10 tips to optimize your brain power

Avoid a big breakfast. Breads, muffins, bagels or pastries block your brain barriers.

Avoid binge drinking. Excessive alcohol is toxic and is believed to destroy brain cells.

Eat lecithin granules. Soy lecithin is a great source of choline, inositol and phosphorus that are critical for optimum brain function.

Supplement yourself with multivitamins and antioxidants to guarantee optimal brain function. Vitamins such as the B vitamin play a critical roll as catalysts in the production of essential brain neurotransmitters and hormones. A deficiency of even one vitamin may impair brain function.

Take ginkgo biloba to improve brain circulation and memory.

Make sure to supply your body with multi-minerals. Minerals such as calcium and magnesium play a vital roll in regulating optimum mental capacity, steady mood and protection from tension headaches. Minerals protect your brain from toxic metals such as lead or mercury.

Follow a progressive exercise routine. Exercise will help you with your blood circulation, stress, and overall mind and body performance.

Green tea is one of the best beverages to boost mental power and protect the brain from toxins and free radicals.

Don't worry, be happy! Avoid anger. See your glass as half-full.

Make sure you sleep enough. Your brain is rejuvenating during those sleeping hours.

About law of attraction

Photo: empowernetwork.com

You probably heard of it. And you experienced it, without even knowing. Here is a small introduction to the law of attraction.
According to Wikipedia, the Law of Attraction is the name given to the belief that "like attracts like" and that by focusing on positive or negative thoughts, one can bring about positive or negative results. This belief is based upon the idea that people and their thoughts are both made from pure energy, and the belief that like energy attracts like energy.

Actually, it is not just a belief, it is the pure truth: you are what you think. And you become what you think.
How many time you've heard the statement 'be careful what you wish for because you just may get it'? It is not a statement to joke around with. This law is so powerful, your request could manifest instantly and powerfully without warning.

10 amazing facts about your brain during sleep

Most people dream about 1-2 hours a night and have an average of 4-7 dreams each night.

Five minutes after a dream, half of the dream is forgotten. Ten minutes after a dream, over 90% is forgotten. Write down your dreams immediately if you want to remember them.

Dreams are more than just visual images, and blind people do dream. Whether or not they dream in pictures depends on if they were born blind or lost their vision later.

Some people (about 12%) dream only in black and white while others dream in color.

If you are awakened during a dream, you are much more likely to remember the dream than if you slept until a full night's sleep.

While you sleep at night may be the best time for your brain to consolidate all your memories from the day.

As those who invest in dream dictionaries can attest, dreams almost never represent what they actually are. The unconscious mind strives to make connections with concepts you will understand, so dreams are largely symbolic representations.

Japanese researchers have successfully developed a technology that can put thoughts on a screen and may soon be able to screen people's dreams.

Caffeine works to block naturally occuring adenosine in the body, creating alertness. Scientists have discovered this connection and learned that doing the opposite - boosting adenosine - can actually promote more natural sleep patterns and help eliminate insomnia.

A study published in the journal Sleep Medicine described how Disney creators used real sleep disorders in many of their animated pets.

About binaural beats

As promised, in this post we will describe what binaural beats are, how they work and how can they improve your life.

When two different tones of specific frequencies are played through headphones, the brain can become confused and produce its own, imagined tone - a 3D audio hallucination heard only within the head of the listener. The frequencies that produce this phenomenon are known as Binaural Beats.
For example, if a frequency of 100 Hz is played in one ear and a frequency of 110 Hz is played in the other ear, the result is a binaural beat of 10 Hz, created by the brain.
What is actually happening is that the brain is not used to hearing frequencies in each ear so close together and with such intensity as these sounds do not occur in nature and there is no mechanism in our brains to understand them. Instead, the superior olivary nucleus, the area of the brain which controls aspects of 3D sound perception, bridges the difference between the varying frequencies in Binaural Beats with a common 'third tone' in an attempt to normalize this audio into something we can understand.
What is really weird is tat each person hears the third tone differently. It was proved that people with Parkinson's disease can't hear it at all, while women will hear different tones as they move through their menstrual cycle.

10 amazing facts about brain development

Neurons develop at a rate of 250,000 neurons per minute during early pregnancy.

A stimulating environment for a child can make the difference between a 25% greater ability to learn or 25% less in an environment with little stimulation.

The first sense to develop while in utero is the sense of touch. The lips and cheeks can experience touch at about 8 weeks and the rest of the body around 12 weeks.

Children who learn two languages before the age of five alters the brain structure and, as adults, have a much denser gray matter.

Music lessons have shown to considerably boost brain organization and ability in both children and adults.

Reading aloud and talking often to a young child promotes brain development.

The capacity for such emotions as joy, happiness, fear, shyness are already developed at birth. The specific type of nurturing a child receives shapes how these emotions are developed.

Studies have shown that child abuse can inhibit development of the brain and can permanently affect brain development.

A study showed that children with imaginary playmates between the ages of 3 and 9 tended to be first-born children.

At birth, your brain was almost the same size as an adult brain and contained most of the brain cells for your whole life.  

What is brainwave entrainment?

