Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself: How to Lose Your Mind and Create a New One

by Joe Dispenza

In Evolve Your Brain, I discussed how research subjects who mentally rehearsed one-handed piano exercises for two hours a day for five days (never actually touching any piano keys) demonstrated almost the same brain changes as people who physically performed the identical finger movements on a piano keyboard for the same length of time.2 Functional brain scans showed that all the participants activated and expanded clusters of neurons in the same specific area of the brain. In essence, the group who mentally rehearsed practicing scales and chords grew nearly the same number of brain circuits as the group who physically engaged in the activity.