Bridge for Parkinson's: Building Brain Health Through Card Play

Join Chris Kustanbauter on this special episode of the Live Parkinson's - Live an Exceptional Life podcast as he explores the surprising benefits of bridge for brain health. Chris interviews Brian from thebridgeteachers.com to delve into how this strategic card game can be a powerful tool for maintaining and even improving cognitive function, especially for those living with Parkinson's disease.

Discover how the engaging nature of bridge can positively impact various aspects of cognitive health. Brian shares his expertise in teaching bridge and provides compelling examples of the cognitive improvements he's witnessed in his students. This episode offers valuable insights for both individuals with Parkinson's and their caregivers.

Key Topics Covered:

• Introduction to Bridge: A simplified overview of how to play.
• Cognitive Benefits for Parkinson's: Improved communication, memory, organization & planning, strategic thinking, and social interaction.
• Brian's Teaching Experience: Real-world examples of cognitive benefits observed in bridge students.
• Personal Benefits of Bridge: Brian shares his own experience and the advantages he gains from playing.
• Caregiver Benefits: How caregivers can also benefit from learning and playing bridge.
• Getting Started: Resources and avenues for learning and playing bridge to support cognitive function.

Looking for ways to enhance your cognitive health or support someone living with Parkinson's? This episode offers a unique and engaging approach.

Call to Action:

• Subscribe to the free monthly Live Parkinson's newsletter for more valuable insights and resources: Visit liveparkinsons.com
• Support the podcast and website: Show your support at ko-fi.com/liveparkinsons

Hashtags:

#Parkinsons #ParkinsonsDisease #BrainHealth #CognitiveHealth #Bridge #CardGames #Memory #Caregivers #BrainTraining #LiveParkinsons #Podcast #HealthPodcast #SeniorHealth #Dementia #Alzheimers #CognitiveFunction #MentalWellness #TheBridgeTeachers

Contact Brian at the Bridgeteachers.com via his email at brian@thebridgeteachers.com

Chapters

• 0:02 Bridge for Parkinson's
• 14:12 Benefits of Bridge for Mental Health
• 20:57 Accessible and Budget-Friendly Bridge Benefits
• 27:13 Accessible Bridge Learning for Beginners
• 33:15 Overcoming Challenges
• 40:37 Exploring Bridge as a Stimulating Game

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Hello and welcome to Live Parkinson's Live an Exceptional Life the podcast dedicated to helping you live a great quality of life through strategies, stories and science. I'm your host, chris Kustenbader, and I've been living with Parkinson's for 15 years. Thanks for joining me today. Today we have a special guest, brian from thebridgeteacherscom, and we're going to talk a little bit about how Bridge for Parkinson's can help boost brain health through card play. One of the things that we always talk about on the podcast is that we need to make sure that we're maintaining or trying to improve our cognitive function through mental stimulation, whether it's card games, board games, crossword puzzles, sudoku, whatever it happens to be. I'm fortunate to have brian from thebridgeteacherscom today to talk a little bit about how bridge can help us with our cognitive function.

Speaker 2: 0:51

So welcome, brian oh, it's amazing to be here.

Speaker 1: 0:55

Thank you so much can you tell me a little bit about yourself and how you became interested in playing bridge or how you became a bridge player?

Speaker 2: 1:04

sure. Sure, I was working at a student union back when I was a very young man and this beautiful young lady came into my store. She lived in a dorm across the street and we became friends for about a year and then we'd known each other for a year and I asked her out on a date and she said sure, I'll go on a date with you as long as you learn to play bridge first. And she had parents who'd been playing social bridge, kitchen table bridge pretty much her entire life, but they never taught her the rules of the game. And then, right before she left for college, they taught her the rules of the game. And bridge is a partnership game and she didn't have a partner, so she needed someone to play with.

Speaker 2: 1:49

And I remember thinking, well, okay, how hard can that be? And I really wanted to go out on a date with this lady. So I said, okay, sure, I'll learn to play Bridge. And that's how I got started. And 33 years later that young lady is my wife. She's been my bridge partner the entire time. Probably the main part of thebridgeteacherscom she does all the video recordings of the lessons and things like that and I'm more behind the scenes type of infrastructure. But yeah, we still play Bridge to this day and we're married and happily together.

Speaker 1: 2:36

Nice Well, can you tell for listeners, myself included, unfamiliar with playing Bridge, can you briefly explain some of the basics of the game and why it's so engaging?

Speaker 2: 2:46

Sure. So Bridge is a two-part game and I think that's one thing that can be confusing to people. You have to break down into two parts. The first section is called the auction, where you and your partner are communicating and the opponents are communicating about what resources you have for the second part of the game. And the second part of the game is the play, and the play at its core is a trick taking game. So in other words, everybody plays a card, highest card wins. That's one trick. Turn it over, play a second round. Everyone plays a card, highest card wins. It's a standard deck. There's no jokers, there's no cards removed or added, so there's 52 cards. There's four people, everyone gets 13 cards, so there's 13 tricks. So Bridge is a two-stage game the auction and the play.

