Retrain your brain for maximum happiness

I guess you might have heard about the concept of neuroplasticity. For a long time the concept of we can retrain our brain physiologically seems like nonsense. You can train your muscles and the structure of the muscle will change according to the stress it has to withstand. It is basically changed by the information it is getting from its environment. Not only will it change your muscles, it will change your bone density, cardiovascular system, endocrine system (hormones) and in turn have an effect on your overall well being.

You can do the same thing with your brain. The only difference is that you don't see it. You don't see it physically change its neural structure. You can see your muscles growing, because that's the function that they need. They need to grow to perform. In your brain what actually happens is more like what happens in a computer, it's almost as if you loaded a new piece of software. When you have finished this newsletter, your brain will be wired differently than when you started. Every single instance of anything that you do, literally rewires the hardware itself.

If you perform a certain function, your brain starts to build networks that make that function easier to perform in the future. If you do it one time, it becomes a little easier if you do it 20 times it becomes permanent and more automatic. The problem with neuroplasticity is if you tell your brain to wire for learning how to whistle it will do so, if you tell it to wire for solving complex mathematical equations, it may take a little longer but it will follow your intention. If you tell it to wire for hating people or for fearing the end of the world (because of what the media is telling you), then that's what you're getting on autopilot in the future.

The challenge of our modern world is that we think that this brain is supposed to be there to make us successful. Well, it's not the primary function of the brain. The primary primary function of the brain is to make you safe and keep you alive. The secondary function that we push the brain to do is to invent iPhones, build cares and analyse our environment. That's a secondary function, but believe it or not, before that secondary function, your brain is supposed to make you happy. Happy is the ultimate form for you to perform in life.

If you're not happy, you're not as effective as you could be at achieving survival. Think about if you're grumpy ALL the time at work. People don't like you. You're not focused. No one wants to help you. You're wasting most of your time, thinking about the negative and so you're not innovative or creative anymore. It degrades your performance. Happy is a better place for you to be at work, because it will make your customers want to do business with you to make your colleagues want to help you out, it will make your boss welcome you and their team and so on and so forth.

We are social animals by definition, and we want to have that in our life and the easiest way to connect and to open up and to discover the world is to be in a happy place. That's a primary function of your brain. It's hard for some people, and we can all think of someone in our lives who has a stubborn wiring, that almost seems impossible to unwire.  Something happens and our reaction to that thing might be to catastrophize the end of the world and that feels like it is set in stone. It feels like it's a certain set of wiring trigger, and then the brain goes through the circuitry and it goes: Catastrophe! Panic!

And the answer to that I found was to actually guide yourself to the opposite. So if my wiring is to look at everything and see what's wrong with it, I should deliberately force my brain to look for what's right with it. So the next time traffic is very busy in the morning and you're running late, and your brain's immediate reaction is  "oh, what's going to happen? I'm going to be late for work.", you could try to ask yourself "and what's good about that?". Maybe the person you have a meeting with is running late as well and is hoping for you to be late too. 

That's the truth that your brain tries to deny you from seeing. And interestingly, you can train your brain. So what you can do is for every negative thought that your brain gives you, you task it with giving you a positive one. Better make it two positive ones, or nine. Because in reality, if you look at life around you, more than 90% of life is okay. And your brain to contribute more than that as negative is not fair. Right? 

Try to use your negative thought triggers as a call for action. Don't be bothered by your negative thoughts. Instead, try to see it as an opportunity for growth. Thank your brain for reminding you of being more positive and ask it to show evidence of why your life is great right now. Questions trigger the reticular activating system, the problem solver of your brain. It's the most powerful tool you have to kick start the pattern recognition machine on your shoulders. Just give it the right questions and it will give the answers.

Questions you could ask yourself today: "Why is it that I am so looking forward to this week?", "How come I am so happy today?", or "Why do I feel so motivated today?". It doesn't matter what your inner critic is telling you. He will try to sabotage it and tell you that this is BS, but trust me, you can overrule that voice easily. And as long as you don't know the answer, love the question ;)