Hey guys and welcome back to another episode of your Brain's Coach podcast. My name is Angela Shurina, I'm your host, I'm your Brain's Coach and today I'd like to introduce myself a little bit more. So I've been in coaching for more than 15 years I believe, like 17 years now. Years go by. I started in fitness, then transitioned to nutrition and then recovery and then stress management Kind of started in athletics, working with professional athletes and obviously with people who are not professional athletes as well, then transitioned into productivity Not transitioned.
Speaker 1I still do a lot of lifestyle coaching, health coaching, weight loss, habit formation for better health, longevity and to increase your energy levels and to just increase the quality of your life, to feel better before you can do better. Now I work a lot more in the executive coaching space productivity coaching, self-leadership coaching, mindset coaching a lot of those things which are needed to actually maximize the return on investment in your health and healthy lifestyle coaching. Health and healthy lifestyle coaching. Now I work half and half with individuals and then teams and companies, and then startups and different accelerators or founder communities. In all of that work I combine three modalities health, mindset and how we organize our personal and professional projects Basically how we do our work and how we integrate work and life experience, and I help people to do better as a coach. You don't tell people what to do. Well, it's a part of it, but most important part of my job as a coach is to help people change their behaviors, and that often comes from learning how to make better decisions, questioning decisions and habits and patterns that did not serve us well. Change is hard, but it's much, much easier when you have sort of a mirror, a guide, accountability, so you could almost get out of your own head and see what's actually happening before you have a chance to change it. So that's what I do, and here I'm sharing my experience, my learnings, all this stuff that I acquire from different certifications, different thought leaders, different books I read two, three books a day and just ongoing conversations with my clients. So all of that I'm sharing here in a podcast form. Today I'm sharing with you something that I partially learned in the recent book and we're going to have an author on our podcast in the next couple of months. So partially what I learned in this book, partially my experience and research in psychology of behavior change and neuroscience. Also, we have a little bit of nutrition and lifestyle, all with the purpose to help you dial in your focus, your attention. This is the currency of your achievement.
Speaker 1Folks, last time we talked a lot about making decisions and making sure that you do make new decisions and then you follow up with new actions. It's the only way how you can create new life, new you, how you can grow, because what you've been doing till this point got you this far and what got you here won't get you there. So if you want to grow and evolve and create new results, you always have to look at what you do and it's like what do I need to do next so I get to the next level? Because if you do what you usually do, you get what you usually get right. Change has to change, like the breakfast that you loved brought you the body that you want. If you want a new body, you kind of have to change the things that you got comfortable with. Hope this makes sense.
Speaker 1I'd like to start with a quote. What information consumes is rather obvious it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information in which, by the way, we exist now creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among overabundance of information sources that might consume it. And that's been written by Herbert Simon. He is a researcher psychologist and he wrote it actually like half a century ago, 50 years ago. Even back then people thought they were struggling with information overload and attention deficit. Can you imagine what he would write now? Need to actually look up if he's still alive, but that's what he wrote Sounds very up-to-date, wouldn't you say?
Speaker 1Most people, folks, and the choice to be most people or smarter people is always on your side, right? What do you actually choose? So most people treat their attention like garbage. They throw it into different direction with no regard to what it's going to bring them back. It's like I'm just going to give it away to you whatever comes my way, and then when you do that, your energy and your resources follow that attention, and so you end up, even though you might have a lot initially, you end up feeling like you have very little. It's kind of like you get your paycheck and then you decide to just go into town and buy all the stuff that screams for your attention and you'll end up buying a bunch of stuff that you won't need in a couple of weeks and then you're going to be broke and you're like where did all my work go? You know, I worked so hard, I got this money and now I have nothing, just a bunch of stuff that doesn't add quality into my life.