Speaker 1: 3:39

Okay, great. So how does Bridge challenge the brain to contribute to cognitive health? Since people, if they're interested in learning bridge as another option for you, know some mental stimulation, can you talk a little bit about how bridge might help them with that?

Speaker 2: 3:56

Absolutely. So I'm going to. I'm going to preface my comments or my my you know my experience with the statement I'm not a medical professional. I do not have any credentials in that area. I just have a lifetime of bridge and also research, reading other people's research on the topic. Bridge has been shown to decrease cognitive decline by up to 75%. That particular study, I believe, was from Harvard. There's also been a Scottish psychiatry group or psychology group that has done a lot of studies. There's been longitudinal studies that have shown that not only can it decrease the incidence of cognitive decline but it can also prevent, retard or mitigate ongoing cognitive decline. So that's the outside research that I'm aware of and that I've read and I've talked to people about.

Speaker 2: 4:56

In terms of my own personal experience, both teaching and playing Bridge is challenging on several different areas. So the first is language. Bridge requires you to speak with your partner in a very specific, very information-dense language. In Bridge you only have 38 calls or bids to make and there's 55 trillion possible hands that you're trying to describe. So the information language that you're speaking has to be incredibly dense and rich. Also, bridge in our daily life. There's not a lot of consequences to misspeaking. If I go into the grocery store and say, you know, I'd like a pound of beef, and I meant I only need a half pound of beef, there's not a consequence to that misspeak, whereas in bridge, if you misspeak when you're communicating with your partner, you end up having a disaster. There's an immediate negative enforcement, just as there's a positive reinforcement. When you have a good conversation with your partner, there's a positive reinforcement. When you have a good conversation with your partner, there is a positive reinforcement. So it drives specificity of language in a way that normal life doesn't. So that's the first skill is language, and I think that's really important because it's been shown in all parts of life, from you know, childhood development to later in life, that having language be an active part of your life is good for mental health and cognitive health.

Speaker 2: 6:40

The play playing a hand of bridge or defending a hand of bridge if you're the opponents is about solving puzzles. It's about solving a series of puzzles and they can be arranged in different timing sections. So, in other words, you might see the same puzzle you saw before, but now you have to figure out where in the hand, at what time you're going to do it. So that's another skill, and then this is both a meta skill outside of the game and within the game. There's also the fact that you have to be constantly thinking about your partner. You also have to think about the opponents a little bit.

Speaker 2: 7:40

I think especially at beginning and intermediate levels that's a little bit less prevalent than, say, at the expert levels, but you need to be thinking about your partner. You need say I say I'm going to wash the dishes and I don't. Okay, my wife's irritated. She should be. I made a commitment I didn't follow through. There's no real consequence. There should be, but there probably isn't. Anticipate your partner's problems and solve them and listen to them again. There's an immediate negative consequence or an immediate positive consequence. So learning, solving puzzles and social interaction are baked into bridge and you can't succeed without developing those and utilizing those. And so those are three aspects of you know, using your brain, that are extremely heightened when you play the game of bridge.

Speaker 1: 8:33

Oh, that's great, Because one of the questions I was going to follow up with was one of the things that a lot of people with Parkinson's have issue or troubles with is executive function, where they can maybe only remember one or two things at a time, or planning and organizing, and also memory. I know I get frustrated with my memory and so I'm assuming bridge can help address some of those, because I'm sure that the memory's involved, there's some strategy involved, but I'm sure there's a lot of organization and planning as you're playing the game. Some of the things that can help benefit people with Parkinson's.

Speaker 2: 9:09

Yes, absolutely. I think, to start with memory, bridge is, at its core, a memory exercise. When I first started playing, I could barely remember what was played on the previous trick, what was played on the previous trick. And then, as again, if you don't, if you don't remember something, if I forget to buy tortilla chips at the grocery store, you'll notice. All of my analogies are me not showing up for my wife properly. I try, I try, I try to be a good husband, but sometimes I forget the tortilla chips at the grocery store. There's again, there's a minor consequence. There's like oh, shoot, shoot, she's very kind and patient, so she's not going to yell at me. Bridge will crush you. If you don't remember something, bridge is going to just give you a smack.

Speaker 2: 9:59

Played, or remembering the language of the system meant that I, you know. My lack of that meant that we were not as successful as we eventually became Now, if you like. For instance, I played bridge with a student on an online tournament a couple of days ago. If you asked me about those hands, I could tell you every bid and every card played in order over 18 hands, and that seems like a party trick, but it's really not. It's just a simple fact of.

