Colors that invite your anxiety, your brain is your enemy past midnight (sorry night owls), and 2 ways you choose your destiny through food.
Brain coach’ weekend reading. Instead of the Sunday paper.
As I’m a brain coach with professional certifications in nutrition, integrative health and image consultancy (among other things like interior design and raw vegan cooking) — it doesn’t surprise me to read articles about “cutting edge” studies, confirming what in practice has been known for decades. That our brain doesn’t function all that well at night (when our demons come alive), that the food we eat changes our personality traits and your destiny (it seems microbiome is the connection link, the “trend” has been known in Eastern traditions for thousands of years), that colors have a direct effect on people’s moods, vibes, auras, intentions, health, and actions.
DAH!
I got a very interesting set of articles in a newsletter from BeBrainFit.com this week. As a multi-factorial brain coach who helps people build and use their “better brain” with tools from many disciplines, using neuroscience as a uniting link, I found it especially fascinating:
How processed food choices make our brain’s executive function worsen (aka we make dumb decisions), bringing decline of our brain’s cognitive capacities — worse memory and information processing with age compared to junk food abstainers (too much is a serving of French fries daily):
“People who consumed more than 20% of daily calories from processed foods had a 28% faster decline in global cognition and a 25% faster decline in executive functioning compared to people who ate less than 20%,” said study coauthor Natalia Gonçalves, a researcher in the department of pathology at the University of São Paulo Medical School.
For a person who eats 2,000 calories a day, 20% would equal 400 or more calories — for comparison, a small order of fries and regular cheeseburger from McDonalds contains a total of 530 calories.”
How microbes in our gut change our moods, intentions and actions (and with consistent exposure that becomes your character and destiny that you choose to eat for breakfast):
“It’s increasingly clear that what happens “in our heads” is actually a reflection of what happens in our bodies. Despite the physical distance between our GI tract and our brains, it’s now understood that what happens in the gut is affecting a number of pathways in our brains…”
How night owls are probably not the best decision-makers, as the rest of us, when we choose to stay up after midnight. A PERSONAL HACK: since I became an early sleeper I stopped experiencing any cravings for crappy food or crappy decisions.
“Plenty of evidence suggests the human mind functions differently if it is awake at nighttime. Past midnight, negative emotions tend to draw our attention more than positive ones, dangerous ideas grow in appeal and inhibitions fall away.”
And be careful about the colors you choose to surround yourself with for life and work — they might be causing your depression and anxiety to never leave, your heart rate and blood pressure rise, and your stress levels to accumulate. That’s why I never live in blue or grey rooms, never wear that much red anymore, unless feeling sleepy when I need to work or feeling like some sensual play.
“Red can trigger anxiety in many people, and is known to be one of the most stressful colors to decorate with.
The effects of room color among humans is often under-estimated, however, more recently, color psychologists have found that the color red is said to have specific negative effects on mental health and psychomotor activity.”
As a brain coach, I never stop learning about what changes our brain and how we can use that to prime the desired state. I teach all of my clients one simple model:
- What do you need to accomplish?
- How do you need to feel (your state) to do your best job to get the result?
- What do you need to change in your environment/actions to condition that state?
- the last question is of course my job to teach you.
www.BrainBreakthroughCoach.com — Your team can do more.