Speaker 1So the same happens with a lot of people's attention. You got it all in the beginning of the day and then you wasted it on social media here, on some weird conversations there, or some website over here, on some gossip or conflict that didn't need to happen because you needed better boundaries and communication strategies and all of that. And at the end of the day you're like I'm fatigued, tired, I'm just going to watch some more Netflix. And you got no learnings, you got no improvement, you got no growth. And yet you felt like you know, there was so much stuff that you cannot possibly handle anymore, and a lot of people who don't decide to spend time on learning how to harness their focus and attention end up having exactly the situation day after day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, and that's how you move nowhere. And then you see those other people moving forward, working on amazing projects, writing books, I don't know creating businesses, moving to a beautiful country, having beautiful relationships and developing different awesome hobbies and skills and you're like how do they do that? Well, the way you do anything in the world, full of information and deficit of attention, is you become very intentional about how you spend that and also you learn how to train your focus and learn how to make your focus be driven more by push, not by pull, and push and pull. So this is what I got, this new concept that I'm going to be using now.
Speaker 1I got this from the book Lit Life Ignition Tools written by Jeff Karp. He is a scientist, a researcher in medical bioengineering, I think, very smart guy, has all the PhDs, etc. So subtitle of this book and we're going to have Jeff on our podcast, by the way subtitle Use Nature's Playbook to Energize your Brain, spark Ideas and Ignite Action. But a lot of this book is about focus and intention. Because Jeff struggled with that, because before he found his systems, like how his brain works and how to go about using that brain better. Because Jeff understood brain is your primary machine of success and you kind of need to figure out how yours works. By the way, guys, different brains if you didn't think about that before work differently because of different neurotransmitters, different ways your nervous system is wired, different ways your brain centers operate and communicate to each other. It's a combination of environment and biology and your DNA and so the way my brain works is not going to be the same as your brain works and many other brain work, how other brain work and many other brain work how other brain work, and they call it neurodiversity.
Speaker 1So if somebody tells you you need to do this or learn this or I don't know, resolve or solve this problem in this specific way and it doesn't work for you, like a lot of clients I work with, for example, when I ask them to read something they're like is there. You know, the smarter ones say Angela, I'm not a reader, can I listen to that? And then if I recommend a book, I give them a link to audio book article. If there is a way to make this article audio, then I'm going to give that to them. But realize that people who succeed in life with their specific brain figure out how to operate it effectively. Seed in life with their specific brain, figure out how to operate it effectively.
Speaker 1So what they want to get done, they get done in their specific way, like when I was in university studying computer science, there was one teacher she was a computer programming teacher and she would give you a task but then you needed to solve it in the way she thought through it. And that just drove me nuts because I'm like well, there is another way to do that, and it's not even about better or worse, it's like it's another way. And my brain came up with this solution and she wouldn't explain. She couldn't explain how her solution was better. That would drive me nuts. She would just say, well, that's how I needed this to get done. And that was like the worst thing you could tell to a person who's creative and actually very motivated to solve stuff and solve it in the best, most effective way possible. When you tell them this is the way it's done, because I said so. And, by the way, if you communicate like that to your teenage kids, that drives them nuts as well. So try to be more of like well, you know, this is what I came up with. This is my reasoning, this is how I came up to that.
Speaker 1What do you think about that? It's always a collaboration. Give the autonomy to people and kids. But anyhow, back to focus and attention. So push, pull the concept that I got from the book Elite. So you want your attention to be driven by push that comes from you, not by pull that comes from the world. And the stuff, the pulls that come from the world, the need for or the request for your attention, that's what pull is. You need to learn how to stop yourself and ask yourself is this really moving my agenda forward? Now, before you can answer that, you need to actually know what's your agenda Like. What are you trying to do here? And that is another problem.
Speaker 1A lot of people don't set this intention. Before they decide to work on a project or do some deep work, they don't explicitly, they don't very clearly say to themselves this is what I'm trying to do, and this is why the reason why it's important to do so, because with all the information that you're going to be bombarded with, or different pulls for attention from other people and environment in any way, like hey, I'm sitting in front of a window and it's South Africa and there are some guinea fowls jumping from time to time and I could be distracted by so many things, just to give you an idea. But I know what I'm doing and why I'm doing that, and that animal kingdom isn't really related to that. So for my brain, it's very easy to tune out this information or this new data like, oh, there is a cat walking behind my window, in front of me, right. My brain knows this is not relevant to what we are trying to do here, so disregard.
