<p>What exercise does to your brain—and how to actually do it regularly.</p> <p> </p> <p><a href="https://www.instagram.com/wendy.suzuki/?hl=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Wendy Suzuki</a> is a Professor of Neural Science and Psychology at New York University, where she is also the first Asian-American Dean of the College of Arts and Science. She is the author of two books, <em>Good Anxiety</em> and <em>Healthy Brain, Happy Life</em>.</p> <p> </p> <p>This episode is part of our monthlong <a href="https://www.meditatehappier.com/podcast-playlists/new-years-2025-do-life-better" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Do Life Better</em></a> series.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>We talk about:</strong></p> <ul> <li>How exercise not only enhances cognitive function but also protects against age-related cognitive decline and neurodegenerative diseases. </li> <li>The difference between cardio and strength training</li> <li>Whether it matters if you track your steps</li> <li>How to sustain your motivation to exercise</li> <li>And practical tips on how to start, restart or increase an exercise habit</li> <li>We also talk about the brain benefits of sleep, meditation, and healthy eating (with a detour into ways to counteract the potentially unhealthy obsession with being healthy)</li> <li>And finally, we talk about the counterintuitive benefits of anxiety</li> </ul> <p> </p> <p><strong>Related Episodes:</strong></p> <ul> <li><a href="https://www.meditatehappier.com/podcast-playlists/new-years-2025-do-life-better" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Do Life Better</em></a></li> <li><a href="https://www.meditatehappier.com/podcast-playlists/get-fit-sanely" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Get Fit Sanely</em></a></li> <li><a href="https://www.happierapp.com/podcast-playlists/sleep-better" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Sleep Better</em></a></li> <li><a href="https://www.meditatehappier.com/podcast/tph/evelyn-tribole-rerun-2023" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The Anti-Diet | Evelyn Tribole</a></li> </ul> <p> </p> <p><strong>Sign up for Dan's newsletter</strong> <a href="http://www.danharris.com" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>here</strong></a></p> <p><strong>Follow Dan on social:</strong> <a href="https://bit.ly/3tGigG5" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Instagram</strong></a><strong>,</strong> <a href="https://bit.ly/3FOA84J" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>TikTok</strong></a></p> <p><strong>Ten Percent Happier online</strong> <a href="https://bit.ly/46TZglY" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>bookstore</strong></a></p> <p><strong>Subscribe to our</strong> <a href="https://bit.ly/3FybRzD" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>YouTube Channel</strong></a></p> <p><strong>Our favorite playlists on:</strong> <a href="https://spoti.fi/3Qa8kMT" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Anxiety</strong></a><strong>,</strong> <a href="https://spoti.fi/3MjtMxF" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Sleep</strong></a><strong>,</strong> <a href="https://spoti.fi/3QvyA5J" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Relationships</strong></a><strong>,</strong> <a href="https://spoti.fi/3QxZASc" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Most Popular Episodes</strong></a></p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Full Shownotes:</strong> <a href="https://www.meditatehappier.com/podcast/tph/phap-luu-889" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">https://www.meditatehappier.com/podcast/tph/wendy-suzuki-888</a></p> <p> </p>
Actionable Insights
1. Prioritize Daily Aerobic Exercise
Engage in regular aerobic movement to flood your brain with neurochemicals and growth factors, enhancing cognitive function, growing new brain cells, and protecting against age-related decline. Aim for at least 30 minutes daily or 45 minutes, 2-3 times a week, ensuring your heart rate is elevated.
2. Optimize Sleep for Brain Health
Prioritize 8-9 hours of quality sleep nightly, as it’s crucial for cleaning out brain metabolites and fighting disease. Implement sleep hygiene like removing screens, making the room cold, hydrating early, and avoiding alcohol to improve sleep quality.
3. Cultivate Strong Social Connections
Actively seek and maintain strong social connections, as they are vital for overall brain health, contribute to a longer and happier life, and can serve as a powerful motivator for healthy habits like exercise.
4. Practice Mindfulness & Meditation
Engage in regular meditation or mindfulness practices, such as a morning tea meditation ritual, to foster brain health and self-awareness, which can fuel broader behavior change.
5. Adopt Brain-Healthy Eating Habits
Focus on common-sense eating, prioritizing lots of fruits and vegetables, reducing processed sugar, and considering Mediterranean-related diets. Pay attention to how different foods make you feel through self-experimentation.
6. Use Box Breathing for Calm
Practice the box breathing technique (inhale 4, hold 4, exhale 4, hold 4) in calm moments to activate your parasympathetic nervous system. This tool can then be used discreetly in acute anxiety-provoking situations to calm yourself down.
7. Integrate Power Walks Daily
Incorporate power walking into your daily routine for 10 minutes or more, as it’s an accessible way to elevate your heart rate, improve mood, and contribute to long-term brain health without needing a gym or special equipment.
8. Leverage Anxiety for Empathy
Reflect on your personal anxieties and recognize their commonality in others, using this understanding to offer a helping hand or invite someone into a conversation. This reframes anxiety as a portal to compassion and connection.
9. Practice Joy Conditioning
Actively recall and relive joyous, funny, or lovely memories to rebalance your emotional state and counter the brain’s negativity bias. This practice strengthens positive emotional pathways and can be done alone or with others.
10. Engage in Generosity to Reduce Anxiety
Choose an activity you excel at that benefits others and make a practice of doing it regularly. This act of generosity helps you get out of your own head, reducing self-focused anxiety.
11. Make Exercise Habits Short & Fun
When starting or restarting an exercise habit, choose activities that are short, enjoyable, and familiar from your past. This approach helps you get hooked and wanting more, preventing burnout or soreness.
12. Connect Habits to Meaningful Motivators
Link your desired habits, like exercise, to deeply meaningful personal goals, such as living a long, healthy life or delaying the onset of cognitive decline. This provides a powerful, abiding motivation.
13. Don’t Catastrophize Sleeplessness
If you find yourself anxious and unable to sleep, get out of bed to do something relaxing or productive instead of struggling. This prevents associating your bed with struggle and reduces anxiety about not sleeping.
14. Utilize Self-Awareness for Habits
Pay attention to how different routines or activities make you feel and track your habits (e.g., through journaling) to identify what works best for you. This self-reflection is a powerful tool for long-term health and habit formation.
15. Reframe Anxiety as Strength
View challenges and anxiety, when held constructively, as opportunities to build inner strength and resilience. Facing fears head-on fosters deep learning and personal growth.
16. Consider Circuit Weight Training
If you enjoy weight training, explore circuit-style workouts that involve rapid movement between exercises. This can provide a simultaneous cardio benefit alongside strength training.
17. Take Rest Days When Needed
Listen to your body and take rest days for physical healing, especially after intense workouts. While daily activity is beneficial, prioritize recovery if your body requires it.
18. Build Sleep Pressure Deliberately
To ensure deep, satisfying sleep, try waking up earlier or engaging in a hard workout during the day. This builds up natural sleep pressure, making it easier to fall asleep.