The Better Brain Buchzusammenfassung - das Wichtigste aus The Better Brain

Einleitung anhören

00:00

Zusammenfassung von The Better Brain

Name: The Better Brain
Rating: 4 (288 reviews)
Author: Bonnie J. Kaplan and Julia J. Rucklidge

Bonnie J. Kaplan and Julia J. Rucklidge

Overcome Anxiety, Combat Depression, and Reduce ADHD and Stress with Nutrition

4 (288 Bewertungen)

22 Min.

Themen

Inhaltsübersicht

The Better Brain
in 7 Kernaussagen verstehen

Audio & Text in der Blinkist App

Kernaussage 1 von 7

What’s in it for me? Learn how food impacts your mental health.

There’s a mental-health crisis brewing in the United States. One in five people reports suffering from a mental condition – whether that’s depression, anxiety, or ADHD. When you add in the families of each of these people, you realize that’s half the country suffering from the effects of mental ill-health.

More prescriptions are being written than ever, yet recovery rates are unchanged and the number of suicides has actually gone up. What’s more, the stigma around mental health means that research funding is limited.

On the bright side, there’s a simple way you can support your brain and mental health. It’s cheap, with far fewer negative side effects than a cabinet full of pharmaceuticals, and can be found in your kitchen. That’s right – we’re talking about food.

In these blinks, you’ll learn

why eating sushi makes you happy;
how a bee’s diet determines whether it will end up as a queen or worker; and
why what you eat during pregnancy can affect your toddler’s smarts.

Good nutrition can do more for your mental health than pharmaceutical potions.

The notion of curing sickness through food is not a new concept. More than 2,000 years ago, Hippocrates wrote, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine thy food.” And just a century ago, an article in The People’s Home Library advised readers to tackle mental-health problems by eating better.

The problem is that the message hasn’t always gotten through.

Take the story of ten-year-old Andrew, who had symptoms of anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and psychosis. His parents were getting increasingly desperate. Andrew had been treated, medicated, even hospitalized. Nothing seemed to work – until he was prescribed multinutrients, which included an array of vitamins and minerals. Within ten months, his OCD was gone.

The key message here is: Good nutrition can do more for your mental health than pharmaceutical potions.

It wasn’t just Andrew’s OCD that went away. Next, his symptoms of psychosis vanished. Now an adult, Andrew has graduated from high school and has a job. What’s more, the nutrients cost just 2 percent of what his parents had been paying for his inpatient care.

If such an easy, affordable, and available cure can be found right in your pantry or local grocery store, why isn’t food touted more? Why don’t psychiatrists prescribe multinutrients or a change in diet instead of a drug regimen?

The answer is simple: money. The committees that write the clinical practice guidelines are tied to drug companies through funding. And there’s another problem, too: societal norms mean we’ve grown used to treating everything with medicine.

From their earliest years in medical school, psychiatrists are trained to prescribe drugs. And since 1985, when direct-to-consumer advertising started, our population has been increasingly eager to consume them. The change in advertising laws didn’t just mean that people were suddenly inundated with ads for medications; it also meant they were discovering more and more conditions for which they could get a magic pill.

Some medications have only been approved based on 6–12-week clinical trials but are regularly prescribed to patients for life. They often have side effects or are extremely addictive. And yet we rarely stop to ask whether drugs are the best answer.

It’s time to take a step back. In the next blinks, we’ll look at how to fix your nutritional habits and build better mental health without relying on pharmaceuticals.

The better you feed your brain, the better your brain will serve you.

Picture the inside of a beehive. In each cell of the hive, an egg is hatching. The larvae that emerge are all genetically identical. By the time the bees reach maturity, every one will be sterile – except for the queen. And it all comes down to nutrition.

What happens is that the colony selects the individual larva that will become the queen and feeds it a diet rich in royal jelly. The others are fed pollen, nectar, and honey. These contain plant chemicals that affect the DNA of the larvae – chemically castrating what will become the hive’s worker bees.

The components of your gut microbiome affect your emotions.

Relying on your gut instinct. Feeling butterflies in your stomach. Our emotional reactions are often attributed to the digestive system. And it’s no coincidence. Increasingly, research shows that the bacteria in our very complicated gut “microbiome” really do affect how we feel.

In studies done in the 1980s, many mental health patients reported digestive complaints like stomach aches. The reasoning used to be that a stomach ache might be a symptom of anxiety or stress.