Speaker 1There is even a system, reticular activating system, that helps your brain to do that. When you clearly state your agenda, your purpose, your, why, your brain activates this filtration system which filters out the irrelevant. But again, before your brain can do that, you need to actually state it to yourself. I even recommend to my client, who struggled with that a lot, to, before each focus session, before each deep work session, write it down what you're trying to achieve and why it's important. Why is also crucial? Because this is the promise of reward.
Speaker 1Your brain is driven by the promise of like. What's in it for me? What am I going to get from this? Yes, you're trying to finish this presentation, but why? What is it for us? For money, status, accountability? You promised it to someone and you need to maintain good relationships. It might advance your job or it might give you opportunities. If that's for a public speaking event. What are you getting from this. Your brain has to understand it very clearly, otherwise all the pools will be equally attractive. It's like, well, but there is this new thing.
Speaker 1And speaking of new thing, novelty is another way to master, to control your attention. But you need to learn how to use it in your favor, for your agenda. So, for example, if there is something new in your environment, like I don't know, maybe a notification came through which shouldn't be on in the first place when you're trying to do deep work. But when some new information came in you, again you need to evaluate if that's a pull. Is it relevant, is it not? But then you can use novelty for your agenda and manufacture it on demand.
Speaker 1So you're going through some material that you need to learn, for your career perhaps, and it kind of starts getting boring. You ask yourself what's new here? Maybe what can I Google on that subject that I'd like to know of? That can be new, like what's in the news. Let me see what's the latest, what's the updates. Your brain loves novelty because it's new information, potential opportunities or potential dangers.
Speaker 1So if you are going through some again boring material or something that is not really exciting, you try to find something novel or manufactured, like the question what's new about that? Let me look it up. Let me ask chat GPT, and you might say well, it's going to make me go down the rabbit hole when, in that case, you need to set some filters in advance. Let me just answer this question and then I'm going to get back to what I'm doing. You got to be very specific and clear, setting a lot of boundaries in this. A lot of information and attention deficit, error, so novelty. But then from novelty, another very useful tool, or related tool to that, to push your attention and to spark your attention in the right direction.
Speaker 1If you're again going through some material, ask more questions, ask questions that promote curiosity and learning. What else? What is interesting about that? What do I want to know about that? Like, for example, the book Lit. When a friend recommended it to me and, by the way, it's so great to have friends who recommend you the books that you absolutely love reading, so Lit. When I first saw this book I'm like, oh interesting. What's the? You know abbreviation stands for Okay, life Ignition Tools. That sounds interesting. What's the abbreviation stands for Okay, life Ignition Tools. That sounds interesting. What's the subtitle? You know, in a book, subtitle is very important. Use Nature's Playbook to energize your brain, spark ideas and ignite action. That sounded like right up my alley, something that I can use, something that I can share with my clients, something that I can use in my talks. And then I usually download a free sample on a Kindle and I'm like let me read a little bit more. So you have this curiosity.
Speaker 1I try to read two, three books a day on things that feel related to my field of expertise, and so that was a great way for me to spark curiosity, to spark the craving for more reading, which was aligned with my agenda, to learn a lot more and to just know a lot about the subject that I'm so passionate about helping people to change, to unlock more of their potential so together we can create more positive impact. Right, see how it goes. Oh, something new. Oh, is it aligned with my agenda? You know, that was the pull from a friend. You know, have you read this book? No, that was the pull. And then I checked it with myself. Is it aligned? Yes, so no, I'm curious about that. What's about? What does it mean? What the author is going to be talking about? Right? So you get this novelty and curiosity. It's like pop, pop, pop, pop pop.
Speaker 1But the key here, folks, where a lot of very curious entrepreneurial people struggle with very creative people is that you don't check with your agenda. Is it moving you forward anywhere or is it just another rabbit hole that steals your time, energy and other resources from the important project that you're actually trying to finish? That check a lot of people just don't do with themselves right? So what did we learn so far? Push versus pull. Push you set the agenda for where your attention goes. Pull something in the environment, from notifications to websites to just your mind wondering your mind, like oh, I wonder what Lisa thinks about that. Oh, I wonder what Jack is doing at this moment. You see, like, are they relevant? What I usually do.
