Change Your Brain Every Day - Our Top Brain Health Tips of the Year

Episode Date: January 8, 2019

2018 was the biggest year yet for The Brain Warrior’s Way Podcast! In this episode, Dr. Daniel Amen and Tana Amen summarize some of the top brain health tips covered in the podcast throughout the year. Tune in and pick up on some important nuggets you may have missed!

Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. Here we teach you how to win the fight for your brain to defeat anxiety, depression, memory loss, ADHD, and addictions. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we've transformed lives for three decades using brain spec imaging to better target treatment and natural ways to heal the brain. For more information, visit amenclinics.com.

The Brain Warriors Way podcast is also brought to you by BrainMD, where we produce the highest quality nutraceutical products to support the health of your brain and body. For more information, visit brainmdhealth.com. Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Welcome back. So we are in our new year series, and we're going to talk about how to stay passionate with your goals and your intentions this year. But I want to read this. I want to read this testimonial first. This is Alicia Garcia. She said, when Rice Brooks, she's talking about,

we did a podcast with Rice Brooks who wrote God's Not Dead. It was actually really good. She said, when Rice Brooks compared our soul to the brain and said that if you could scan the soul, then you'd see something wrong. That was a light bulb moment for me. So I just wanted to read that because we have so many great podcasts throughout the last year, since we're moving into this new

year. Go back and listen to some of those. We had some amazing guests last year. So really fun. And as we're talking about this new year and our intentions, right, the soul and passion are a big part of that. So let's talk about how people can stay passionate, how they can turn, you know, some of the challenges they've had into purpose and get connected. You know, that's actually one of the ways people can take tragedy and turn it into something that really motivates them. Yeah. That when you can find passion and purpose and meaning in the brain warrior's way, in our book, which I was just looking at again today. It's a really good book. We were talking about essence.

Yeah. It's a really good book. We were talking about essence. It's taking the things you've struggled with and becoming purposeful and helping others. It's a game changer for the pain that we've experienced in the past. In fact, many of the people who I know who are the most passionate, who make the biggest changes, I'm sure you could probably say the same, are people who have done that, who have taken the worst pain, I mean huge tragedies, and figured out a way to leverage that into something very purposeful and meaningful to help change, either do something big in the world or something to help people and to make a difference? No, no question that's true. Behind everyone who does something great is often a fairly deep hurt. And so where is your pain, but have you been able to turn it into purpose? So as we think about this new year, let's just quickly summarize the highlights

from Brain Warrior's Way. And we developed a mnemonic that we like called mastery. Right. And the M is mindset. And there's so many directions to go with that, but you don't get well because you should. You get well because you love yourself, because you love your life, your passion, your purpose, your wife, your husband, your children. That doing the right thing is never you should do this. It's you want to do it. And if you're not doing the right thing, you have to go, well, why don't you love yourself? Other things we tackle is, well, everything in moderation.

I've heard that so often. Everything in moderation. And when I'm feeling weak, I believe that. But when I'm feeling strong, I'm like, oh, everything in moderation is the gateway thought to cheat. It's. Something's moderation. I remember when you turned me on to Bill Phillips' book, Body for Life, and they had cheat days, right? I mean, you're like 1,500 calories six days a week.

And then on the seventh day. Eat whatever you want. Eat whatever you want. And I'm like, oh, well, that way I won't feel deprived. And I'm like, but in what other addiction? Because clearly we're addicted to food. 70% of us overweight. 40% of us are obese.

Clearly we're addicted to food. In what other addiction are you allowed cheat days? Right. I mean, if you're an alcoholic or a cocaine addict or a serial sex addict. Yeah, no, we're not a fan. I think they'd be okay with cheat days. Because what cheat days do is they keep you hooked. You never really get out of the cycle of the food addiction.

Right. And so I actually see bad food as the enemy. Brain Warriors way, this is going to hurt me. And a lot of people see that as extreme. Except I have a brother that's 150 pounds overweight and I'm not. Well, if you've got labs like mine where you just, you know, you actually eat really good, but you just give in a little bit and all of a sudden shows, and you're like, wait, that's not fair. Guess what?

Life's not fair. It means you have to be serious. What do you say about fair? Fair is a place with bad food and farm animals. So near us, it's in Pomona, the county fair. So bad food and farm animals. So it has nothing to do with life. The A in mastery is assessment.

You have to know your important health numbers. You've alluded to them a couple of times. And this is really important because here's the thing. We're talking about purpose and we're talking about passion in this podcast, right? So this last year, I've already said, like in the last podcast, I was feeling kind of blah, just like not having my same normal drive and energy and, and my same, I just didn't have the same normal drive that I have to do things, motivation. And if you are all of a sudden feeling different. And so when I was talking to the doctor, he's like, well, any reason?

