What is inside the Brain, and how will you use and nurture it

Men ought to know that from the brain, and from the brain only, arise our pleasures, joys, laughter and jests, as well as our sorrows, pains, grief's and tears. Through it, in particular, we think, see, hear and distinguish the ugly from the beautiful, the bad from the good, the pleasant from the unpleasant. It is the same thing which makes us mad or delirious, inspires us with fear, brings sleeplessness and aimless anxieties. . . . In these ways I hold that the brain is the most powerful organ in the human body.

 –HIPPOCRATES

The Good News about our brain, nestled within your skull, mere inches from your eyes, are eighty-six billion of the most efficient transistors in the known universe. This neural network is you, running the operating system we know as life, and no computer yet conceived comes close to its awesome capabilities. Forged
over millions and millions of years of life on Earth, your brain is capable of storing nearly eight thousand iPhones’ worth of information. Everything you are, do, love, feel, care for, long for, and aspire to is enabled by an incredibly complex, invisible symphony of neurological processes. Elegant, seamless, and blisteringly fast: when scientists tried to simulate just one second of a human brain’s abilities, it took supercomputers forty minutes to do so. 

Now for the bad news: the modern world is like The Hunger Games, and your brain is an unwitting combatant, hunted mercilessly and relentlessly from all sides. The way we live today is undermining our incredible birthright, fighting our optimal cognitive performance, and putting us at risk for some seriously nasty afflictions.

Our industrially ravaged diets supply cheap and plentiful calories with poor nutrient content and toxic additives. Our careers shoehorn us into doing the same tasks over and over again, while our brains thrive with change and stimulation. We are saddled with stress, a lack of connection to nature,
unnatural sleep patterns, and overexposure to news and tragedy, and our social networks have been replaced by The Social Network—all of which lead ultimately to premature aging and decay. We’ve created a world so far removed from the one in which our brains evolved that they are now
struggling to survive.

Whether or not we are conscious of it, we are caught in the crossfire between warring factions. Food companies, operating under the “invisible hand” of the market, are driven by shareholders to deliver ever-increasing profits lest they risk irrelevance. As such, they market foods to us
explicitly designed to create insatiable addiction. On the opposing front, our underfunded health-care system and scientific research apparatus are stuck playing catch-up, doling out advice and policy that however well intentioned is subject to innumerable biases—from innocuous errors of thought to outright corruption via industry-funded studies and scientific careers dependent on private-interest funding. 
It’s no wonder that even well-educated people are confused when it comes to nutrition. One day we’re told to avoid butter, the next that we may as well drink it. On a Monday we hear that physical activity is the best way to lose weight, only to learn by Friday that its impact on our waistline is marginal compared to diet. We are told over and over again that whole grains are the key to a healthy heart,
but is heart disease really caused by a deficiency of morning oatmeal? Blogs and traditional news media alike attempt to cover new science, but their coverage (and sensational headlines) often seems more intent on driving hits to their websites than informing the public. Our physicians, nutritionists, and even the government all have their say, and yet they are consciously and subconsciously influenced by powers beyond the naked eye.

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Things to be avoided;

Inflammation

In a perfect world, inflammation is simply the ability of our immune systems to “spot clean” cuts, wounds, and bruises and to prevent the occasional bacterial tourist from becoming a full-blown infection. Today, our immune systems have become chronically activated in response to our diets and lifestyles. This has been recognized in the past several years as playing a pivotal role in driving or initiating many of the chronic, degenerative diseases plaguing modern society.

Overfeeding

We haven’t always been able to summon our food with a few swipes on a smartphone. By solving our species’ food scarcity problem during the Agricultural Revolution, we’ve created a new one: overfeeding. For the first time in history, there are more overweight than underweight humans
walking the Earth.

Nutrient Deficiency

“Every passing minute is a chance to turn it all around.” This is particularly true of our bodies’
ability to repair against the damages incurred due to aging, but only when we feed them the right ingredients. With 90 percent of Americans now falling short in obtaining adequate amounts of at least one vitamin or mineral, we have set the stage for accelerated aging and decline.

Toxic Exposure

Our food supply has become awash in “food-like” products. These products directly contribute to the three factors mentioned above: they are stripped of nutrients during the production process, they promote their own overconsumption, and they drive inflammation. Most insidious, however, may be the “bonus” toxic additives— the syrups, industrial oils, and emulsifiers that directly and
indirectly contribute to an activated immune system, driving anxiety, depression, suboptimal cognitive performance, and long-term risk for disease.

Chronic Stress

Chronic psychological stress is a major problem in the Western world. Like inflammation, the body’s stress response was designed by evolution to keep us safe, but it has been hijacked by the modern world.

Physical Stagnation

Our bodies are designed to move, and ignoring that fact causes our brains to suffer. The evidence on exercise is mounting to an impressive degree, validating it not only as a method of boosting our long-term brain health (enabling us to fend off diseases once thought unpreventable), but as a means of enhancing the way we think and learn.

Sleep Loss

Last but not least, good-quality sleep is a precondition for optimal brain function and health. It gives you the ability to make dietary and lifestyle changes by making sure your hormones are working for you, not against you.