Monday, July 16, 2007

Variety is the Spice of Brain Fitness: Part I – EPIQ performance

When it comes to the fitness of your brain (or your body)
variety is key. Your brain health depends on many factors
including: everything you put in your mouth; the physical
and mental activities you choose to do or not to do; the
amount of rest and reflection you allow yourself; and all
the stuff you tell yourself in your own head.

If I had to sum up how to get the healthiest and fittest
brain possible in one word, it would have to be 'variety'.
This applies to all the things I mentioned above, which I
will be getting into in detail over the next several weeks.
These are the cornerstones of your brain fitness and help
to improve the general intelligences of your brain. Yes,
intelligences, plural.

How smart are you?

Many people think of intelligence as your IQ or 'book
smart'. Really, this is only one kind of intelligence.
Other major intelligences are also your emotional
intelligence (EQ) and your physical intelligence (PQ). The
great thing is that you can improve all of your
intelligences with effort.

Your EQ, popularized by Dr. Daniel Goleman, is your ability
to control your own emotions and read the emotions of
others. It is a major factor in your social skills – how
well you interact with other people. Are you responsive or
reactive? If you are sharp as a tack when it comes to
Einstein's theory of relativity but have no idea how to
hold a conversation with another human being, you would
have a high IQ but a low EQ.

Your PQ is your ability to control your own body. This
breaks down into conscious control – coordination,
strength, flexibility and balance, and unconscious control
– how well your internal systems respond when called upon.
How good of a job does your brain do at controlling your
heart rate, disease-fighting immune system, and appropriate
hormone responses to eating, stress, excitement,
challenges, etc. Your physical intelligence is how well
tuned your body machine is.

These are all important factors in leading a successful
life. Your IQ will help you solve life's challenges, your
EQ will help your daily interactions with others and your
PQ will help you stay healthy and fight disease of all
sorts.

EPIQ Performance

Your brain is the master integrator of everything you do,
feel, think and experience and the fitness of your brain
determines your IQ, EQ and PQ. The more you work on the
different aspects of brain fitness the better it all comes
together.

Not only that, but each of these intelligences helps the
others as well. For example, the better your PQ, the better
your hormone stress response system works, the easier it is
to keep your cool and the better your EQ gets. Also,
staying calm in challenging situations gives you a better
chance at clear thinking and problem solving and increases
your IQ.

This is only one example of probably thousands of ways that
your intelligences work together. The more you work on your
brain fitness the better they all get. It all comes back to
variety. Using nutrition, physical and mental activities,
appropriate rest and positive thinking to improve your
brain fitness and improve all of your intelligences.

Over the next several weeks I will be writing about the
roles of all of these brain fitness promoting behaviors in
increasing your intelligences, EQ, PQ and IQ – you can
remember them as EPIQ (pronounced 'EPIC') performance. The
goal is to increase your EPIQ performance in all aspects of
your life as much as possible.

A focus on brain fitness will allow you greater success at
work or business, improved relationships and improved brain
and body health. Improving your brain fitness will help you
move from where you are today to where you want to be.


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Master Brain Fitness techniques for you and your family.
The Brain Code is the key to unlock your maximum potential.
Dr. Simon Evans puts together the right ingredients in
right amount to create the recipe for success. Visit
http://www.thebraincode.com for FREE Brain Fitness
resources.

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