Like, are you depressed? Like, are his family things bad at home? I'm like, nope, nope, nope, nope. Well, that's time to get your numbers checked, right? Because it means for me, especially with my health history, it could be your thyroid. I'm 50, I just had a hysterectomy, probably my hormones. So it could be any number of things,

but you have to get checked. My ferritin turned out to be really low. So it could be a number of things that are causing that. Well, and in the book we have, and on BrainFit Life, we have, well, what are the important numbers you should know? And given this is January, or whenever you're listening to it, if you're just starting with us, this is a good time for you to know, well, what's your blood pressure?

What's your BMI, your body mass index? What's your complete blood count. You just mentioned ferritin. Right. If your vitamin D is low, you're not going to have energy. Like hormones like testosterone and estrogen. Right. Progesterone for women, hemoglobin A1C, fasting blood sugar, cholesterol.

You want to know because you can't change what you don't measure. And they affect how you feel. And if you're not getting well, I just saw someone in the clinic who was struggling with anxiety and depression. And he's been battling it for years. And I'm like, did anybody ever look at your brain? He's like, no. It's like you can't change what you don't measure. And imaging is just one way that we measure what's going on in your brain. And then the S is sustenance. It's food.

It's medicine or it's poison. One of the tips I want to give people going into the new year, It's sustenance. It's food. It's medicine or it's poison. One of the tips I want to give people going into the new year, this is what I decided, because we were so busy and we were eating out a lot. So trying to find healthy stuff and eating out, but you still don't know what's in everything, right? So find five recipes. One of the things I really am proud of with Brain Warriors Way Cookbook is how simple the recipes are.

So I went back to my own cookbooks and I found five recipes. Don't make this overwhelming. Just pick five to start with. Five recipes. I don't care if you have to repeat them and then you'll start finding other ones you like, but just start with five. And like today, I did crockpot chicken shawarma. It's only got like five main ingredients and a few spices. It's super easy. Last night I made lentil soup, but pick five that are easy. And what I usually do is make leftovers so that we have more than one meal.

So just pick five and just get started. Because you are a creature of habit. I mean, like making you, you are making us the almond milk, pumpkin spice cappuccino in the morning. It's a habit. When we don't do it, we miss it, right? So you already have habits.

Are your habits serving you or are they hurting you? Right. And if you love yourself, you only want to engage in habits that help you. Right. And that's love. It's not should. You should do this. It's because you care about yourself.

Well, and to switch that, to flip that. So, I mean, we all are like, oh, my God, I've got to make dinner, right? If you think about it from that perspective, it's a lot of work. Got to get the groceries. I actually started buying stuff on Amazon Fresh. It was awesome. But anyways, so last night when we made dinner, we actually just did it as a family. It was actually really fun. So we did it as a family.

We literally all went in the kitchen. Chloe made the salad. You made the chicken. I made the lentil soup. And we had fun. It was just this fun family thing we did. So it's all in how you look at it. But your cookbooks evolved over the years to become simpler and simpler. Yeah, because I don't have time. That's just the truth. Right. And one of my favorite ones is Healing ADD Through Food. Yeah, that one and Brain Warrior's Way.

So sustenance is so important, and you just have to ask yourself, does this food help me or does it hurt me? And if you listen to us for long enough, you're going to go, oh, well, that's obviously not good for you, right? It's better to eat the orange than drink the orange juice. People often get confused about oils. There's a whole section. That's a whole podcast.

But there's a whole section in Brain Warrior's Way, the cookbook, whole section Brain Warrior's Way cookbook on oils. So highly suggested. So room temperature olive oil, cooking avocado oil. Low temperatures. You can cook with olive oil at low temperatures. So like how low is it? So you don't want it like no more than if you were making an omelet. Okay. It's like medium heat. You don't want to go over medium heat. Um, so, but for higher temperatures, I like macadamia nut oil a lot. Avocado oil is good. Those are probably coconut oil. Yeah, but I, but there's, um, it tends to give things an odd flavor and there's some people who shouldn't have the newer research shows. Some people should not have coconut oil. There are some people, if you have a, an active

heart condition, avoid it more or less. So think of a plate, 70% plant-based foods. I was just watching you make the lentil soup and you had carrots and celery. It was so pretty, huh? And bell peppers. And garlic and yeah. Yeah, it was really pretty and it was so good. Yeah. Delicious. Curry and yeah. Yeah, it was really pretty and it was so good. Yeah.

Delicious. Curry and yeah. And then 30% high quality protein mixed in with a lot of healthy fat. That's the brain warrior's way diet. So there's not much in the way of bread, pasta, potatoes, rice, sugar. So we get rid of those sugars that quickly turn to sugar because they can be addictive and they mess up your blood sugar. And you fall in love with them and you have no business having bread in the same place

as your wife. So when we come back, we're going to talk about training, essence, responsibility. And you don't do this for two weeks. This is a way of life. So we're going to finish mastery. That's how we call it, the Brain Warriors way. Stay with us. Use the code PODCAST10 to get a 10% discount on a full evaluation at amenclinics.com or on our supplements at brainmdhealth.com.

Thank you for listening to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Go to iTunes and leave a review and you'll automatically be entered into a drawing to get a free signed copy of the Brain Warriors Way and the Brain Warriors Way Cookbook we give away every month.