Brainwave entrainment, also known as 'brainwave synchronization' is a practice that depends upon a 'frequency following' response from your brain, following a dominant external stimulus. Usually, the external stimulus is a specialized software, but it can also be a pulse of sound or light.
When the brain receives an external stimulus, through ears, eyes or any other senses, it emits a response which is called a 'cortical evoked response'. These electrical responses travel throughout the brain and they can be measured using sensitive devices attached to the scalp.
When the rhythmic stimulus presented to the brain is, for example, a drum beat, the rhythm is reproduced in the brain in the form of a 'cortical evoked respose'. If the rhythm becomes fast and consistent enough, it can start to resemble the natural internal rhythms of the brain, called 'brainwaves'. When this happens, the brain starts responding by synchronizing its own electric cycles to the same rhythm as the drum beat. This is usually called a 'Frequency Following Response' or FFR.

10 fun facts about brain

Your brain stopped growing at the age of 18.

You can't tickle yourself because your brain distinguished between unexpected external touch and your own touch. 

While you sleep, your body produces a hormone that may prevent you from acting out your dreams, leaving you virtually paralyzed. 

Every time you blink, your brain kicks in and keeps things illuminated so the whole world doesn't go dark each time you blink (about 20,000 times a day). 

If you are snoring, you are not dreaming. 

Laughing at a joke is no simple task as it requires activity in five different areas of the brain. 

Just because you don't remember your dreams doesn't mean you don't dream. Everyone dreams! 

Those who are left-handed or ambidextrous have a corpus collosum (the part of the brain that bridges the two halves) that is about 11% larger than those who are right-handed. 

Brain waves are more active while dreaming than when you are awake. 

Scientists discovered that men and women's brains react differently to pain, which explains why they may perceive or discuss pain differently. 

Another 10 interesting facts about our brain

The weight of the human brain is about 1.3-1.4 kg.

Your brain uses 20% of the total oxygen in your body.

The next time you get a fever, keep in mind that thehighest human body temperature ever recorded was 46.5 C –and the man survived.

It is thought that a yawn works to send more oxygen to the brain, therefore working to cool it down and wake it up.

Your brain is 60% white matter and 40% gray matter.

Every time you recall a memory or have a new thought, you are creating a new connection in your brain.

Memories triggered by scent have a stronger emotional connection, therefore appear more intense than other memory triggers.

Memory is formed by associations, so if you want help remembering things, create associations for yourself.

A newborn baby’s brain grows about three times its size in the first year.

Excessive stress has shown to alter brain cells, brain structure and brain function.

Brainwaves described

It is very important to understand how your brain works and how it contributes to your state of mind. Most of us are used to focus on our emotions trying to become happier or a more spiritual being. What most of you don’t know is that your brain waves and your subcionscious mind play a big part in this pursuit of happiness.
Let’s take a look at your brain wave frequencies and how they affect the state of mind. Each frequency is measured in cycles per second (Hz) and has its own set of characteristics. Each of these waves represent a specific level of brain activity and a unique state of consciousness.

Let’s begin with Beta. Its range is 14-40Hz and is the wave of your wide awake state.
Beta brain waves are associated with normal waking consciousness and an increased state of alert, logic and critical reasoning.
Beta brain waves are essential for your effective functioning throughout the day, but they can also translate into a stressful, restless and anxious mind. 
Imagine Beta as that annoying little inner critic that gets louder and louder. Once it gets lounder, it means that your brain waves are high into above mentioned range and that stress is just around the corner or it has already arrived.
The majority of adults operate at Beta, this is why stress is the most common problem these days.

10 interesting facts about our brain

Our brain is made up of about 75% water.

While awake, our brain generates between 10 and 23 watts of power, enough energy to power a small light bulb.

There are no pain receptors in the brain, so the brain can feel no pain.

There are over 150,000 km of blood vessels in the brain.

If our brain loses blood for 8 to 10 seconds, we will lose consciousness.

Boredom is brought on by a lack of change of stimulation, is largely a function of perception, and is connected to the innate curiosity found in humans.

Our brain consists of about 100 billion neurons.

The human brain is the fattest organ in the body and may consists of at least 60% fat.

Women tend to take longer to make a decision, but are more likely to stick with the decision, compared to men, who are more likely to change their mind after making a decision.

Our skin weighs twice as much as our brain.

About brainwaves

Our brain is made of billions of cells called neurons. To communicate with each other, neurons use electricity. The combination of millions of neurons sending signals at once produces an enormous amount of electrical activity in the brain, which can be detected using sensitive medical equipment, measuring levels of electricity over areas of the scalp.
The combination of electrical activity of the brain is commonly called a 'Brainwave pattern', because of its cyclic, wave-like nature.
Our mind regulated its activities by means of electric waves which are registered in the brain, emiting tiny electrochemical impulses of varied frequencies, which can be registered by an electroencephalogram (EEG).
With the discovery of brain waves, came the discovery that electrical activity in the brain will change depending on what the person is doing. For instance, the brainwaves of a sleeping person are vastly different than the ones of someone wide awake. Over the years, more sensitive equipment has brought us closer to figuring out exactly what brainwaves represent and with that, what they mean about a person's health and state of mind.
The known brainwaves and their associated mental states are:
- Beta emited when we are consciously alert, or we feel agitated, tense, afraid.
- Alpha when we are in a state of physical and mental relaxation, but aware of what is happening around us.
- Theta which is a state of somnolence with reduced consciusness.
- Delta when there is unconsciousness, deep sleep or catalepsy.