Speaker 1I also give this hack to my clients have a notepad, have a note app open and whenever this idea not really relevant and you don't really want to think about pops up and you don't know if you get it, just write it down and get back to what you were doing. So push versus pull, right. Push your agenda, pull, question it. Is it aligned with my agenda? If you need to think about it later, just put a note, write down a note and get back to what you were doing and then you can spark focus and this powerful molecule, dopamine, that puts you into the state of deep focus, flow, state this. You know it's like intensity. I want to get it done, I want to dig deeper into this and want to make something of it. So you want to optimize dopamine and you can do it not just by stuff like caffeine or taking some nootropics. You actually can spark it by manufacturing novelty, curiosity, asking questions and then also stating why it's important. Because why is reward? Your dopamine is seeking for rewards. It's a molecule to get you moving towards reward. So when you state why it's important and you tell your brain this is what we are getting from this even if it's in 10 years, by the way, guys your brain will comply and get back to work to get this done. So you could get that reward Curiosity, novelty, questions, purpose.
Speaker 1And then one tool that I mentioned here using notebook. I usually like to use paper notebooks because they don't have additional notifications. I don't have to open anything up. It's still easier than to figure out the next tool and use technology to put a note down. I have those very tiny notepads which are flip through right and then I just throw it away. I use it specifically for this purpose as I'm going through some work. I'm going to write down all the thoughts, all the wandering thoughts in my head, and then at the end of this work bout that is usually intense it's kind of like a reward oh, let me go through all of this rabbit holes for and I set the limit as well. So it's 10 minutes, it's 15 minutes and done, so I don't end up spending then on this list, you know, another hour or so that could be distributed to deep work that moves the important stones forward.
Speaker 1You see, there is always a better system of managing this most important tool of achievement your brain. And remember we talked about how your brain is different from any other brain. So your job is to figure out and that's why also a lot of my clients get from our sessions they finally figure out how their brain works and how to use it more effectively. The brain is the most sophisticated machine in the entire universe, but unfortunately it came with no user manual and it was not personalized for your brain. So you kind of have to figure it out and having someone to reflect back to you to tell you okay, this is the pattern that you do, so let's break it down, let's see how it works. Let's see why it works, let's see if it serves you and if it doesn't, let's figure out with your brain how it works. So we change it. Okay, so we talked about notebook and put there your wandering thoughts to then go through them so they don't disrupt your deep work. To then go through them so they don't disrupt your deep work.
Speaker 1Then, before even starting that deep work on the question of notebooks, notepads and writing things down, before you even start this deep work of focused time, I always recommend my clients to close all the loops, open loops. Look it up, google it in psychology and many other disciplines that have to do with mind management, so to speak. Open loop is something that you're thinking of, but you haven't made any decisions, so it's kind of like looping. Should I buy a ticket to this concert? What should I eat for lunch? For dinner, I need to talk to Mary and I don't know yet how or where. All of these things that you got to do that you need to think of, that you need to make decision of, or also I need to make cat food later in the day. I need to not forget that those are looping in your working memory, in the actual memory in your brain, the memory, the kind of memory that is kind of like operating memory in your computer and when you load it up with all the applications in this case open loops and thoughts in which you're not made decisions about it works worse, worse and worse.
Speaker 1Having less, less and less capacity for you to make decisions, to think creatively, to figure out solutions, you need to free it up to make complex thinking and decision-making, especially if you work in strategy envisioning or you are about to jump into some brainstorming to figure out a strategy for the next decade. You need your working memory free, empty, and the way you do it. What also helps, you don't actually have to, and that's what research shows. You don't have to make a decision about every single thing looping through your head, but you gotta dump it out Again on a piece of paper. Dump it all out so your brain feels empty. It is a very effective strategy to reduce overwhelm and to have more of your working memory available for you to make complex decisions and to think through complex, very often systematic, system-like questions and strategies and decisions. So dump it all out before all of that.
Speaker 1Literally write down every single thing that you need to remember, make a decision about, and figure out and what I also like doing, the things that are time-bound. I just put it on my calendar, not like a blog, but somewhere at 6 am, in yellow color, so distinct, I put okay, I need to think about getting consultation with a tax person, and I would just put it there. So on that day I see it and that's when I'm going to do it and that's how you keep your head empty so you could work on complex things. Again, all based on research of how your brain works, and that aspect doesn't really differ for people. Some people have more working. It seems like some people have better working memory in terms of how many things you can keep in it. Some people have it worse working memory in terms of how many things you can keep in it. Some people have it worse. Presumably, you can train your capacity to operate many different variables in your brain, but the main point here close the loops so your head is ready to work on things that matter.
