Head Strong: The Bulletproof Plan to Activate Untapped Brain Energy to Work Smarter and Think Faster-in Just Two Weeks

by Dave Asprey

Brain degeneration is not inevitable. Brand-new, healthy neurons can be created at any age. It just takes more conscious planning to keep doing it as you age.

high-sugar diet for just two months exhibited a significant decrease in cognitive function. Notably, the area of the brain that suffered the most was the hippocampus—where neurogenesis occurs. Sugar is the enemy of neurogenesis.

Avoiding the enemy of neurogenesis is really tough.

studies have shown that increasing the amount of omega-3 fatty acids in your diet can promote adult neurogenesis.19

I supplement with fish oil.

polyphenols, which are found in coffee, chocolate, blueberries, grapes, and other blue, red, and orange foods. In fact, coffee fruit, the part of the coffee we usually throw away, has some of the best-studied polyphenols for growing neurons. Polyphenols are like Miracle-Gro for neurons.20

Your neurons require massive amounts of energy to function and they die when they don’t get it. • Myelin is made of fat and insulates the communication path between neurons. • You can grow new neurons (neurogenesis) at any age, and it is possible to increase your rate of neurogenesis by five times! Head Start: Do These Four Things Right Now • Eat more good fat, particularly healthy saturated fat from grass-fed butter and meat. • Eat a lot less sugar. Sugar reduces your rate of neurogenesis. • Manage your stress. Stress reduces your rate of neurogenesis. • Have more sex, but if you’re a man, don’t ejaculate every day because you’ll waste hormones that are hard to make, along with precious mitochondria. 4 INFLAMMATION

The people who had fewer types of gut bacteria and more parasites had higher risks of developing Alzheimer’s.

A huge study found a strong association between coffee consumption and longevity. The more coffee the study participants drank, the less likely they were to die.

In fact, drinking coffee was associated with a lower risk of dying from a number of common diseases, including heart disease, lung disease, diabetes, and infections.

you eat all of your food within a specific window of time (six or eight hours) and fast the rest of the day (sixteen to eighteen hours). This is an effective way to cycle in and out of ketosis while remaining well fed, and it’s been proven to have plenty of other brain benefits such as increasing neurogenesis.43

Mold toxins are a real problem when it comes to coffee.20 A 2003 study showed that more than 90 percent of green coffee beans were contaminated with mold before processing,21

the United States has no standards for coffee, so it lags behind the EU, South Korea, Singapore, and China, all of which have set limits at economically feasible levels. And the coffee they reject actually gets sent to the United States for unsuspecting people to drink.

Eating a diet low in sugar, rich in antioxidants and polyphenols, and containing high-quality fats, grass-fed protein, and organic, responsibly sourced foods is the best way not only to avoid foodborne molds but also to detox from mold exposure.

After your brain and your heart (and your ovaries if you’re a woman), your eyes contain the highest concentration of mitochondria in your body.

Your visual systems require up to 15 percent of your total energy budget.

New York Times bestseller The Code of the Extraordinary Mind and CEO of Mindvalley,

An excellent 2010 review of randomized, controlled studies showed that strength training significantly decreases anxiety, improves memory and cognition, reduces fatigue, and makes you happier. All of this is due to the boost in endorphins and the increased rate of neurogenesis, mitogenesis, and mitophagy that resistance training provides.

Replace all of the compact fluorescent and white LED lights in your bedroom with lower-wattage halogen bulbs, or go all-in with a lamp that has an amber or red bulb. The amber or red bulb may look funny, but it won’t disrupt your sleep like fluorescents or LEDs.

If you already know that you have light sensitivity or if you have dyslexia or other reading problems, you might consider getting the Irlen lenses I mentioned earlier. These are glasses with a custom tint specifically for your brain. You can get them from a specialist who measures your eyes to see which specific filters will give you more brain energy.