Healthy Brain, Happy Life (2 page)

But the secret weapon here to activate your brain and to use the power of the mind-body connection to make ourselves happy, that genie in the bottle, is neuroscience. I came to realize that I was the living example of neuroscience; everything I did with my body was changing my brain, for the
better
! Once this came into focus for me, I knew there was no turning back. I found that when I took the time to develop more of the dimensions of my own identity, I felt more fully myself, more complete. I was 100 percent motivated to make the changes that I needed to make in my life to be happy, to manage my negative thought patterns, stay focused, and follow through on my goals. So what I’m saying is that, from a neuroscience perspective, you
can
use your brain to make yourself happy.

Today I am forty-nine. I am fit, I am happy, I have an active, fun, and surprising social life, and I am as committed to my career as ever before. I travel the globe giving talks and presenting at conferences—to fellow neuroscientists, to medical doctors and their students, to celebrities, and to children of all ages. Because of everyone’s fascination with the brain, I am in high demand. I do TED talks and tell Moth stories. I speak to huge crowds of academics. But I have not lost my focus on the regular physical exercise that started me down this transformational path. In fact, I not only teach an undergraduate neuroscience course at NYU that incorporates exercise but I teach a weekly free exercise class open to NYU and the entire New York City community. I walk my talk—literally—every day!

In
Healthy Brain, Happy Life
I want to share with you how I got to this happy place, this life I pined for when I was turning forty. I also want to share with you the science behind this change. From now on, all the neuroscience and brain research you hear about in the news will make sense and feel relevant to you and your life. I am going to offer you advice and insight—based not only on my own experience but also on what all the current and past neuroscience research tells us. This is why I am calling
Healthy Brain, Happy Life
a personal program. It’s not a cookie cutter, step-by-step plan; rather, it’s a flexible set of accessible advice, tips, and scientific facts that will empower you to change, to grow, to use your very malleable brain as much as possible.

I am also going to share riveting science narratives from my work and the work of legendary scientists in my field that will show you how we’ve come to understand the brain . . . and what we still don’t know.

The chapters contain practical take-aways that get to the central neuroscience concepts that apply to your daily life plus what I call
Brain Hacks,
four-minute shortcuts that act as quick ways to access the brain’s power to restore energy, boost mood, and improve thinking. The Brain Hacks make the neuroscience concepts tangible and usable for everyone. For those times when you want a shortcut to your brain, don’t have the time or the inclination for exercise, and need a brain boost, use a Brain Hack!

Are you ready to use your brain to jump-start your life? Okay! Let’s get started.

HOW A GEEKY GIRL
FELL IN LOVE WITH THE BRAIN:
The Science of Neuroplasticity and Enrichment

L
ong before I wanted to be a scientist, I dreamed of being a Broadway star. My father, an electrical engineer and one of the most diehard Broadway fans you will ever meet, took us to every traveling Broadway production that came to San Francisco, just an hour away from my hometown of Sunnyvale, California. I saw Yul Brynner (when he was about eighty-five) in
The King and I
, Rex Harrison (when he was about ninety-eight) in
My Fair Lady
, and Richard Burton (kind of old, but not ancient) in
Camelot
. I spent my childhood watching Shirley Temple movies and all the classic Hollywood musicals. My dad took my brother and me to see
The Sound of Music
when it was released in the theater each year. We must have seen it twenty times. I fancied myself as a magical blend of Julie Andrews, Shirley Jones, and Shirley Temple, and in my daydreams, I would spontaneously break into song and, in my adorable, impossibly plucky way, save the day and get the guy—all in one fell swoop.

But despite my father’s love of all things Broadway, I was clearly expected to do something serious with my life. As a third-generation Japanese American with a grandfather who had come to the United States in 1910 and founded the largest Japanese-language school on the west coast, my family had high expectations for all of their children. Not that they ever verbalized these high standards—they never had to. It was simply understood that I should work hard at school and pursue a serious career that they could be proud of. And by serious, I knew I had only three choices: I could become a doctor, a lawyer, or something academic—the more impressive sounding the better. I didn’t fight these expectations; they made sense to me.

Quite early, in the sixth grade at Ortega Middle School in fact, I began a lifelong pursuit of science. My science teacher that year, Mr. Turner, taught us about the bones of the human body, testing us by having us put one hand into a dark box to identify a bone by touch. I loved it! No squirming for me—I was thrilled by the dare. I became even more excited when I got to do my first pig and frog dissections, and despite the revolting odor, I knew I had to know more. How did all those little organs fit so compactly and beautifully into that little pig body? How did they all work together so seamlessly? If this is what it looked like inside a pig, what might the inside of a human look like? The process of biological dissection captured my imagination from the first moment I got that choking whiff of formaldehyde.

The emerging scientist in me was also fascinated with that most coveted of candy concoctions when I was growing up: Pop Rocks. While other kids in my class were satisfied by the mouth-feel of explosions on their tongues, I wanted to understand
what triggered
these bursts and what wild sensory/chemical experiences you could have in your mouth by combining them with other things, like fizzy seltzer water, hot tea, or ice water. Unfortunately, Mom deemed these experiments a choking hazard and they quickly ended.