Speaker 1The next one also make sure that nobody is expecting you to do anything, so you're not like in that agitated state, or this person might call me, or this person can message me. I need to be waiting for this email, that one, what you want to try to do again to remove that agitation and to be able to dive deeper into focus and flow state where you can be the most effective you to get things done and get results, instead of then having too long hours. In order for you to dive into deep focus, you need to take all this pressure and anxiety and thinking out of your brain. Your brain literally needs to be like free as a bird to just dive deep into the ocean of focus and flow so you can connect as many dots and experiences and memories and data points as possible. And so the next thing that you want to make sure of is that you're not waiting for anything.
Speaker 1What I like to do, I communicate with people. Okay, what time am I going to call? What time should I be expecting your call? What time should we exchange messages? What time should I expect your email? Now, it doesn't have to be precise on their site, but I make sure that I make them aware that before that time, I'm not going to be responsive, and that's how you don't have to worry that somebody is waiting for you, looking for you or you know things that for us are not comfortable, like if you're making someone wait for you or something is on hold because of you. We don't like that and it's also probably not that nice to other people. So what is nice to other people and to your attention is focus is to communicate very clearly when are you gonna be available to deal with that thing? A call, a message, an email or whatever that is, which again will allow you to not keep anything in your head and not be in that agitated open loop state and instead you can dive deeper and give all of the resources and focus into the subject matter and be a lot more effective than you would be otherwise. One other hack here to jumpstart using machine or using car analogy to jumpstart your engine of focus.
Speaker 1A lot of my clients, especially more on the ADHD spectrum, have troubles and they call it procrastination or delays or just they say, oh, I'm struggling to get started on more complex tasks, like I always find excuse to do something easy and what we do is all of them, and that again has to do with dopamine optimization and igniting that. What has to do with dopamine optimization and igniting that. What's the car analogy? I'm not a car person, but use it sometimes. To ignite that engine you need the spark, and the spark can be as easy as getting some small thing done. It's also been written by Gregory McKeown, the author of Essentialism and Effortless.
Speaker 1So do something small to boost that dopamine production, which then will help you to dive deeper into focus. But if it's related to what you do otherwise, again this rabbit hole not related, might not exactly work. But for some of my clients, even making, doing dishes works. It's like let me jumpstart this dopamine production by getting something done and getting this reward. Dopamine is actually very simple once you understand how well, at least what's known in the literature right now and analyzing human behavior. But anyhow, dopamine doesn't seem to be that complicated once you understand. Oh, it's driven by rewards, by progress, by stuff done by purpose, because it's also a promise of reward. So starting doing something small will give you the spark to that engine of focus to start like and we're ready to go right.
Speaker 1So start something small, what I usually do if I need to work on this presentation and it's heavy I need to just come up with this raw material for the talk. So that's usually where a lot of people stumble. Just this is the beginning of seemingly complex and big stuff. So I do something small. Sometimes it's like, let me answer two of this simple email to get it done, get it going and feel like I've accomplished something and get this boost of dopamine. Another thing I might do I'm like, okay, I don't really know what the whole talk is going to be about, but I want to talk about this and this and that and this and I don't know in what order, but I'm just going to dump all the ideas on paper order. But I'm just going to dump all the ideas on paper freehand, the most frictionless way, and I get myself excited. Or I want to do this, I want to make people moving. I want to speak about this book that I've read and I want to give this fascinating piece of research and I'm just dumping ideas and doing that.
Speaker 1You're already doing that. You're already doing the first step and that gives your dopamine, your focus, that spark that they need to get you into the deep state of focus. You don't always have to come up with a title and a step-by-step plan for the whole one-hour presentation. That's actually probably where a lot of people stumble, and your brain doesn't usually work that way Structuring, after. That's why writers don't edit first. They have drafts many of them and then they give it to editors or edit themselves first and turn on their analytical brain, which works differently than your super creative brain, and that's how you get those things done.
