I come from the data heavy research world. I specialised in Human Computer Interaction and Anthropology. I like all things scientific, rational, factual, empirical, logical and sensible. If i don't understand something it bothers me. I can't sleep much. I try and find an explanation on why it happens the way it happens. A few words like awareness, mindfulness, zen, compassion, love throw me off as I could not understand these aspects using my logical and rationale brain. For starters, I decided to question everything around me till i find a certain level of clarity inside me. This quest started two years ago.
From that day when I started seeking answers and connecting dots, let me tell you this, I feel like an idiot every single day. It was a really hard feeling to live with. Till that day, I thought I knew something about some topics but when I started going deeper and seeking more clarity everything went for a toss. I realised that profound things are simple and they are hard to find.
Great things never came from comfort zones.
- Neil Strauss
This is when I stumbled upon Neuroscience as a full-fledged subject. In grad school, I remember lectures in anatomy and physiology. We did touch upon brain as a system, its structure and its function. I don't think I cared about it so much then. But this time, when I was intently searching for depth about a few topics, Neuroscience gave me all the answers I needed. I realised, all human phenomenon is biological. Even psychological stuff have biological explanation. I experimented enough with weight loss, learning strategies, minimalism, decluttering, efficiency, productivity etc and I found all the necessary answers in our biology and especially in our brains.
You can only understand something from where you are and with what you know so far. As a student of cognitive science, I could not miss applying information processing concepts and methods to understand the human brain and I discovered that there is something called as brain health. No I am not talking about mental health. I am talking about brain health. The day I realised the beauty of human brain, my life changed for ever.
How do u take care of this magnificent organ called brain matters for your wellbeing! Personally, I don't like my brain to be clogged, to be stuck, to be overwhelmed, to be pained at any time. I like my organ to be well oiled and well maintained at all times. Your brain is an amazing machine and a prized possession.
I treat my brain with utmost responsibility and care so I never overload it with too much information. I don't read so much news, I don't do much social media, I hardly use my phone and my computer in everyday work (my total time spent on phone is 55 mins on average), I don't play games, I can't binge watch even for a short period - I puke in 2 days, I don't stay in crowded places, I can't handle too many social (Whatsapp, slack, telegram etc) groups, I deliberately quit all information overload avenues whatsoever. In many ways I am anti-social 🙈.
I don't like my dopamine receptors to be tampered. I don't want my hypothalamus to go for a toss. Naturally I have 12-14 hours of flow most days. As a person I am cheerful and joyful all days. I don't need this work-life balance cheat sheets and remote working tips. I don't need too much sleep. This was a profound change in me after caring about my brain. All I did was constantly work towards clean neurons every single day. My mood swings vanished. My groggyness went away. I can consistently walk/jog everyday. I write here for brain health. I started seeing things clearly. The problem solving efficiency went up by several notches.
I try and share these nuggets with my inner circle at every possible opportunity. Some requested me to write a few snippets here now that I have a dedicated place to write. A filter called NEURO is available now and we can talk about brain and its magic whenever possible. Go for your brain health and everything else will fall in place. Let us discuss all exciting topics from the lens of neuro here!
