In this lecture we're going to be introducing the concept of neuroplasticity.
Imagine being able to rewire your entire mental existence.
When we talk about neuroplasticity we're talking about the concept of a plastic flexible brain which
in short means that you can actually change your mind physically and chemically.
Now there is a phenomena where your brain's neural synopses and pathways are outward as an effect of
environmental behavior or neural changes.
And we're going to talk way more about this later on but I want to assure you that this concept of neuroplasticity
that you heard about is actually true.
Researchers look at this concept in different ways.
Some of them look at it as the ability of the brain to change its actual structure and function in response
to a certain experience.
Other researchers look at it as the capacity of the nervous system for adaptation and regeneration after
a trauma which is directly linked to Charles Darwin Theory of Evolution and of course some researchers
look at it as the ability of our central nervous system to undergo this entire structural and functional
change in response to a new experience which is kind of the combination of both ideas that we said before.
Now I personally read several books related to neuroplasticity when I first discovered this concept
a couple years back I was absolutely fascinated.
It is one of the most phenomenal human experiences that I've ever seen or read about before and throughout
the course you will discover that this misconception that the brain only changes at a young age is absolutely
wrong even when you're an adult even elderly people can alter their brain and work on their brains plasticity.
So now generally speaking we are going to define the concept of neuroplasticity.
So what is neuro plasticity neuroplasticity also known as brain plasticity is a concept that is strictly
connected to the brain's ability to change adapt and adjust both physically functionally and chemically
by stimulation from your environment behavior thinking emotions habits and other physical elements.
And I believe that this definition is pretty straight forward.
In a nutshell what this definition is saying is that your brain has the ability to change not just change
but adapt which is a Darwinian concept.
It comes from the concept of evolution how our brain and our entire body would adapt to different environments.
It has been known for a long time that through evolution we can change our physical structure and Charles
Darwin when he went to the Galapagos Islands he discovered something amazing.
There's a certain species of finches a kind of bird that derived from one island to another.
Different species had different beaks.
There was the large ground finished medium ground venge small tree fringed and a green warbler Finch.
Each and every one of these birds even though they are the same bird but the different species through
natural selection had different beaks to be able to adapt to a different diet that was existent on a
specific island.
And what Charles Darwin concluded is that the regulation of the BNP protein is the principal way in
which you break variation occurs in these finches and the differences were acted upon by natural selection
and resulted from the evolution of these species to words their specific environment.
And researchers discovered after a while that the entire brain's structure function and chemical structure
can not just change but also adapt to environments and situations and adjust itself.
And moreover they discovered that this does not just happen by the influence of the surrounding environment
but also behavior traits the way of thinking emotions habits and other physical elements can play detrimental
roles when it comes to the brain's plasticity.
And as science advanced researchers discovered that neural chains networks and connections are not fixed
at all which was of course against the conception back then.
But in fact they are occurring and disappearing continuously throughout our life and be really careful
when we say throughout our life we didn't say throughout our childhood nor throughout our adulthood.
We're talking about your entire life depending on different factors that we mentioned before such as
environment all the way down to physical elements and experiences.
Now of course we're going to go more over how neuroplasticity works on the brain and how it can affect
the neurons and the entire neural system in our brain.
But first for those of you who don't know what a neuron is or what its function is a neuron is basically
a specialized cell inside the human brain that transmits information to other nerve cells also to muscles
and a glance cells that would release hormones in the body.
Now we just want to focus on the basic understanding of neurons because if you really want to expand
into the entire science there is an entire science behind neurology is an actual branch of medicine
that deals with these disorders of the nervous system.
But what's essential to know is that a neuron can have different shapes different sizes and different
types.
However a typical neuron would have four major regions itself.
There is the actual cell body and then there are the dendrites there is the axon and there are the synoptic
terminals.
Now the cell body usually contains the DNA and other structures to build protein and make energy.
Now the axon is a cable like projection along the length of the cell that is usually covered with a
thin layer of Meilan sheath which makes it approximately like an insulated electrical wire.
And lastly we have the dendrites that all small branch like projections of the cell that insure connection
to other cells allowing the electrical signals to go through from one cell to the other.
Now I'm not going to go in-depth about how neurons work.
I'm going to add an article about it for those of you who are curious to know more about it.
You can always go and check out the article but neuroplasticity is a concept that you can learn without
knowing how the neuron works.
So I don't want to waste any time talking about some information that might not be very useful for you
and I'm going to focus on the core information here.
But as I said if you want to learn more about it there's going to be an article in the course that talks
about how neurons work and how the neural system can work how information is transmitted and how it's
transmitted from the brain and the nervous system all the way to your muscle and your glands.
But in short what you need to know is that science showed that these neural systems and these neurons
themselves that formed a structure all together can actually change this structure based on environment
behavior thinking emotions habits and other physical elements and experiences.
Now for the first side of the story when we were talking about the concept of neuroplasticity what researchers
found is that while we practice one activity on a consistent basis neuronal circuits are being formed
leading to better ability to perform the practice task with less waste of energy.
So when you have a certain behavior that you do on a consistent basis for it to eventually become an
automatic behavior turning into a habit through repetition to eventually become a lifestyle it will
become hard wired in your brain your brain's structure will change and the neural works will change
in a way that would ensure the long getting city of this habit while reducing the amount of energy directed
towards it.
And what most people didn't know is that neuroplasticity is a dynamic process which means it happens
on a consistent basis with each and every decision that you make on a daily basis.
