Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain

In this summary you will learn

• How leading neuroscientists developed a radically new conception of the brain
• Why they now believe that brain cells remain teachable and replaceable
• How this advance can, literally, change your life

getAbstract rating

Why you should read Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain

For nearly a century, scientific dogma held that the brain is immutable, fixed by genes and early upbringing. Wall Street Journal science writer Sharon Begley recently visited the frontiers of neuroscience and returned with a news flash: The dogma is wrong. Researchers have discovered that the brain remains plastic, lifelong. This creates new frontiers: Stroke victims can rewire their brains using challenging exercises; deaf people can repurpose dormant auditory cortexes for other tasks; and blind people can begin to “see” patterns of Braille dots using a seemingly dead visual cortex. Suspecting that they were on to a general pattern, researchers soon looked for similar changes in “normal” brains. Working repetitively on your golf swing, playing the piano or learning a language, they found, also change your brain in lasting, important ways, as does practicing compassion toward others. Begley arrives with heavyweight friends: a foreword by the Dalai Lama and a preface by Daniel Goleman of Emotional Intelligence. If you want to understand how the brain keeps working, and how to make yours do more of what you want it to, getAbstract thinks you should start here. Your brain will thank you.

About the Author

Sharon Begley is science columnist for The Wall Street Journal. She is the co-author of The Mind and the Brain: Neuroplasticity and the Power of Mental Force.