Fit Brains: All About New Ideas

Thanks to Jill Fallon of The Business of Life for alerting me to 10 Valuable Life Lessons. . . Learned from Coffins, just in time for Halloween. A later post, Six Ways to Carry Trash, got my attention, too. American Inventors Spot is all about invention, innovation, and new ideas.

Research on healthy brains has shown again and again that learning what is new to us is good for us. That includes looking at old ideas in new ways. By making the effort to push the edge of our learning beyond our comfort zones, we also create new neural connections and pathways. This is what neuroscientists call "cogntive reserve" or "brain reserves." We're building extra thinking capacity, a kind of mental savings account to use in the future as need.

Everyone's Brain Needs to Laugh

Check out Reluctant Nomad's "Insults--they just don't make them as they used to."

Smile, snicker, chuckle. Just let go and laugh out loud. You'll feel great.

Then ponder these findings about humor and our brains. According to Allan Reiss, MD of Stanford University in a 2005 study, men and women's brains react differently to humor. Researchers already know that men and women share much when laugh. For example, both use the part of the brain responsible for language processing and semantic knowledge and juxtaposition. But women seem to use the language and reasoning areas more and expect a punchline less, which activates the reward center. So when we do find something that's amusing, we are really pleased.

And then there "Humor's Sexual Side." John Morreal of William and Mary College, says that the content of men and women's humor is quite different. Men tend to find practical jokes and put-downs hilarious while women tend to use humor to bond with others. Geoffrey Miller of the University of Mexico finds that women prefer funny men and how much they laugh may be tied to sexual attraction whereas the number of times men laughed at women's jokes had no correlation with that kind of interest in the woman. And, of course, women who use "men's" humor are seen as too aggressive.

Oh, my goodness, what a tangle. And it just keeps going.

Everyone seems to agree that humor is a sign of cognitive health. We already know that because we instantly feel more positive when we laugh. In case you've forgotten, circle back to the top and take a look at those funny insults. And for the women in the audience, the ones that take quick language processing and reasoning are the most fun.

technorati: cognition, brain, brain exercises, humor

How to Laugh Out Loud

Start reading Nora Ephron's latest book of essays. But don't finish it in one sitting. Decide to take it with you to jury duty. For breaks. To distract yourself from the serious nature of what's at hand. To give your brain a little tickle, something light and amusing. Stick the shiny, new hardback in your gigantic purse, along with your bottle of water, your iPod, your sunglasses, your distance glasses, your TREO, your cosmetics, your old, torn, grimy tissues, money, business cards, extras from your tear-out Sudoku calendar in case you have three minutes somewhere, pencils, pens, receipts from last year's purchases, and vitamins that spilled from their case eons ago and are now in zillions of little crumbs along the bottom and in the built-in pockets on the side. Pull the slim volume out, amongst the throngs waiting to be called into service as jurors, or dismissed. Dust the vitamin crumbs and tissue pieces from the sides. Ignore the fidgeters, the sleepers, the annoyed, the frightened, the horribly bored. Begin reading. Giggle, clear your throat, and then burst into uncontrollable, inappropriate laughter that will just not stay put inside your mind. Ignore the bailiff pointing at you. Ignore the prospective jurors around you, looking wistfully because they'd give anything to have brought along something fun and funny to read. The essay is called, "I Hate My Purse." Ms. Ephron describes her purse and it's just exactly the mess mine is in. Except that mine is pathetic. Hers is hilarious.

If you're a woman over the age of 35 and certainly if you're over 50 (and hey, I think men would love this one, too), you should read Nora Ephron's latest collection of wry, sometimes hilarious and sometimes poignant (and sometimes both simultaneously), always honest, and usually universally applicable group of essays, I Feel Bad About My Neck and Other Thoughts on Being a Woman.

Ephron says she doesn't like getting older. It's not as advertised. I say any big life change, and getting older qualifies, is a great reason to trot out your sense of humor. And Ephron does, with sparkling style. Delightful, all the way through.

Even though I recognized some of these essays as the same ones I read when they were first published in The New Yorker, who cares? They were even better the second time around.

technorati: Boomers, humor, books, women