Speaker 2: 10:34

For the last 30 years I've been working very, very hard on my memory and when I was a kid and I don't know what it was like for you, but when I was a kid I was always told you get a certain amount of brain cells. When your brain stops growing, they start dying off and eventually you end up with a dead brain and you're dead. It was an extremely depressing outlook. Thanks childhood teachers. But they've shown that's actually not true at all. They've shown that's actually not true at all. Probably the most famous example of this for me is the London cab driver test, which is called the knowledge is extremely complicated. I think it takes like two or three years for a typical cab driver to study it and pass it, and they studied their brains. And London cab drivers have a larger hippocampus which is, you know, my memory is by mass, by mass. They're not. They're not measuring it by, like a test or, like you know, turnover flashcards. They're literally just measuring the amount of brain matter that London cab drivers have in that area and they grew it. So, just like you want bigger biceps, you go to the gym and you do bicep curls. If you want a stronger memory. You work on your memory and what I love about Bridge is Bridge will sneak in skill development on you, like you're playing a game, you're having fun, you're either throwing cards or you're clicking buttons on the screen and you don't know that you're working out your brain.

Speaker 2: 12:08

I turned around, I was 20 when Samantha and I met and I turned around I was 40. And all of a sudden, I had this crazy memory that I didn't set out to have an insane memory, I just needed it to be good at a game that I loved. So, yeah, so memory focus that's one thing that we really focus on with students is stripping things down for them. I think that, regardless of your age or your circumstances, I think when we try to take on more than is appropriate for the moment, take on more than is appropriate for the moment, I think we're going to fail.

Speaker 2: 12:52

So, for me, I'm always seeking ways to tell my students okay, here's the two things I want you to think about, two. Right, and getting in the habit of I'm not going to think about six things, I'm going to think about two things allows us to develop that focus on those two things. So, yeah, so, memory and focus. Bridge requires it, but it's fun. So you know it's not the same, as you know, sitting down and trying to memorize the phone book or something.

Speaker 1: 13:18

Well, I mean that's a good point, that to focus on just one or two things, because I, you know, I've had Parkinson's for 15 years and I know that things that I used to be able to do I can't remember as many things. Like you know, just going to the grocery store my wife will say, aren't you going to make a list? No, I've got it and it's only. You know three to five things and I get up there and I can remember the first two and then I'm mean, that's a great point. And I did want to ask you you mentioned that you teach. You know you've been teaching bridge. Do you have any personal stories where you might've had somebody with, whether it's a disability or whether you've just seen them blossom in terms of their cognitive function from where they started?

Speaker 2: 14:01

Yeah, I would say over the course of my career teaching thousands of people that I've seen, I've always seen focus and memory improve. There's always a beneficial aspect to bridge. The most extreme example of this, which is unique, and I had a student who reached out I had a person reach out to me and say I would like you and Samantha to teach me and my wife to play bridge and I said okay, great, he wanted both of us to attend, which was fine. That's a bit unusual for us Usually-person lessons. Now we're 100% virtual, except for tournaments and things like that.

Speaker 2: 14:48

But we drove to their very nice home and his wife was not fully mentally present. She was resetting every one or two minutes. She would setting every one or two minutes. She would who are these people? Why are they here? He'd explain they're here to teach us bridge. She was unhappy about this and then, one or two minutes later, she'd ask the same question again. She would say who are these people?

Speaker 2: 15:25

And Samantha and I were teaching. We're doing our best. This is obviously a very challenging situation. Our approach to this is to teach no different than we would teach anyone else.

Speaker 2: 15:35

Repeated, we repeat the concept. If the student needs a concept repeated. We repeat the concept when the student is ready to move on, we move on. Right, the student sets the pace. And I think that's really important as a teacher is to always let the student set the pace. They might not think of it in those terms, but that's what should be happening.

Speaker 2: 15:59

So we reach about a half an hour into the lesson and we take a little break and he takes us aside and said I just want to let you know that my wife is actually a high level tournament bridge player and about six months ago she had a stroke, and a severe one, and basically her cognitive function was almost completely destroyed. And Samantha said oh okay, we understand Definitely something. I wish she would have warned me coming in. I could understand why he didn't. So we sat back down and probably about 15 or 20 minutes later, samantha and I put a hand on the table a lesson hand on the table and she picks it up and all of a sudden she was a completely different human being, just flashed into a different personality.

Speaker 2: 16:54

She said she had the auction very quickly and then the dummy came down and she laid her hands down, which is called a claim You're allowed to do this. And she said I'm going to do this, this and this. And I said, okay, great. And she says this hand's so easy, this is so boring. I'm like, okay, great.

Speaker 2: 17:15

And then she told us a story about a hand she played at a bridge tournament 20 years ago or 20 years previous, and Samantha and I were in shock. We didn't. I mean, we'd never experienced something like this before. We'd never seen something like this before. And about a minute later she went back to who are these people? Why are they here, not knowing how to play bridge?

Speaker 2: 17:38

He fired us very gently at the end of that lesson. He said he couldn't handle it emotionally that his wife of 50 years was not the person that she was and she couldn't do the things she used to do. And there have been studies that have shown that if you can somehow access parts of your brain that you've previously had, you can actually rebuild neural pathways. So unfortunately, I didn't get to see what would have happened if we kept coming. I definitely had plans for bringing extremely complicated hands out of high-level bridge books to throw at her when she was having these moments of connection. So that's the most extreme example I have and again, I'm not a medical professional, so I'm not saying this will work for you or anybody else, but I am saying that I've seen bridge help improve memory and focus in every student I've ever had, in myself, in my wife so, and you, and scientific studies back that up.