Huge structure is of behaviors and personality traits can be traced down to neural plasticity every
single experience [REMOVED] behavior memory social experience that you had ever since you were a kid was
contributing to words this structure that you have in your brain the neural structure that you have
and through the concept of neuroplasticity.
All of this change and adaptation happens.
So every time you give in to temptation and you eat what you're not supposed to eat you are teaching
yourself that it's OK to break rules that you put for yourself in the country.
Every time you push yourself hard in the gym you're developing stronger willpower and tolerance for
this these feelings of discomfort at one point and similar and Arcam also mentions that every time you
focus your entire attention on one single activity at a time you will be increasing your overall concentration
and focus.
And now of course we're going to be talking about each and every one of these concepts later.
But the main idea is to understand that when we practice an activity on a consistent basis the neural
circuits are being formed this neural structure and network in your brain is changing is being formed
or it is adapting to a certain pattern.
And the latter can actually turn into a lifestyle.
And that explains countless of random habits that you do on a daily basis.
But it doesn't stop there.
Once we stop practicing a certain activity the brain will redirect these neuronal circuits by much known
use it or lose it principle in a nutshell.
You have the ability to rewire your brain and we are just talking about thoughts we are talking about
changing the actual chemistry and physical state of your brain not just through adaptation but through
cancellation.
So the concept of neuroplasticity works both ways.
It creates and it can destroy as well during these changes.
The brain would engage in synoptic pruning deleting the neural connections that are no longer necessary
or useful or that we're not using that often.
And it will strengthen the necessary ones that we are using on a consistent basis.
So when you have a certain thing that you do and you're so natural at it and you do it without even
thinking.
But then you stop doing it for a year or two and then you get back to it you're going to feel like you're
not as good as before.
And people just say yeah you probably forgot about these things.
But in fact what is happening is that the neural network that was responsible for this certain habit
started to weaken up.
Now of course when we talk about neuroplasticity we're not talking about a short process.
We're talking about a process that needs and takes a lot of time but in short work the concept of use
it or lose it principle means is that when you use a certain neural structure or network it will become
stronger.
And when you don't use it it will become weaker and you will lose.
And this is just the beginning.
First off and of course we're going to be talking about what is neuroplasticity and how it works in
more depth than what we talked about before.
We're going to see that there are different types of neuroplasticity.
We're going to talk about neuro suicide actions experiences and behaviors things that we do on a daily
basis or that we do often that would work in a way as a reverse neuroplasticity it would actually damage
your brain rather than help it.
Then we're going to look at some fundamentals and basics that can help you understand the system of
neuroplasticity really well the first step into acquiring the ability to rewire your brain is to understand
the fundamentals and basics upon which neuroplasticity concept is more over you're going to learn how
to read why.
Or your brain increase your brain plasticity and neuron networks then we're going to move on to other
concepts that are still directly related to neuroplasticity.
We are going to explore the concepts of focus concentration and attention and in fact you're going to
discover that focus concentration and attention are three different aspects.
And when most people say you need to focus more what they usually mean is that you need to concentrate
more.
And this misconception creates a huge gap in the understanding of the human brain is focused concentration
and attention's concepts.
We are going to talk about the superhuman productivity some techniques some concepts some rules and
principles that can make you super productive.
You're also going to learn how to manage your time properly and how to manage your mind properly.
And of course we're going to be talking about these concepts because as we said they are all detrimental
factors when it comes to neuroplasticity.
The more concentration you put on a task the more brain tool and brain energy is consumed the better
it is when it comes to rewiring their brain and changing the neural structure.
Then using your attention to your advantage.
So instead of checking your phone every single time it blinks or it rains.
And that's of course caused by our somehow disrupted attention.
And then we want to use the concepts of superhuman productivity the concepts of time management and
mind management turn them into an actual habit that is required inside your brain.
And finally we're going to talk about habits and how to change them.
We're going to talk about the concept of procrastination and how to beat it.
We're going to talk about emotional intelligence learning strategies memory boosting and enhancing habits
are of course one of the most essential principles when it comes to neuroplasticity.
Habits equals repetition and consistency and repetition and consistency ensures proper brain plasticity
and flexibility.
And then we're going to talk about procrastination which is one of the biggest enemies when it comes
to brain plasticity.
What procrastination does is that every single time you're trying to do something and we're trying to
do something.
Your brain is trying to wire this thing into your neural system and structure what procrastination does
is that it just cuts this chain every time you procrastinate.
You avoid proper consistency and you fall back into weakening the neural structure and system when you're
working on your brain plasticity.
On the other hand we're going to also talk about emotional intelligence because you're going to see
throughout the course that moments that are filled with a lot of emotions big emotional states would
actually trigger way more neural structures than experiences that are not that charged with emotions.
And that's exactly why first time experiences can always create shocking moments for people and can
create mental health issues especially when they are charged with a lot of emotions.
So when you're a baby and it's the first time you see a dog and you see this dog biting somebody or
attacking somebody your mind is going to be wired into an idea that puts dogs and danger as equivalents.
We are also going to talk about learning strategies because when you learn new things you are creating
new neural structures in your brain.
And this is one of the most essential goals that we have.
Lastly we want to talk about your memory boosting your memory enhancing your memory and also controlling
your memory.
Because there are a lot of old memories that have a huge impact on our lives and this memory might be
20 years old but it's still impacting your life on a daily basis.
And this is what we need to look into.
And of course boosting your memory to ensure that your brain will remember a certain pattern or behavior.
So you can repeat it consistently afterwards.