Speaker 1But the idea here is start small, do something to get the dopamine flowing, the one that is needed to put you into a deep state of focus and attention. So what we talked about in this side of our conversation learning how your brain operates and how to seize the power of your focus and attention so you can reinvest it into things that are important to you, versus sprinkling it all over the place at the end of the week, month and year, ending up broke and thinking where did all my time go and how did I end up here? Right? So we talked about closing the loops here. Right? So we talked about closing the loops, dumping all the stuff that you got to remember onto some piece of paper that you then allocate time to go through. Also, communicating with all the people who might be waiting for stuff from you when you're going to communicate when you're going to make this call, when you're going to make this email, when you're going to text them, make this call, when are you going to make this email, when are you going to text them. So all of that decided in advance.
Speaker 1So you free up your brain for working on stuff which is important and then start small. You don't have to pick up the biggest brick of work In fact, that actually going to make you procrastinate and stumble. Instead, get the spark, get your dopamine flowing a little bit, get the sprinkle which then opens up a whole fountain or spring in waterfall of dopamine and attention. And again, for some clients, sometimes it's like, well, I'm going to do a couple of dishes or make my bed. That's why they say make your bed in the morning. It actually jump starts your getting it done, muscle and your dopamine production.
Speaker 1Now that we've covered all of these tools and tricks and tips that you can use, that you can put into a very nice system to push your attention where it needs to go and get your objectives done, versus being pulled by all the sources of information and people and all kinds of distractions which end up spreading your attention, your energy, your focus, your time too thin and you end up getting done nothing. So push versus pull right, push is your agenda, pull question it. Now a little bit on the supporting lifestyle to help with proper neurotransmitter production, or those neural messenger molecules like dopamine which keep you focused, to help you with that. But then also blood sugar regulation, oxygenation of your brain, which are crucially important for your focus. It's like if you don't have fuel in your car, I don't care what kind of mechanic, magical mechanic you are, the car is not going anywhere. So the lifestyle brain-supporting lifestyle is kind of very similar. If you don't do that, don't try to fix all of the other stuff that we talked about. For what is it? 20 minutes, close to 30. You gotta get the fuel going right first. So what are some foundational aspects of lifestyle which you need to pay attention to if you want to maximize the superpower of your brain?
Speaker 1Number one sleep. Folks, if you don't sleep well, no wonder you can't focus. Dopamine production is very sensitive, for example, for your sleep duration and quality After a bad night of sleep. That's why you can't think straight. You might have brain fog, hard to focus. This is a normal situation. So you need to sleep, not to try to get super strong nootropics.
Speaker 1The second one exercise you got to be moving as often as possible, because movement delivers more blood, more oxygen, more nutrients to your brain that make high function, like deep focus, possible. So you got to get moving. What I recommend to my clients is, every 30 minutes or 40 minutes, do a few squats, like stand up from your chair. If you've been sitting on that chair, do stretches, do 10 squats. They call it in science, exercise snacks, and exercise snacks seem to be as effective as working out by promoting health outcomes.
Speaker 1But the most important part, it just delivers oxygen and blood to all of the organs and more specifically to your brain, which sits above your heart, which makes it harder to deliver oxygen and nutrients too. It's kind of like if you live like I do in South Africa, like good luck getting stuff from Amazon, it's going to take forever and it's going to be crazy. And so the same happens when your heart tries to deliver stuff to your brain. It's above your heart, your heart has to work super hard to deliver anything there, and your brain is a thirsty, hungry organ that consumes more than 20% of your energy a lot of oxygen, a lot of glucose. It's really resource-dependent and resource-intense, so keep moving. If you want your brain to do its best job, so sleep. If you want your brain to do its best job, so sleep.
Speaker 1Movement, then a couple of other things that helps to train this circuitry necessary for attention and focus, not just your dopamine, but also the neurons, the neural circuits themselves. The neurons, the neural circuits themselves, like training them to switch between different areas of your focus, to switch your attention when you want to switch it, and to also to keep it where it is when you need to, when you need to get some deep work done. So if you exercise this, if you training system, meditation, meditation you know, I always explain to my clients it's not some woo-woo thing that you do for enlightenment. It actually trains your brain to pay attention, to stay focused, which is needed for basically anything that you do. That's what meditation does. It's training your focus muscle and I like to recommend to my clients to combine meditation with breathing.
