Home Mindfulness and Happiness Switch on Your Brain

Switch on Your Brain
Read in 14 min.
Listen in 17 min.
Learn the key ideas of the book by Caroline Leaf

Switch on Your Brain

Change the way you think to improve the quality of your life

If you think that our genetic makeup is unchangeable and therefore our lot in life is already determined from day 1, you need to think again. Our biology does not determine our destiny, and our mind can have a truly huge impact on our brain and on our physical and mental health. Neuroscientist Caroline Leaf specialises in the power of thought and the impact of our choices. In her book Switch on Your Brain, she explains how our thoughts and choices affect us physically, mentally and emotionally. Her "brain detox plan", teaches readers how to destroy toxic thoughts and replace them with healthy ones, thereby effecting a positive change in the brain, which is actually malleable by nature, to attain unprecedented levels of happiness and mental health.

Switch on Your Brain
Read in 14 min.
Listen in 17 min.
IDEA CHIAVE 1/9

Brain plasticity: our brain is not in a fixed state, it is constantly changing

As human beings, we possess the extraordinary ability to identify, achieve and maintain optimal levels of intelligence, mental health, peace and happiness, as well as to prevent diseases of the body and mind.

Modern neuroscience research has proved this ability, which on an instinctive and spiritual level, we already knew long ago: what we think in every moment of our life has the capacity to become physical reality, and therefore have an impact on our physical and mental health. A thought or a choice that we make can mean either a positive or negative change in our brain cells: it is something big and profound, and we control it.

Until only a few decades ago, scientists thought that the brain was a fixed, hardwired machine, whose functions were predefined. According to this view, therefore, a damaged brain would simply have been incurable. Today we know that this is not the case: our brain is not something static and unchangeable.

On the contrary: neuroscience has discovered a very important feature of the brain, namely brain plasticity or neuroplasticity. This is the brain's ability to be malleable and adaptable, constantly changing in every moment of the day and night. Scientists are therefore beginning to recognise the renewable characteristics of the brain: the fact that the brain can actually be modified by the mind can give us great hope, regardless of the biological circumstances in which we are born and live. Such circumstances have far less impact on our mental and physical health than we think: how we deliberately choose to react to them matters much more.

So, the key to activating the brain to achieve happiness and mental health lies in understanding that, through the very thoughts that we think and the choices that we make, we can modify our brain and free ourselves from the genetic constraints we believed to be inevitable.

  

The key ideas of "Switch on Your Brain"

01.
Brain plasticity: our brain is not in a fixed state, it is constantly changing
02.
Mind controls matter, not the other way around
03.
Free will and responsibility: our destiny is not written in stone
04.
The importance of thinking intentionally and staying focussed
05.
The 21 day brain detox plan to destroy toxic thoughts and build healthy ones
06.
The first two phases of brain detox: awareness and intentional thought
07.
The final three stages of the brain detox plan: journal, replace, action step
08.
Quotes
09.
Take-home message
 
 
4books preview

Try 4books Premium for free!