Speaker 1: 18:49

Well, that's great.

Speaker 1: 18:50

Now the other part of one of the things with Parkinson's is people can become socially isolated because with their motor symptoms they've got tremors or they're having difficulty walking and they're embarrassed to go out in public and then pretty soon they start dropping out of a lot of social activities that they're involved in.

Speaker 1: 19:08

It sounds like Bridge is an opportunity for people to get together with others, and maybe it's through one of the Parkinson's support groups, because a lot of people go to monthly Parkinson's support groups and maybe that's an opportunity for them to start, you know, having maybe forming some bridge teams there to really help to improve the social interaction among the support group members and especially caregivers as well, because caregivers are a lot of times, are burdened and stressed because they spend so much time taking care of the patient with Parkinson's that they don't have a lot of time for themselves, the patient with Parkinson's, that they don't have a lot of time for themselves. And maybe Bridge might be in as part of the support group and outlet for them to get together, have fun and benefit themselves at the same time. So that's just something I was thinking through as you were talking, and then have you seen in your experience where Bridge has helped create sense of communities in other areas.

Speaker 2: 20:06

Yeah, absolutely so. I want to address first of all how accessible bridge is. So there's two ways to play bridge in person, which I love. I would definitely say that, whether it's a bridge club or a community group or just four friends who get together and play bridge, you know there's the country clubs I've gone to teach lessons in, there's card rooms where people play bridge. Community centers frequently have some sort of bridge option available. So that's definitely a great way to experience bridge and get some social connection.

Speaker 2: 20:46

If you're facing challenges or maybe you just don't want to go out to a group, maybe you're more of a homebody and you want to cuddle with your dogs. Speaking for myself, there's a website called BridgeBasecom, b-a-s-e, so BridgeBasecom and it's completely free. I don't have an affiliate link and it's completely free. I don't have an affiliate link. So if you sign up, the only real way to spend money on there is by entering certified tournaments by the ACBL, and also I think they have some other sort of things that you can purchase, like lesson packs and things like that. But essentially it's free and you can create an account and you can sign up and you can play Bridge 24-7 for free. You can play with a partner. You know you can just have the computer, give you a random table, whatever. So Bridge is extremely accessible and it's also extremely budget-friendly.

Speaker 2: 21:47

I don't think there's anybody in this world right now who isn't trying to stretch their entertainment dollar, to stretch their time dollar. I know that when Samantha and I play for fun, we can play for three hours and have spent nothing except what it costs for our electricity and our internet and we're already paying that anyway, right. So that's great. It's a free way to spend some really enjoyable quality time For me. I get to spend it with my wife, which is amazing.

Speaker 2: 22:14

But I want to speak to the caregivers. If you're listening to this podcast and you're a caregiver or you're supporting someone with Parkinson's, I want to say that bridge is amazing in a lot of ways. So there's two different ways you can approach it. You can learn bridge and be the partner of your person that you're caring for, if that's something that you are interested in and enjoy for them to have quality time where your workload, your caregiver load, is extremely minimal. I took care of my grandmother. My grandmother was the strongest person I've ever known. She was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and so for the last six months of her life she lived with me and my family and we took care of her.

Speaker 2: 23:08

And as things got bad and my family and we took care of her and as things got bad, it was a hospice situation and all that Caregiver fatigue is really dangerous for the caregiver and any way that you can find to continue to give quality care in a way that is good for the caregiver I think is so critical because then it becomes sustainable. So if you have somebody who falls in love with Bridge, samantha and I were not good at Bridge for several years. We played with our friends and we were terrible and just bad at Bridge and then I actually fractured my leg on a national tour of Romeo and Juliet and I basically couldn't walk for six months and I had to, I had to. I basically couldn't walk for six months and Samantha had to take care of me. You know I could get around the house and stuff like that, but like couldn't work. Could you know, just basically go to rehab and sit at my computer and at that time there was the first, you know, bridge website that I was aware of and I could play bridge eight hours a day, eight to 10 hours a day, and, boy, it made a huge difference in my life and therefore it made a huge difference in her life, because that was eight to ten hours of my day where she didn't have to worry. You know, okay, well, he's just sitting around depressed or watching tv or getting sad or whatever.

Speaker 2: 24:26

So I'm not saying that you know someone, there's going to be a few people out there who try bridge. You're gonna going to like, oh yeah, I love this game. I play eight to 10 hours a day. I'm not saying that's going to happen for you, but I am saying, even if it's just an hour, even if it's just a half an hour, where someone is like having fun and enjoying themselves and you can have a cup of tea or, you know, catch up on your emails or whatever, bridge is amazing that way.

Speaker 2: 24:51

And if it's a community, if you're, if, if you know, if your community is building it, then then that that community becomes more robust in terms of activities. And now again, you know that you're, the person you're supporting is having an amazing time. I mean, if you play in a tournament, a session of bridge is like three hours, so that's time. I mean, if you play in a tournament, a session of bridge is like three hours, so that's, that's three hours where they're having an amazing quality of life and your workload is minimized. I love bridge for that reason, one of the many reasons I love bridge.

