Brain Fitness

This morning, I was exercising my secret sin… browsing political blogs. (Shameful, I know… please don’t spread it around.) An enigmatic, just-posted entry on DailyKos caught my eye: ” A short diary, but a question on life.”

The author (with an intriguing nick of BFSkinner) asked rather eloquently what we would do if diagnosed with a disease that would inevitably rob us of our minds? A disease that would steal our very self, a disease that can be treated to slow but not stop the progression, a disease which, in the end, will win. How would we approach living the tale of Flowers for Algernon - the story of a mouse and a man who, having had their intelligence artificially enhanced, then watch that intelligence fade, along with their life?

Predictably, the question stirred me. I mean, heck… that book probably helped shape my fascination with improving and maintaining the human brain. Instead of contributing a quick comment and moving on, I decided to write here, instead.

Because there’s just no way I can explore this briefly.

Here’s what I hope I would do:

[click to continue...]

Yes, I know. I *said* I was going to do a ketchup-catchup post every Friday. But I’m behind on my catching up; did you really expect anything else? Seriously, I’ve been buried in work for Brain Fitness Boot Camp all week… with a major forum upgrade and changes in how the course material is accessed, etc. Those of you who are members will be getting an email shortly, detailing the additions - and for those of you who aren’t signed up yet, well… what are you waiting for, dang nabbit?

But while my head was buried in code, some cool things crossed my desk… and some other things are still bubbling on the back burner. [click to continue...]

Actually, these might or might not be the *top* things I’ve learned… because really, I’m not sure how to rank them.  But they’re certainly five things I didn’t expect to learn.  Anyway, on with the list!

1.Neuroplasticity Rocks.    

Although there’s no simple way to summarize it,  my deepening understanding of  how the neural pathways in the brain grow, strengthen, change and fade away has made a huge difference in my approach to… well.. everything.   The concepts involved have helped me to understand how both good and bad habits are formed, maintained and changed…   that new things are *supposed* to be hard, and being “smart” doesnt magically make new neural pop into existence without work. 

[click to continue...]

Remember a week or so ago when I told you about my new bloggy crush, Havi Brooks? You all helped me take her teleclass webinar thingy on non-strategic marketing strategy, and it was really cool. Thanks!

Today, I’ve decided to shamelessly steal-borrow-adapt one of Havi’s other ideas - a weekly post that she calls her Friday Chicken/Checkin. It’s essentially a place and time where she rambles waxes eloquently about her week - the good, the bad, the painful, the beautiful. But because I’m me, and I have to be different even from the different, I’ve opted for a condiment cliche instead of a poultry pun. There’s a reason for my changing it up, too… it’s a reminder to me to catch-up on all of the things I should have told you about this week, and didn’t.

So here goes, your very first edition of Friday Ketchup!

First up? Some linkage for you:

[click to continue...]

OOPS. You missed the deadline for the extra special price offer, but I *did* get to attend Havi’s call (and it was way cool. more later) Still, I’m leaving this post here because, well… I love the image of the duck with antlers too much to take it down.

_________________________________________

Here’s the thing. I have a new bloggy web crush. Her name is Havi Brooks. No, she doesn’t know I exist, and yes, that is a rubber duck on her shoulder.

More on the duck, later.

I have a crush on her because Havi does things on the web the way I used to do them before I started learning how I’m supposed to do things on the web, got all self conscious and mucked it all up. See, her marketing approach is to be shamelessly, unrelentingly, and blatantly herself, wearing her issues and quirks on her sleeve.

She also has a wicked sense of intuition, humor, and creativity. Sound familiar? [click to continue...]