tissue in the abdomen. Chronic stress stimulated the release of NPY in the abdominal fat and increased its growth by 50 percent in just two weeks. After three months, they also displayed symptoms typically associated with metabolic syndrome, including high blood pressure, inflammation, high cholesterol, glucose intolerance, and more. What this study shows us is that chronic stress packs on even more abdominal fat than you might experience from a high-fat, high-sugar diet alone–and it does it faster;
1226. In Kirtan Kriya meditation, the following simple sounds are known as the five primal sounds: “sa,” “ta,” “na,” “ma,” with “aa,” the end of each sound, considered to be the fifth sound. Touch the thumb of each hand to the index finger while chanting “sa,” the middle finger while chanting “ta,” the ring finger while chanting “na,” and the pinkie finger while chanting “ma.” The sounds and fingering are repeated for two minutes out loud, two minutes whispering, four minutes silently, two minutes whispering, and two minutes out loud;
1227. A Chinese study showed that people who received just twenty minutes of daily meditation training for five days showed a significant decrease in stress-related cortisol;
1228. The Relaxation response: 1. Sit quietly in a comfortable position. 2. Close your eyes. 3. Deeply relax all your muscles, beginning at your feet and progressing up to your face. Keep them relaxed. 4. Breathe through your nose. Become aware of your breathing. As you breathe out, say the word “one” (or some other relaxing word you choose) silently to yourself. For example, breathe in . . . out, “one,” in . . . out, “one,” etc;
1229. If you want your brain to work better, be grateful for the good things in your life. Psychologist Noelle Nelson was working on a book called The Power of Appreciation and had her brain scanned twice. The first time she was scanned after thirty minutes of meditating on all the things she was thankful for in her life. After the “appreciation meditation,” her brain looked very healthy. Then she was scanned several days later focusing on the major fears in her life. Her frightened brain looked very different from her healthy gratitude brain and showed seriously decreased activity in two parts of her brain. Her cerebellum had completely shut down. The cerebellum, also called the little brain, is involved in physical coordination, such as walking or playing sports. New research also suggests that the cerebellum is involved in processing speed, like clock speed on a computer and thought coordination or how quickly we can integrate new information. The other area of her brain that was affected was the temporal lobes, especially the one on the left. The temporal lobes are involved with mood, memory, and temper control;
1230. Showing gratitude on a daily basis is one of the keys to increasing your sense of joy, happiness, and life satisfaction;
1231. Diaphragmatic breathing, in which you direct and control your breathing, has several immediate benefits. It calms the basal ganglia, the area of the brain that controls anxiety, helps your brain run more efficiently, relaxes your muscles, warms your hands, and regulates your heartbeat;
1232. As you inhale, let your belly expand. This pulls the lungs downward, which increases the amount of air (and oxygen) available to your lungs, body, and brain. When you exhale, pull in your belly to push the air out of your lings. This allows you to expel more air, which in turn encourages you to inhale more deeply;
1233. Whenever you feel stressed out, take a deep breath, hold it for four to five seconds, then slowly blow it out (take about six to eight seconds to exhale completely). Take another deep breath (as deep as you can), hold it for four to five seconds, and blow it out slowly again. Do this about ten times;
1234. The scent of lavender has been used since ancient times for its calming, stress-relieving properties. This popular aroma has been the subject of countless research studies, which show that it reduces cortisol levels and promotes relaxation and stress reduction;
1235. The present is all we really have, we can’t change the past, and that it is what we’re doing right now that shapes our future;
1236. Caffeine disrupts a natural process that keeps stress under control. When ingested, caffeine prevents the release of adenosine, a chemical that regulates bodily functions. Normally, when we get stressed, adenosine levels rise to reduce the body’s response to stress. With caffeine, however, adenosine is suppressed so your body’s response to the stress is heightened;
1237. Laughter lowers the flow of dangerous stress hormones that suppress the immune system, raise blood pressure, and increase the number of platelets, which cause clots and potentially fatal coronary artery blockages. Laughter also eases digestion and soothes stomachaches, a common symptom of chronic stress. Plus, a good rollicking guffaw increases the release of endorphins, which makes you feel better and more relaxed;
1238. It’s kind of pointless to go to the first few days of the U.S. Open (i.e., golf). They’re just practice rounds. No actual competition occurs;
1239. Robbie likes jazz and blues music;
1240. George Washington didn’t have any children of his own;
1241. (Architect) Frank Lloyd Wright was born two years after (the end of) the Civil War;
1242. The brain is like a muscle. The more you use it, the more you can continue to use it. New learning makes new connections in the brain, making you sharper and more efficient. No learning actually causes the brain to disconnect itself. Unlike a muscle, however, the brain gets easily bored and requires new and different challenges to stay healthy. Once the brain really learns something, it uses less and less energy to accomplish the task. To keep active, the brain needs a constant stream of new challenges;
1243. Travel to new lands, especially ones filled with fascinating history and sites, keeps the brain learning and working at optimal efficiency. In addition, going to different cultures often involves a new language, which really pushes the linguistic and memory centers of the brain;
1244. New navigation routes enhance the brain’s parietal lobes, which are involved in direction sense;
1245. Everyone has two apoE genes, and if one of them–or worse, two of them–is apoE4 , that person’s chances of getting memory problems is quite high;
1246. To find out your apolipoprotein E (i.e., apoE) genotype, you can ask your doctor to order a simple blood test. This should be done under the strictest confidence so that insurance companies or others cannot obtain the information and potentially use it against you. It would be best to pay for the test on your own and keep it in your personal records, but not allow it to be included in your medical records;
1247. Alcohol is a double-edged sword. Four or more drinks a day increase risks for stroke and heart disease, while one drink every few days actually reduces these risks (presumably by increasing HDL cholesterol, which clears other types of cholesterol that cause hardening of the arteries);
1248. Diabetes damages almost every organ, including the brain, by making blood vessels hard and brittle. This increases the likelihood of stroke, heart disease, and hypertension, all of which increase aging problems for the brain;
1249. People with a family history of diabetes should have an Hg A1C and fasting blood glucose test once a year after the age of forty. Also, if symptoms of increased urination, increased thirst, or increased appetite develop, then fasting blood glucose should be checked for diabetes;
1250. Exercising at least every three days helps protect against diabetes and a number of other illnesses;
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