Speaker 1: 25:24

Oh, great, yeah, my neighbor Marlene. She's 85. They've been playing bridge with a group of four or five or I think there's maybe eight of them, but it's dwindled down over the years because a couple of them have passed away, but 50 years. So every Tuesday they either go next door to her house or they're at one of the other person's house and they spend three and four hours playing bridge and you know they make you know different snacks for each other, but they really enjoy it. So it's, it sounds like bridge is a great way to help support your emotional well-being as well and it can give whether it's the person with Parkinson's or whether it's the caregiver. It's kind of a win-win for both groups.

Speaker 2: 26:04

Absolutely yeah.

Speaker 1: 26:06

So can you tell us a little bit about how, if someone wanted to get started in playing bridge Because most people they might be listening and thinking, well, this sounds great, and so anything that they can do to improve their communication and project their speech, that's going to help as well. So it sounds like there's a lot of benefits. But then people may be sitting listening and saying, well, that's great, but I have no idea how to get started or where to get started, and is it a hard game? Is it something that's going to be really hard for me to learn and I'm just going to get frustrated and quit. So maybe you can speak a little bit to that.

Speaker 2: 26:59

Yeah, that that was the big problem when Samantha and I started to learn, you know, back in early 90s, was there was no internet to speak of. I didn't have an email account yet, I didn't have a cell phone yet. So, grab some bridge books from the library and they were like hieroglyphics to me because they were all designed for, you know, intermediate or advanced players. So I would say the steps are. To me, the steps are very, very clear, which is step one just learn the rules. Just learn the rules, so don't worry about being good, don Just learn the rules. So don't worry about being good, don't worry about a lot of people want to bridge into strategy pretty quickly. You can do that a little bit, but just focus on. Well, how do I actually play this game? Just mechanically, what do I do next? And according to the rules, okay, I make a bid. Okay, the auction is over. Okay, I knew the auction was over because I understand the rules. Okay, now how do we play the hand? Okay, great, that's done. And in order to do that, samantha has a. She actually has two videos. One is learn bridge in two minutes and two seconds, I think, or 22 seconds, and the other one is learn bridge in 10 minutes. It's just her going over the rules. Okay, once you do that, you're going to want a base some. Learn some basic language. It's just like learning French or you know, or Swahili. You're going to want to learn some basic words so you can have some simple sentences with you and your partner, and then you're going to want to learn some basic play techniques. Now, there's lots of ways to do that.

Speaker 2: 28:29

I would say for the for bridge, for bridge, for the bidding um, you can get samantha's book. It's available on amazon. You can come to our website, uh, which you know we have over. I think we have over 400 hours of videos now. So from everything from I've never played before to getting into more intermediate topics. We have a YouTube channel. There's plenty of other YouTube channel people out there.

Speaker 2: 28:56

You could check with your local bridge club and see if they have free lessons. There's lots of bridge teachers out there. So I would say that when you get started, give yourself some sort of resource. That's not just I'm just going to figure this out, I'm just going to stare down the barrel of bridge and figure it out on my own Right. Learn the mechanics so you know how the rules work. Focus on that until you understand it. And then very simple bidding system and learn a couple of things about the play. Once you have all that in place, you'll be on your way. You'll have the foundation laid and you can start building and building, and building. You can take it as far as you want and that's how we structure. Our lessons is we. You know, samantha is all about. Our specialty for the last 25 years has been people who've never touched a deck of cards before, like that's who we want to talk to.

Speaker 1: 29:48

Yeah, and I think that's probably most of this audience that they're. They're just, they just want to do it. They want to do it for fun, they want to do it to help help with their cognitive function and social interaction. They don't want to be, you know, experts going to global tournaments and and things like that.

Speaker 2: 30:01

Yeah. So people always ask me well, what, what do I need to know to to play bridge? If you know, they say good or they make some sort of result-based comment To me if you know six topics in the bidding, so if you know six topics of language, you're going to be able to deal with 95% of the hands that come up. And if you know six techniques in the play play of the hand you're going to be able to handle hands for the most part. So it's not like you have to learn. You know, samantha and I's system notes are something like 300 pages. You don't have to know that, right?

Speaker 2: 30:39

There's a reason why Samantha's books on bidding there's two books on bidding and they cover those six topics, right? So it's not you have to learn. So it's not. It's not you have to learn the encyclopedia. It is that you, I think. If you do it, I think, if you structure it correctly, right, you just focus on how do I play this game and what is some, what is a simple way to bid and what's a simple way to play, then then the game is available to you, right? You don't, you don't need more than that.

Speaker 1: 31:10

Well, it's really like with any game. I mean, if you think about it, one of the first things you do when you get a new game is you open the box and you, okay, how do I play? And you have to look at the rules and you've explained to everybody so they understand. And so what I'm hearing you say is that just understand what the rules are and then get together with a couple people and then practice. It's worth anything. You know, because when I turned 54, after I had Parkinson's, I said I'd really like to learn how to play guitar, and you know I have to break it down into small steps, but it's.

