Your Brain On Exercise

Your Brain On Exercise

I recently went to see a talk by an expert in neuropsychiatry, and bestselling author, John Ratey, MD, latest book being ‘Spark’. He presented about the effects of exercise on our brain. In this picture, the woman on the left is 70 and used to be obese, and the marathon runner on the right is 100. It really is incredible what we can do with our minds and bodies when we look after them! Today, for the most part we live very sedentary lifestyles, most of us in front of our computers for the majority of the working day and it’s easy to forget just how important regular movement and physical activity really is. Going back to ancestral times (how many times do I talk about that on this blog, my apologies but it just makes sense!) we used to move around all day long, hunting and gathering, building things etc. Our bodies are designed to move, regularly, and not sat in chairs all day long. I once heard the chair referred to as the worst invention ever for our backs, and for our health in general. Our spinal chords and brain make up the central nervous system. Our spine is like the hard drive for our body – with every bone, vertebrae and nerve connected to every essential organ and every other part of the body. When it’s sedentary and inactive, it deteriorates and we become ill. The quick fix is back pain relief – the form of a drug. This of course never addresses why the pain is there in the first place. Pain is there for a reason, and we tend to cover it up! So deterioration of the spine will continue and we become numb to the pain. This is one of the plentiful reasons we need to be really active, every day. Back to the this talk, here are my notes from this talk. I hope you find them useful:

– Exercise stimulates neurogenesis (creation of new brain cells) and plasticity (ability to learn and remember)
– exercise induces release of BDNF, a protein which protects brain cells
– we’re designed to move, it’s in our DNA, not to be sat at desks all day long
– the stress hormone, cortisol impacts the hippocampus in the brain, responsible for memory
– Your brain shrinks when you’re depressed and when you don’t move.
– Train yourself out of depression. [In Food Matters, an expert talks about how you should be depressed if you’re not nourishing your body with the right nutrients and especially if you’re combining that with lack of exercise. One of the biggest takeaways I’ve had from all of the documentaries I have watched is that we’re stuffing our faces, yet starving. We are depriving ourselves of key micronutrients – our vitamins and minerals – from plant-based foods] – Walk out of Parkinson’s disease. Alzheimer’s is now dubbed Type-3 Diabetes due to its identical correlation with insulin resistance – [a result of consistent intake of high GI carbs and sugar – and lack of physical activity]. Check out my post on Grain Brain for more info on this
– Change your brain by moving
– Example of swimmer Phelps diagnosed with ADHD – academic performance improved dramatically when he started swimming
– Board room of the future – treadmill desks [Conscious businesses are learning just how vital it is that we are active and how being sedentary impairs concentration and focus]
– Google HQ already has treadmill desks
– Richard Branson has no chairs in meeting rooms – they walk around
– Sugar is toxic for neuroplasticity, leads to early erosion of brain cells
– Sugar Triggers mood swings and stress
– Vitamin D, omega-3, cinnamon, Turmeric, B12, all amazing for the brain
– No Alzheimer’s where people consume curry (shows power of turmeric as anti-inflammatory and brain protector)
– Concentration and creativity increase 20-30% with exercise
– Oxytocin (love and connection hormone) is released when moving
– In schools, discipline problems drop when kids exercise, concentration improves
– 83% drop, scores went up when morning exercise was introduced

– You turn your brain on when you move.
– Look at this image of your brain before and after exercise
– exercise is more powerful than Add/ADHD drugs and causes no damage to the brain
– Meditation prepares mind for learning. Yesterday I met with a friend who turned his life around through meditation, exercise, and changing his diet. His doctor wanted to put him on antidepressant medication and he refused. This is a really interesting point. He did 5 years of medical school and dropped out the more he found out about the medical profession. He knows what antidepressants do to your brain and body. There was no way he was going to put them in his body. In this talk, John Ratey talked about how exercise is more powerful then most ADHD medications. It’s natural with no side effects! I always tell my coaching clients: You’ll never regret working you, you’ll only regret not working out. Just for fun…