Know Your Own Brain

 What have you given up on before you even started? There are so many things we try a little and then stop because the learning curve seems too steep. We can't do everything, and so we stop doing something that might take too much effort or too much time to understand. Fair enough?

It's not fair enough when it comes to understanding how you are making choices. You might know your own mind but that mind is shaped by your brain. If you don't know anything about your brain, it's hard to know when to trust your thinking and when to challenge it.

Allow me to introduce you to Lisa Feldman Barrett. She's one of my favourite sources of news about how the brain/body system works. When you read 7 1/2 Short Lessons About the Brain you'll understand how  how many things you "know" about your brain that are just plain wrong. And you'll see how having better information connects to knowing yourself better and making better choices. This is a short, easy read by someone who knows her stuff so well that she can build bridges between readers and the information that will be useful to them.

7 1/2 Lessons About the Brain


At this point, I want to mention two things. How Emotions Are Made is a longer, harder read and really, really useful too. If you don't understand how emotions happen, then you are doomed to be swatted from one strong feeling into another. That leads to bad choices and bad experiences. The alternative is not to give up on emotion or to control emotion. It's more like surfing: emotion is the wave but your mind should be the surfer.

The second thing I want to mention is that Lisa Feldman Barrett is a good speaker and if you look up her Ted talks, you will learn and enjoy. But you might not remember. TED talks are fast, and while you're thinking about one point, you might miss the next. This won't happen if you sit down with a book and read one section at a time. You'll have the same chance to find our what Lisa Feldman Barrett knows. But you'll have a much better chance to find out what you think.

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