Science shows there’s a direct connection between your diet and your mental health.

Scientific evidence overwhelmingly proves that there is a strong relationship between what we eat and how we feel. And the epidemic of mental health issues rife in America today can be tied to the epidemic of poor eating – especially of ultra-processed foods.

The good news is that the opposite is also true. Eating healthily can actually protect your mental well-being.

You’re on the right track if you’re eating foods your ancestors would recognize.

Only eat meat. Never eat meat! Eat frequent, small meals. Only eat from 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Try FODMAP. The keto diet. Paleo is the way to go!

In the cacophony of conflicting diet advice, what’s the best way to eat to improve how your brain works and how your mind feels?

Cutting unhealthy foods from your diet can have long-term health benefits.

You now know what you should eat: lots of fresh foods, preferably homemade. But what about the things you should avoid?

Researchers have identified five steps to help in changing behaviors: precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, and maintenance. In terms of creating better eating habits, this might mean first thinking about the lifestyle changes you'd like to make. Then, specifically considering the things you're eating – what’s good and what's bad for you? Make a plan to get more of the former and avoid the latter. Next, put your plan into action. And, finally, stick to it!

Taking multinutrients can improve your mental health.

Calcium supplements. Iron pills. B12 tablets. At one time or another, we’ve all been told to take our vitamins. For those of us who don’t yet have a healthy, well-balanced diet, this can be a crucial prescription.

But many of us aren’t making the most of our vitamin regimen. To supplement our nutrient-deficient diets, we generally just take single-ingredient tablets. The thing is, besides B-complex formulas, most over-the-counter supplements haven’t undergone rigorous testing for benefits and don’t cater to individual needs.

Du möchtest die gesamte Zusammenfassung von The Better Brain sehen?

Kernaussagen in The Better Brain

Mehr Wissen in weniger Zeit

Sachbücher auf den Punkt gebracht

Kernaussagen aus Sachbüchern in ca. 15 Minuten pro Titel lesen & anhören mit den „Blinks”

Zeitsparende Empfehlungen

Titel, die dein Leben bereichern, passend zu deinen Interessen und Zielen

Podcasts in Kurzform ^Neu

Kernaussagen wichtiger Podcasts im Kurzformat mit den neuen „Shortcasts”

Worum geht es in The Better Brain?

The Better Brain (2021) serves up the ultimate mental health cure: good nutrition. With numerous anecdotes, case studies, recipes, and actionable tips, it explores the connection between what we eat and how we feel – and shows how a healthy diet can help battle mental problems.

Wer The Better Brain lesen sollte

People living with anxiety, stress, or depression
Parents looking to improve their children’s mental health
Anyone interested in living a healthier life

Über den Autor

Dr. Bonnie Kaplan is a psychologist, researcher, and professor at the University of Calgary’s Cumming School of Medicine. She writes and teaches about nutrition and mental health. Dr. Julia Rucklidge is a clinical psychologist at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand. She has conducted extensive research on micronutrients.

Kategorien mit The Better Brain

Psychologie Geschichte

Ähnlich wie The Better Brain

The ADHD Advantage

Dale Archer

What you Thought Was a Diagnosis May Be Your Greatest Strength

11 min

3.2

Eat to Beat Depression and Anxiety

Drew Ramsey

Nourish Your Way to Better Mental Health in Six Weeks

21 min

4.3

ADHD 2.0

Edward M. Hallowell and John J. Ratey

New Science and Essential Strategies for Thriving with Distraction – from Childhood through Adulthood

25 min

4.7

Anxiety at Work

Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton with Anthony Gostick

8 Strategies to Help Teams Build Resilience, Handle Uncertainty, and Get Stuff Done

24 min

4.2

Accessing the Healing Power of the Vagus Nerve

Stanley Rosenberg

Self-Help Exercises for Anxiety, Depression, Trauma, and Autism

19 min

4.5

DIRTY LAUNDRY

Richard Pink & Roxanne Emery

Why adults with ADHD are so ashamed and what we can do to help

Healing the Shame-Fueled Relationship Between What You Eat and How You Feel

The Origins and Healing of Attention Deficit Disorder

24 min

4.4

Neurodiversity at Work

Theo Smith and Amanda Kirby

Drive Innovation, Performance and Productivity With a Neurodiverse Workforce

Turbocharge Your Focus, Productivity, and Success with the Secrets of the ADHD Brain