Speaker 1You might consider breathing practice also, some sort of meditation practice, because meditation basically means paying attention to the subject of your choice and that can be your breathing, just paying attention to breathing in and breathing out. Close your eyes and do that, for, yeah, I don't know. Start with three minutes. Start small, be consistent and then build it up. Don't go for like 20-minute meditation every day, even though I've never meditated in my entire life and never thought I'll be able to, and I'm struggling to even focus for one minute, but now I want to do 20 minutes. No, you don't leave the heaviest waist in the gym First. You start with small weights. You don't run a marathon on day one. You build it up, sometimes 100 meters at a time. So, the same as meditation, start small and it is a training for your focus.
Speaker 1More advanced meditators are amazing at being present and paying attention because they train for it. They do meditation for hours, sometimes, right. They train for it. They do meditation for hours sometimes, right. Those are like comparing to elite 100K plus runners. That's who those meditators in Tibet are. So train your focus with meditation, with breathwork, by the way, specific kind of breathing, more exhale-focused breathing actually changes the way your brain operates and consumes fuels, which also helps a lot with your attention and your focus. Plus, it helps you to regulate blood sugar, which is also very important for your prolonged focus and attention.
Speaker 1Blood sugar, getting us to the food aspect. If your diet is full of processed stuff and it increases inflammation but also makes your blood sugar go up and down. We're talking about stuff made from white flour. We are talking about sugary drinks. We are talking not drinking your fruit juices with no fiber. All of that stuff will make your blood sugar spike up and down and with that your focus and attention will follow the same trajectory up and down, up and down, up and down. So a lot of people struggle with focus and attention because the diet is shit Sorry for my French. And so when you change your lifestyle and your nutrition in a brain-friendly way, a lot of them discover their brain isn't that bad after all and can pay their attention and do even a little bit of meditation. So all that to say, guys.
Speaker 1Again back to car analogy. I don't care what kind of magical mechanic you are, if your car doesn't have proper fuel, it's not going to go anywhere. The same with your brain. You might be looking into all kinds of different brain trainings and nootropics and all of that stuff. It might give you a little bit of tiny boost like the last drops of fuel, but it's going to be nowhere near what your brain is capable of when you actually deliver what it needs for optimal function, from sleep to movement, to fuel your actual brain-friendly nutrition. A lot of my clients who start eating more protein for breakfast, more fiber for breakfast, they're like oh you know, my mood stabilized and my focus doesn't wander all that much. Yeah, because that's how your brain is supposed to work when you give it what it needs to be getting so sleep, exercise, breathing and meditation and proper brain nutrition, which I can tell you more about if you schedule our session. Just reach out Angela at brainbreakthroughcoachcom.
Speaker 1All that being said, so today we talked about this central concept of push versus pull. Push your attention with your agenda and question a lot, all the pulls that you get from outside of your head and sometimes your own wandering thoughts. We talked about writing those wandering thoughts down and dumping everything, closing all the loops so your working memory, your brain capacity, can be dedicated to the stuff that's important. We talked about starting small to jumpstarting that engine of dopamine production and your focus with it. We talked about purpose and novelty and curiosity and questions to again get that dopamine flowing and inspire yourself to dive deeper into subject matter and things that need to get done. And we talked about lifestyle aspects that make this machine that we call brain function well and according to its specifications.
Speaker 1I hope that you found this podcast useful and very applicable to your life, and you're going to sit down after you finish listening to that or schedule it. At some point of the day you're going to re-listen it or question yourself or test yourself on the information which, by the way, is, according to Andrew Huberman from Stanford, the best way to learn and memorize information. So you're going to sit down and test yourself on this information and then ask yourself how am I going to put this into action so I actually get the rewards associated with the information that I just learned? Right? So hope again this podcast you found very useful. Please do share it with people who might benefit from it a lot, channeling their focus, attention and energy into things that matter so their life moves into the direction they desire. Same applies to you. Share at least with one other person. That's how we help more people to live better life. And until next time, guys, invest your attention wisely, because that's going to define the life you end up living. Talk to you soon. Have an awesome day.