Part 2 of Well-Being: Healthy Brain

Healthy Brain covers Pillars 4-6:

Pillar 4 – Active Learning

Don’t retire. Always stay engaged with at least some work and always be a learner. Continuous learning strengthens our brain. When we engage our minds in a new endeavor the brain generates stronger synapses and connections. Activities like starting a blog, building a website, learning a language, discovering art and music, learning to play a musical instrument, engaging in online computer games, traveling, cooking, and others are healthy for the brain.  

A paper by a group of researchers in France show “strong evidence of a significant decrease in the risk of developing dementia associated with older age at retirement, in line with the "use it or lose it" hypothesis…our results indicate the potential importance of maintaining high levels of cognitive and social stimulation throughout work and retiree life.” See the paper here.

Pillar 5 – Meaningful Intimacy

Intimacy relates to physical, emotional, intellectual, sexual, and other types of relating. It’s about how close you feel to someone and builds when you speak to someone, get to know them, feel empathy for them, and open up to them. Sharing your deepest thoughts and emotions with someone you love or trust can be one of the healthiest aspects of intimacy. See Heath Science Journal for more background.

Pillar 6 – Managing Thoughts & Emotions (T&E)

Positive T&E can include amusement, wonder, gratitude, spirituality, optimism, interests, joy, love, trust, prayer, confidence, contentment, laughter, and many others.

Negative T&E can include anger, humiliation, embarrassment, guilt, regret, distrust, sadness, fear, stress, anxiety, and many others.

Positive T&E give us energy. Negative T&E drain our energy. At any given time, we have a basket of Positive T&E and a basket of Negative T&E. Which basket you focus on is the one that determines your path.

For Well-Being, the key is to experience a lot more Positive T&E than Negative T&E. Here is an excellent resource from Barbara L. Fredrickson and her book, Positivity, to help you calculate your Positivity Ratio: Positivity Ratio Test.