“4 Essential (and Overlooked) Facts About Your Brain and Your Mind”

I just read another brain-focused Alvaro Fernandez (Sharp­Brains’ co-founder and Chief Executive Officer) article posted on The Creativity Post that I wanted to share with everybody. You can find it here: http://www.creativitypost.com/science/4_essential_and_overlooked_facts_about_your_brain_and_your_mind#sthash.ztc3o2Eu.dpuf

The four “essential (and overlooked) facts” he writes about are:

1. “Smart pills” simply don’t exist (drat)
2. Aging can bring (cognitive)decline...
3. … and also improve­ment.
4. “Cells that fire together wire together.”

Here’s the summary that I like: “our brains and minds are far from set in stone due to genet­ics or age. Grow­ing evi­dence sug­gests beyond a rea­son­able doubt that what we do at every sin­gle day has an impact on brain fit­ness that very same day and also later in life.”

Image credit: <a href='http://www.123rf.com/photo_17620970_humans-brain-with-gearwheel-inside-illustration-on-white-background-for-design.html'>dvarg / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

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.”