A Radical New Approach to Depression

27 min

4.5

The ADHD Effect on Marriage

Melissa Orlov

Understand and Rebuild Your Relationship in Six Steps

Why Anxiety Is Good for You (Even Though It Feels Bad)

How Microdosing Made a Mega Difference in My Mood, My Marriage, and My Life

The Bulletproof Plan to Age Backward and Maybe Even Live Forever

A Guide for Occupants

Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression – and the Unexpected Solutions

Train Your Subconscious to Grow Mentally and Materially

10 min

4.0

Breaking The Habit of Being Yourself

Joe Dispenza

How to Lose Your Mind and Create a New One

Using the Brain to Understand and Treat Fear and Anxiety

What the Rich Teach Their Kids about Money – That the Poor and the Middle Class Do Not!

How to Eat Smart and Sharpen Your Mind

Time Management for Mortals

23 min

4.5

Building a Second Brain

Tiago Forte

A Proven Method to Organize Your Digital Life and Unlock Your Creative Potential

19 min

4.5

Listen Like You Mean It

Ximena Vengoechea

Reclaiming the Lost Art of True Connection

An Uncomfortable Book About Relationships

14 min

3.5

Good Reasons for Bad Feelings

Randolph M. Nesse

Insights from the Frontier of Evolutionary Psychiatry

28 min

4.2

A Short History of Nearly Everything

Bill Bryson

A journey into the most intriguing and intractable questions that science seeks to answer

The Biohacker's Guide to Getting the Body and Mind You Want

20 min

3.8

Confidence From the Inside Out

The Blinkist Team

Build your confidence by living on the edge of your comfort zone

9 min

4.6

The Everyday Hero Manifesto

Robin Sharma

Activate Your Positivity, Maximize Your Productivity, Serve The World

Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World

Zen and the Rediscovery of the Obvious

31 min

3.9

The Self-Driven Child

William Stixrud and Ned Johnson

The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives

Internet Pornography and the Emerging Science of Addiction

A hands-on guide to happiness

An Open Letter to a New Generation of Therapists and Their Patients

How to Stop Struggling and Start Living

18 min

4.6

Successful Time Management

Patrick Forsyth

How to be Organized, Productive and Get Things Done

Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World

What You're Missing and Why It Matters

Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business

A Daring Strategy to Change How We Live, Lead, and Love

It's Time to Cheer for Yourself

A Practical Guide for Discovering Purpose for You and Your Team

17 min

4.3

The Five Core Conversations for Couples

David Bulitt and Julie Bulitt

Expert Advice about How to Develop: Effective Communication, a Long-Term Financial Plan, Cooperative Parenting Strategies, Mutually Satisfying Sex, and Work-Life Balance

15 min

4.3

Braving the Wilderness

Brené Brown

The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone

16 min

4.3

The Mind-Gut Connection

Emeran Mayer

How the Hidden Conversation Within Our Bodies Impacts Our Mood, Our Choices, and Our Overall Health

15 min

4.5

❤️ für Blinkist️️️

Ines S.

Ich bin begeistert. Ich liebe Bücher aber durch zwei kleine Kinder komme ich einfach nicht zum Lesen. Und ja, viele Bücher haben viel bla bla und die Quintessenz ist eigentlich ein Bruchteil.

Genau dafür ist Blinkist total genial! Es wird auf das Wesentliche reduziert, die Blinks sind gut verständlich, gut zusammengefasst und auch hörbar! Das ist super. 80 Euro für ein ganzes Jahr klingt viel, aber dafür unbegrenzt Zugriff auf 3000 Bücher. Und dieses Wissen und die Zeitersparnis ist unbezahlbar.

Ekaterina S.

Extrem empfehlenswert. Statt sinnlos im Facebook zu scrollen höre ich jetzt täglich zwischen 3-4 "Bücher". Bei manchen wird schnelle klar, dass der Kauf unnötig ist, da schon das wichtigste zusammen gefasst wurde..bei anderen macht es Lust doch das Buch selbständig zu lesen. Wirklich toll

Nils S.

Einer der besten, bequemsten und sinnvollsten Apps die auf ein Handy gehören. Jeden morgen 15-20 Minuten für die eigene Weiterbildung/Entwicklung oder Wissen.

Julia P.

Viele tolle Bücher, auf deren Kernaussagen reduziert- präzise und ansprechend zusammengefasst. Endlich habe ich das Gefühl, Zeit für Bücher zu finden, für die ich sonst keine Zeit habe.