My high school math teacher, Mr. Travoli, lovingly guided me through the beauty and logic of A.P. trigonometry. I loved the elegance of math equations, which when done correctly could unlock the keys to a pristine world, balanced on either side of an equal sign. I already had a feeling that understanding math was a key to what I wanted to do (even though I had no idea what that was in high school), and I worked hard to get the best marks in class. In his lilting Italian accent, Mr. Travoli told us over and over again that we advanced-placement students were “the best of the best.” I took this as both an encouragement to excel and a solemn responsibility to use my math skills to their fullest potential. I was a serious and earnest kid, on my way to becoming an even more serious teenager.

By this time, the only outlet for my inner Broadway passion was going to the movies. I got my parents to agree to let me see
Saturday
Night
Fever
on my own by telling them it was a “musical” and conveniently failed to mention the R rating (I was only twelve). They were not pleased when they realized what I had seen. Later, I was obsessed with movies like
Dirty
Dancing
, and imagined myself effortlessly stealing the show in Johnny Castle’s arms despite the fact that I hadn’t taken a single dance lesson since my ballet and tap days in grade school.

By high school, the balance had decidedly shifted. The shining lights of Broadway had dimmed, and I was a steadfast, committed, and driven student, completely at home in a life of total science geekdom. I can see an image of myself in high school: shoulders hunched, serious faced, and carrying a tower of heavy books, as I made my way through the hallways trying not to attract any attention. Yes, I still relived my Broadway fantasies every time I saw one of my favorite musicals on television, but by then those dreams were kept locked in the den at home and studious geek girl had taken over my life. I was entirely immersed in academics, getting straight As and getting into a top college. I had no time left over to even think about my whimsical interests, never mind letting them coexist alongside my devotion to science and math.

I was also painfully shy, never close to being bold enough to date anyone in high school. I was on the tennis team all four years, but how could I not be? My mother was an intense and active amateur tennis player who made sure I played tennis year round and sent me to tennis camp every summer. Tennis was supposed to make me more well rounded, but in reality, what I desperately needed was a camp focused on the topic of how to talk to boys. Well, I never went to
that
camp, and as a consequence, I also didn’t go out on a single date or to a single prom through junior high and high school. In other words, if there had been a Miss Wallflower USA contest for nerdy science geeks, I would have blown the competition away.

All those stereotypes about the geeky, dateless science nerd? I proved them true.

FROM BROADWAY STAR TO LAB RAT

Although my science obsession, good grades, and academic drive didn’t win me any dates, they did get me somewhere—somewhere good. While I didn’t know exactly what kind of science I wanted to pursue, I knew where I wanted to study it. The University of California, Berkeley, just a hop, skip, and jump from Sunnyvale, was my family’s alma mater. Yes, I toyed with the idea of moving away to college and even got into Wellesley way on the other side of the country, but I was in love with the beautiful Berkeley campus and quirky-cool vibe of the town and just knew that it was the right school for me. I applied and was successfully admitted, which made me officially the happiest girl in the world that spring. I quickly packed my bags and could not wait to start this new adventure.

It turns out I didn’t have to wait long at all to find my academic passion. It came in the form of a freshman honors seminar I took my very first semester at Berkeley called “The Brain and Its Potential.” It was taught by the renowned neuroscientist Professor Marian C. Diamond. There were only about fifteen students in the class, allowing for more direct interaction with the teacher.

I’ll never forget the very first day of that class.

First, there was Diamond herself. She looked like a science rock star standing at the front of that classroom, tall, proud, and athletic with a blonde bouffant hairdo that made her look even taller than she was, wearing a crisp white lab coat over a beautiful silk blouse and skirt.

Also, sitting on the table in front of Diamond was a large flowered hat box. After she welcomed us to her class, Diamond threw on a pair of examination gloves, opened the hat box, and slowly and ever so lovingly lifted out an
actual preserved human brain.

The human brain.

(Courtesy of the author)

It was the first one I had ever seen in my life, and I was completely mesmerized.

Diamond told us that what she was holding in her hands was the most complex structure known to humankind. It was the structure that defined how we see, feel, taste, smell, and hear the world around us. It defines our personalities and allows us to go from crying to laughing sometimes in a blink of an eye.

I remember how she held that brain in her hands. This object used to be someone’s whole life and being, and she respected that awesome fact in the way she handled that precious piece of tissue.

The brain sported a light tan color that I later learned mainly came from the chemicals used to preserve it. The top part of the brain looked like a compact mass of thick, somewhat unruly tubes. It had an oblong shape that was slightly wider on one end than the other. When she turned the brain to the side, I could see more of the complexity of the structure, with the front side of the brain shorter than the back end. The divided and paired structure of the brain was obvious at first glance—the right and left sides of the brain were each separated into different parts, or lobes.