Have you ever wondered why your brain feels like mush even if you’re listening to or reading good material such as personal development books, podcasts and other educational input? I mean, after all isn’t that the kind of material you want to feed your brain vs. the crap on TV?
Your Brain Is Like a Muscle
Although the brain isn’t a muscle it sort of works like one. Our brain use more energy than any other part of our body, about 20% of all your energy intake, and the more it works the more energy it uses. Just like a muscle it gets tired and needs to recharge. If you’re putting your brain through a marathon each day you need to treat it accordingly.
Your brain, since it use so much energy, is also influenced by your nutrition, just like the rest of your body. Poor nutrition leads to poor brain performance.
If you remember from biology, food gets converted to glucose, which is the energy source for the body. Now, not all glucose is good glucose. Your brain doesn’t exactly rock n’ roll if you live on junk food, sugar, caffeine and soda. There’s very little substance in that kind of food. Your brain wants good, healthy nutrition and fluids.
Can You Overfeed Your Brain Even With Good Material?
Yes.
I honor your commitment to feeding your brain good material and don’t stop doing that. Just understand that as with any kind of input, your brain still needs to think about what to do with that. That’s why, regardless of the material, if you feed your brain too much to process, it still gets tired.
As you’re now in this space of personal growth it’s easy to want to listen to all the podcasts, read all the books, do all the things. I totally get that. There’s so much to learn and now you want to know it all, preferably yesterday.
What Can You Do?
Your brain needs time to recharge. The way to do that is to reduce as much other input as possible, especially the kind of input that isn’t helping you to move forward in life, plus allow your brain some time off. Walks in nature, days off the computer, lots of breaks throughout the day, meditation, sleep, time with friends, and other non-reading/listening/studying activities.
Also, remember to implement what you learn so you follow the “Learn, Implement, Learn, Implement” strategy. Feeding your brain without putting it to use is a waste of time and energy.
Yes, I know that means slowing down learning all this great material, but you’ll retain it better by having a fresh brain, not a tired one. Just think of how your muscles feel after a hard workout. After a few days of hard workouts your body isn’t as responsive simply because it hasn’t had time to recharge.
So as you work on your personal growth, remember it still comes down to balance. Because sometimes too much good can have it’s consequences. Even when you have the best of intentions.
If you felt this post was of value to you please share with others so they too can learn how to stop spinning and start living. I appreciate you! Now go and move your life forward but do it in balance. Think long-term. You can do it!
You may also like these posts:
The 6 Foundational Habits for Productivity – No 5. Reduce Input
3 Things I Did to Reduce Digital Noise
Quotes to inspire you…feel free to share! You can find more quotes on my Instagram.