Speaker 1: 31:43

But you also have to be consistent with it. You know consistency, persistence, and you know, and I'm I'm hearing the same thing with bridge. I mean, if you want to have fun and at least understand and get good at it, you have to do it on a, you know, a fairly consistent basis. You can't do it once and then you know, nine months from now, because you're not going to remember, but maybe that comes, maybe people get into doing a weekly bridge. You know bridge club with their friends. Absolutely, you know.

Speaker 2: 32:09

Bridge Club with their friends. So Absolutely, I mean, even if you just watch a video once a month, you know five minute video or 10 minute video in the morning, you know. Just keep your brain in that modality. By the way, there's something I forgot to mention about the accessibility of Bridge, because after we talked in preparation for this lovely conversation we're having, I thought a lot about the physical aspects of physical challenges of people who are working with those disabilities. How can I make bridge accessible to them?

Speaker 2: 32:36

I actually filmed a video we're going to upload it to YouTube on how to play bridge using nothing but your voice. So if you can't use a mouse, if you can't use a keyboard, you can literally just use in. On the Mac it's called voice control and on the PC, which I don't have, I believe it's called voice activation. But you can literally call out these numbers and it'll do the same as mouse clicks. So if you think I can't play Bridge because I can't really use a mouse, that well, stop by our YouTube channel. Look for my face talking about how to play bridge with just your voice.

Speaker 1: 33:15

We can put a link in the podcast description.

Speaker 2: 33:19

Great. As soon as I have a link for it, I'll send it to you. Yeah, absolutely Great.

Speaker 1: 33:23

But yeah, I know that's one of the things that we talked about, because with Parkinson's, a lot of times, whether it's cell phones or a mouse, when you have tremors, it's hard to control the mouse or even sometimes hold cards. So maybe people they don't want to go out because of the tremors. So is there a way for them? If they can't because of physical limitations, is there a way that they could do bridge online and or maybe just do it online every day, just so that they can continue to work on their cognitive function? Is there a?

Speaker 2: 33:56

Yeah, so bridgebasecom for online. I recommend that 100%. There's other sites out there, but Bridgebase is the best it long period of time and they would make card holders. When I first started playing in LA, there was a gentleman who was severely just dealing with a lot of physical challenges. He couldn't even really hold his cards at all, so he had a box with the sides so no one could see it and literally all of his cards would be sort of face up in a pile and then he would be able to pick one out and put it on the table.

Speaker 2: 34:45

If you can't pull out the bidding cards, because there's specific cards for bidding, you can vocalize your bids. So Bridge is extremely accessible, regardless of your challenges. And, by the way, I would love to make an offer to anyone listening to this podcast, which is if you have a specific challenge and you think you can't learn bridge because of that challenge, please email me or Samantha we're very easy Brian at the bridge teachers dot com, or Samantha at the bridge teachers dot com and let us, let us know. Hey, I can't play bridges and this is why I I want the challenge of being able to help you play bridge, regardless of your situation, regardless of of what you're facing. I've had people tell me they're too stupid to learn to play bridge, to which my point is if you think I'm smart, you have not met me my, my wife is the smart one.

Speaker 2: 35:40

You're not too stupid to play bridge, it's just. You just need someone to guide you and we would love to help. So that's not something we charge for. You shoot me an email and I will be like, hey, how do we solve this for you so you can enjoy this game that I love?

Speaker 1: 35:57

Yeah, that's great, because you know I think it's with anything A lot of times we would run into a challenge and we think, oh, I can't overcome this challenge. But there's always ways, if you. You know, instead of looking at it as this, let's say it's a, there's a big rock in my path. Well, okay, how can I chip away at that rock to get to where I need to go? Or how can I get over? So there's always a way. And get back to my example with learning to play guitar. I know, when I first started learning some of the open chords and trying to learn the C chord, I had to really stretch my fingers and I don't have the best dexterity, and a lot of people say, well, I can't play guitar because my hands are too small. But what I learned is it's I call it the three Ps, it's perseverance, patience, and I just blanked out on the other one Patience, perseverance.

Speaker 1: 36:46

I'll think of it then, but as long as you, you know, continue to at least chip away and work at it, then break it down into the smallest steps possible and then continue to add on. So once you've mastered that the initial thing that you've broken it down into then add a piece on, add a piece on. So like if I'm learning a new song, I start with one measure and then, once I get the measure down, then I add another measure and then pretty soon you're building on that and the next thing you know it's like wow, I can play the song. And then it gives you a sense of satisfaction If I just grab a piece of sheet music and I look at it and I say to myself there is no way I'm going to be able to play this.

Speaker 1: 37:24

But then when you break it down or you hear a guitar solo and you think, well, I'm never going to be able to do that. And then next thing you know, if you break it down measure by measure, and next thing you know it's like wow, I can play ACDC's Shook Me All night long solo. So I think that's important to your point about people saying I'm not smart enough, or you know, because we can always come up with an excuse as to why we can't do something. But I think if we're willing to commit to it, then you know we can do it.

