Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Growing the right connectom and prefrontal cortex :)


I am reading this book called "The Willpower Instinct" by Kelly McGonical. Kelly teaches willpower as a course in University of Standford. The book is explaining the science behind the willpower. It explains how strengthening our prefrontal cortex we can gain more willpower. And also she defines simple assignments to practice and muscular our prefrontal cortex. :)
When I was reading this book it reminds of Dr Sebastian Seung TED lecture "growing the right connectom". I wrote about this couple of post before. See when I said saying prays for 10 years was working like a magic for me because it gave me self confidence and of course willpower, to me this is the same practice that Kelly is suggesting in her book "meditation everyday". The meditation helps your brain to become stronger by growing a right set of neurons. This sounds very similar to me to what Sebastian said about our brain is capable of  growing a connectom based on our fears, experiences, etc.
we have flexible brain we can learn how to make it stronger in certain ways. I think being flexible was a key to our survival. My mom lost her dad when she was the Same age as me (2 years before I was born), she lost her sister in a car accident when I was 10, she lost her mother when I was 23 and her younger brother a following year. She told me once " Hiva I don't know how on earth I managed to survive these losses, I think I developed an iron mind." I know now that she certainly did.  This is how her brain coup with the pain.
Our brain is everything, our personality, identity, goals, memories, likes, dislikes are stored in  infinite layers that curled in each other. Curious just curious.

1 comment:

just a peasant said...

I think the plasticity of the brain and the neurophysiology behind all those connections are so very interesting. I sure hope I get to keep for a while.