Yoga, meditation and healthy brain aging

I found it positively refreshing that SharpBrains has included an interview by Alvaro Fernandez, SharpBrain’s CEO with Dharma Singh Khalsa of the Alzheimer’s Research & Prevention Foundation on their website: http://sharpbrains.com/blog/2013/08/08/dharma-singh-khalsa-why-are-yoga-and-meditation-often-overlooked-for-healthy-brain-aging/

The interview is short, to the point and interesting. Here’s one question and answer from that interview:

Fernandez: “Please tell us about your interest in applied brain science. What areas are you most interested in? What motivated you to pursue work in your field?” 

Khalsa: “What interests me the most is how life style influences brain health during aging. What motivated me was my life­long interest in holistic medicine and my 35 years of practice and study of stress, meditation, and memory. I’ve looked at it from both sides; I’ve studied mind/body medicine with Dr. Herbert Benson at Harvard and Kundalini Yoga with Yogi Bhajan.”

Khalsa is one of the speakers in SharpBrain’s upcoming “Virtual Summit.” Here’s a link to the summit’s speaker list - http://sharpbrains.com/summit-2013/speakers/. And here’s a link to the Khalsa’s Alzheimer’s Research & Prevention Foundation: http://www.alzheimersprevention.org/

2013 SharpBrains Virtual Summit

This is always an interesting event, and it seems to get bigger and more popular each year: http://sharpbrains.com/summit-2013/agenda/  It’s also ambitious. Here’s a few of the Summit’s session topics:

How can we harness the Human Brain Project to maximize its future health and well-being benefits?
Digital Health meets Brain Health.
How can organizations maximize the resilience and productivity of their human resources?
What is the future of personal brain health?

What I like about the Virtual Summit:
-It’s virtual. You can attend in your pajamas and watching your laptop screen.
-It’s got provocative subjects. That bit about harnessing the “Human Brain Project” makes me think that this is a bit like the human genome project.
-It’s got great speakers: http://sharpbrains.com/summit-2013/speakers/  At the same time, folks like Dharma Singh Khalsa, Pres¬i¬dent of the Alzheimer’s Research and Pre¬ven-tion Foundation are included which I like because I believe we need to think laterally and creatively about brain issues and solutions.

To be clear, this is an “industry” issue, and probably isn’t very consumer/patient-friendly. It’s also a bit pricey: at $545.00 I can’t afford to attend. If you do attend, please let me know if you liked it.
John

PS – If you don’t think brain training has gone mainstream, read this quote from Tom Warden of Allstate posted on the Summit’s site: “”… we see the opportunity that cognitive training provides as just the next evolution of things that we can advocate and get behind that ultimately make for a better driving experience, a safer driving experience for people. Not only for our insureds, but to help the roads be safer for everyone.”