Speaker 2: 37:53

Absolutely, absolutely. This is, you know, I haven't just taught bridge, I've studied. I haven't just taught bridge of studied, you know, skill acquisition I'm obsessed with like, how do we learn? Why do we learn some things more successfully than others? And you know, one thing that I'm really big on is not being result based. Right, if you put in five minutes on bridge or five minutes on guitar, you were successful. Right, because you put in, you put in effort. If you and I think that when you can get away from this idea of well, how well did I do in those five minutes, and you can just be like I did the thing, I mean my family, we say I did the thing Right, exactly, and that just means we, we showed up and we put in the work you know, I think, when you, when you keep doing that over and over, you show up, you put in the work, yeah, because they say it's going, yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 1: 38:53

Oh, that, with anything, it's if you, even if you do it for 10 minutes, that's better 10 minutes every day, 10 to 15 minutes, versus doing it for 30 minutes once a week. And so, as you mentioned, it's just showing up and that's how you're going to learn and make progress.

Speaker 2: 39:08

Absolutely. There's an amazing book called Atomic Habits which I absolutely am obsessed with. I have given away probably 20 copies of it to people, and this is exactly what it talks about is, when you do something, even if you do it for five minutes, you're building the habit of doing it and then it just becomes part of your routine, and I think that's so important.

Speaker 1: 39:30

Yeah, one of the things I talk about in some of my other podcasts is neuroplasticity, and people think what?

Speaker 1: 39:35

is that it's essentially building new neural pathways. When you're learning a new skill, it's building that quote muscle memory, and in this case, with Bridge, it's the brain memory where you're helping to build your memory, your organization and planning strategic thinking. All those can be, from what I'm hearing, because now you kind of got me excited about learning how to play bridge. So my neighbors always ask me, do you play bridge? And I said no, I don't. You know cause. I had a lot of other things going on, but I it sounds like something that is fun and I can learn. But because I, based on all the things we've talked about, it's there's so many benefits that can help me in in maintaining my cognitive function. You know cause. That's something I worry about too, because my mom has dementia and so you know as as much as I can do to help myself with mental challenges, mental stimulation games, and it sounds like bridge is a perfect opportunity to do that.

Speaker 2: 40:37

Yeah, I think so. I I've. I've played games since I, since I was, uh, I one. Some of my earliest memories are playing games with my grandmother, and I love games. Bridge to me is so rich, there's so much to it and at the same time there's a familiarity, right, I think. I think that's the best sort of experience is when something is familiar but still has new things to discover to it, because then we're grounded and at the same time, we're getting to explore, and that's what I love about bridge all right, well, can can you tell me a little bit about the your uh websites?

Speaker 1: 41:12

they're the bridge teacherscom, and so people, can people go on there and learn to play and then, or just go on and play with other people, I don't know. Can you explain a little bit about how?

Speaker 2: 41:23

yeah, that's. That's a great, great question. So our website is essentially a video library of all of samantha's teachings. She's adding to it all the time. So, like I know, today she's, I'm gonna be like what are you doing today? She's, I'm going to be like what are you doing today? She's like I'm editing videos, so, and and she. So. These are two, essentially, if you've never played bridge before you come to our website, it's a subscription service. We do have free videos in front of the paywall, but, yes, you pay us a monthly fee, minimal monthly fee, and then you have access to all the videos on the website and we start at the beginning. You've never played bridge before.

Speaker 2: 42:03

Here's lesson one, and you just go for as long as you want. I personally, we keep the videos to you know, eight to 15 minutes. If Samantha goes over 15 minutes, she splits it into multiple parts. I would say, one lesson a day at the most, at the most, two lessons a week, something like that. One lesson a week, if that's what you, what you say. But I would not try and drink the ocean in in one month or whatever. Right, but I would not that you could do that, I think, if you did 40. If you did 40 hours a week on sam's videos, you'd still need about 13 weeks right now. So definitely take your time with it, because the lessons are there to help you learn, and then I think you should be playing as much as you can, even while you're learning, if you don't want to embarrass yourself. Bridgebase has robots I think that's $3 for a week of playing with robots. So, again, budget-friendly. So that's our website. Then also, samantha and I do teach privately.

Speaker 2: 43:09

We teach up to. I don't really like to teach more than four people. I'll teach five. I definitely won't teach six at a time. I don't like the lack of attention when six people are in. I can't give enough people value for their time and my time. But that's not required for our website. That's something that would be an additional add-on, something if you decide. Well, I really want to try that. But yeah, so our website is basically essentially a video library. If you want to play bridge, we don't do that. That's bridgebasecom. I can't even imagine the amount of coding that goes into their site. But again, bridgebasecom is free. When we teach, we teach on Bridgebase. So we go on. We create a teaching table, we upload our lesson hands. I love Bridgebase. I don't understand. They're doing just amazing work and I'm so grateful to them. But anyway, so you don't play on our site, you just learn on our site and BridgeBasecom to play.

