Stand with your back to your office or bathroom trash can. Move the trash can to somewhere reasonably convenient in front of you. Just put the trash can somewhere new. Then, go on about your day. Note how many times you accidentally toss a tissue to where the trash can has always been instead of where it is now.
Questions for discussion:
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Why did you pick the old direction?
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Why don’t you ever pick a random direction?
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Is there anything else that goes on somewhere in your body/mind that directs you without forethought or conscious decision? Other controls? Other decisions?
I am impressed by, and my life is more valuable having read, The Brain that Changes Itself by Norman Doidge, MD and “Soft-Wired: How the New Science of Brain Plasticity Can Change Your Life” by Michael Merzenich, PhD. Now, I have a third book that has been a help. Merzenich and his colleagues stress the need for discipline, attention and practice. I don’t doubt they are important but I do think other things matter, too. The inexpensive and inspirational little book Keep “Your Brain Alive: 83 Neurobic Exercises to Help Prevent Memory Loss and Increase Mental Fitness costs $7.39 to download from Amazon”. It suggests ways to modify your usual routine.
The author of the “neurobics” book is Lawrence C. Katz, professor of neurobiology at Duke University in North Carolina. I think a fair summary of the 83 exercises is “shake up and try.” Yesterday, I wanted to see what time it was and I looked at my left wrist. No watch - I had failed to put in on. Then, I remembered: I had taken a clue from Katz and put the watch on my right wrist. I actually had to remember that switch even though if I tried, I could feel it on my right wrist. Clearly, I was not tuned into my body feelings.
I know I can’t be tuned into everything, internal and external, all the time. There is too much. I do find it interesting that I could feel something on my right wrist if I paid attention but I had to see it missing from the other one and remember in my head that I had switched before realizing I had the watch on but on the opposite wrist. I wonder if my body is keeping secrets from me.
Besides using my left hand for many things I usually do righthanded, Katz recommends working on my senses, especially touch and smell in many of the recommendations. Smell seasonings and perfumes. Find things in a bag or purse by touch alone. It’s good for my brain.
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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety
