ExamineHealth

It's often assumed that big changes originate from big moves. That in order to make a greater difference, one needs to make a greater effort. I have found that this is not always true, in life, but especially when it relates to your health. The human body is an example of a system that responds very well to gradual change and consistent effort.

There are many, many examples of this. Taking vitamins or herbal supplements is a great one. Taking a single multivitamin for one day, or even better yet, taking a massive dose of vitamins in a single sitting, is not going to have much of a sustained effect on your general health. This is primarily because your body can only absorb a limited amount of the vitamins at one time. Therefore, in order to truly realize the benefits of taking vitamins, or another supplement, you need to take maintenance doses over a period of time. This will eventually saturate your blood with the vitamins that you're taking and allow your body to maintain a constant level within the body.

The Brain's Propensity for Pathways

Your mind is made up of connections.  Millions and millions of connections.  Each cell in your brain connects with thousands of other cells.  Neurons fire electrical impulses from one to another, triggering chemical reactions and coordinating our thoughts.  This mass of connections forms a mesh through which there are hundreds of thousands of pathways through.  An electrical impulse could travel from one side of your brain to the other every minute of your life and never need to follow the same path.

The interesting thing is that they do follow the same paths.  The neurons in your brain tend to utilize the same paths over and over again.  Each time a particular pathway is used, it becomes strengthened.  The next time that function is needed, or that thought recalled, it hops along the same neurons in the same order.  This is the formation of habits.  This is also the basis for learning.  As we continue to utilize a particular thought sequence, it becomes further ingrained into our brain.  We become more proficient as a result of the increased traffic through that pattern.  

Particular patterns become worn and are more likely to be activated.  They also operate at increased efficiency.  Think of them like grooves that are worn in your brain.  The deeper the grooves become, the more likely those actions and pathways are to be used.  These pathways can also represent associations themselves.  A song can remind you of a particular time period in your life.  This is due to the strong association that you have in your brain between the two memories.

In my second year of college, I had this one instructor who was absolutely terrible. Really, the guy was downright useless as a teacher. And yet, he taught me something that proved extremely helpful throughout my remaining four years of undergraduate studies: teaching is the best way to learn something.

The reason this is true, he explained, is because in order to teach something to another person, in order to convey that information in a logical and understandable fashion, you must first go through the internal process of organizing the information in your own head, forming it into absorbent, bite-sized chunks.

About a year and a half ago, I purchased a stationary exercise bike.  I had never owned one before, but was feeling the need to get some regular cardio exercise in.  Previous to this revelation, I had never thought much about cardio or aerobic exercise.  I always focused on strength training, anaerobic exercise.  What I discovered however, was that it wasn't very functional.  If I wanted to excel at the sports I enjoyed doing, rock climbing, mountain biking, snowboarding, these things required aerobic fitness!  I was sucking wind doing the things that I loved, especially at altitude. 

So I put my new exercise bike behind my couch and in plain view of my TV.  My thinking was that since I usually watched at least some TV each night, I could ride my bike while doing so and get exercise in without wasting any time.