Speaker 1: 44:11

Okay, and then you also have a YouTube channel. You said we do.

Speaker 2: 44:15

We do have a YouTube channel. Samantha posts there. What she tends to post on the YouTube channel is real life examples. So in other words, she played with a student or she was usually not playing with me, usually it's with a student and something came up, some aspect of bridge came up and she'll do a little video on it. And those are all free. Youtube is free and we're not really much on social media. I mean, we do do announcements on facebook and things like that. We haven't gotten to tiktok yet, but yeah, so youtube is free channel. Stop by, leave us a comment.

Speaker 1: 44:48

You know, let us know what you think well, as we kind of wrap up, is there any? What one thing would you like to leave with the? The audience? Audience is something that you think is important about Bridge, and maybe it doesn't have to be one thing.

Speaker 2: 45:07

No, I just have one thing, which is, if you are the type of person who is going to enjoy Bridge, you're going to love Bridge. You're going to love Bridge. Now, everybody's different. You know, I have a friend who's who's actually pretty good at bridge and doesn't care for it. She'd rather be out, you know, taking photographs, like photography, or right. So. So I'm not saying that everybody listening is going to enjoy bridge. I, I don't think that's true.

Speaker 2: 45:36

But if you don't try it, if you don't think that's true, but if you don't try it, if you don't, I would say, invest two months of trying it really and be honest with yourself. I really tried this and and if you, at the end of two months you'll know. And also, at the end of two months, if you like it, you're going to be like oh yeah, no, this is for me, this is for me and it really is a wonderful game and it's a game that you can play all the time, forever. I mean, I've played bridge all over the world. I've I've been walking by random storefronts in the country. I've never been before and found a bridge club and all of a sudden I'm five minutes later. I'm playing bridge with people I've never met. Bridge is is amazing, an amazing, amazing game. Give it a shot, try it. If you're having problems, email us, let us know. Like hey, this isn't working for me or I don't understand something. Reach out to us, but don't rob yourself of something that might be really amazing for you.

Speaker 1: 46:36

Yeah, I know I'm the type of person I love solving puzzles and learning new things. Yeah, I'm definitely going to look into it, just because, especially everything we talked about, with all the cognitive benefits and the social interaction, and I mean I love talking to people. So, if I get to the point where I understand the game and, like you said, you're traveling and it's a rainy day and you say to yourself, what am I going to do? And you happen to find, hey, there's a local bridge club and you can get down and play bridges as a way to mentally stimulate yourself but also meet new people, because you never know who you run into and who you're going to make new friends with and what you're going to learn from other people. I'm always one of these. I love talking to other people because I like to hear people's life story and because I think we can always learn from each other. So I think bridge would allow us to do that.

Speaker 1: 47:24

But I really appreciate you taking the time to to share today and if you can get me the your website and your YouTube, I'll put that in the podcast description and yeah, and then we can. That way people want to contact you.

Speaker 2: 47:37

They can find that, find it there, and then we can that way, if people want to contact you, they can find it there. That's amazing. Yeah, I'll get that over to you right away, and I want to thank you for the opportunity to come on and talk, obviously, about a game I love. But beyond that, I want to thank you for challenging me, because I had thought about issues that people are facing in terms of playing bridge, but not to this level before. So, really, as you said, meeting new people opened my mind, opened my perspective, and it really gave me a lot of food for thought about how I can help people bring bridge into their lives. So I want to thank you for that.

Speaker 1: 48:16

Well, that's great. I'm glad I could help, but it's nice to give people a different perspective and, and you know, one of the things I know that we talked about was how, in improving social interaction, and a lot of people, like we mentioned, go go to support groups and that's a great way, for we talked about earlier in the podcast but whether it's the person with Parkinson's or the caregiver, but you know, there's support groups all over the country with people with Parkinson's and it's a great opportunity to expand Ambridge and have people learn a fun and challenging card game.

Speaker 2: 48:49

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 48:53

Well, thanks again. If new things come up, please contact us and we'll have you back on.

Speaker 2: 49:00

That'd be great, and I would love for you to stay in touch with me about your bridge journey. Absolutely, I would love to hear your experience because you know, obviously we're always seeking to improve our product right, how can we make the website better, more accessible, how can we help people understand it? You know that kind of thing. So, and also, I just want to hear if you love the game Like I want to hear your. I want to hear your first success story. I want to hear your first disaster story. I've got some goods. I've got some great disaster stories for Samantha and I. I'm both back in the early days and recently, so we can start swapping bridge war stories. It'll be great.

Speaker 1: 49:40

All right, I'll do what my my, my one former manager used to say just give me the really really. So I'll tell you how it really goes the really really. I like that, don't sugarcoat, it Just give me the really, really, as he used to say.

Speaker 2: 49:52

So I love that. I love that. That's fantastic, all right.

Speaker 1: 49:55

Thanks again and uh tell everybody I want you to stay healthy and stay strong and live your best life. So thanks again and we'll see everybody soon. Thanks, take care. Thank you, bye.