Brain Fuel: What Keeps It Healthy?
No, this is not another boring chapter from your biology textbook. This, in fact, is an eyeopener to make you realise the invaluable worth and potential of your brain. It may be small, but if it is capable of commanding you at every single moment, even when you’re reading the sentence at this instant, it just deepens one’s curiosity about what it houses within its perimeter. Being the most crucial organ in the human body, it should be safeguarded by you. Of course, your skull does the job physically, but it needs to be well fed to keep itself up and running.
The Mood Factor
There are days when you are less energetic and wary. On others, there may be no bounds to your high spirit. These swings are caused due to the secretion of chemical substances called dopamine and serotonin. They are responsible for changes in our emotions. You may be thinking about how mood fits in the context of mental health. Mood swings are a common sign of your brain not being ‘well-fed’. Social life plays a big role in shaping your emotions. Many of us love to hang out with our friends, and it genuinely proves to be beneficial for our brains. Alongside this, meditation, exercise, hobbies, too help to keep our brain in good health.
Zzzzzz’s
Congratulations, reader! You have arrived at the section that emphasises your dream job. Sleep. Show this to any person who opposes your extended durations of sleep. Jokes aside, it is by far the most crucial activity that your brain requires to stay fit. It serves as a recovery period for your brain to kick out the trash and retain the valuable memories so that it doesn’t become a messy landfill. It also helps overcome exhaustion.
Dear reader, do understand that sleep is not a waste of time. Your brain can store information amounting to several thousand encyclopedias. So you really don’t want it to fill to the brim with pointless information. Otherwise, you would be no better than an overfilled dump yard. Sleep acts as the garbage truck, so its significance is equivalent to that of your most valuable thing.
‘The right diet’
In case you’re eager to read this section just to see me side with you guys as a proponent for Cheetos, Lay’s, Knickers, M&Ms, etc., just like how I did for Glorious Sleep, my hearty condolences to you but I would love to watch your parents constantly poke their noses in your food (if they do). And I would encourage them to exceed limits so that out of frustration, you start having your veggies like good kids. Having junk food is basically like preparing your brain’s tombstone. Imagine devouring loads of preservatives, chemicals, etc., and still calling it tasty. That’s how you look with that bag of chips. An excess of it impedes the functioning of your brain. On the other hand, vegetables strengthen your brain and help it to develop progressively, reducing the probability of acquiring diseases or disorders.
‘A blessing in disguise’
Certain practices, such as sleep, are enjoyable, but others, like eating your veggies, may just add to your endless woes. On the contrary, they are beneficial and aid none but you. Adviseably, if you consider these to be the daily medicines that would cure you from illness, it would eventually become habitual. Upon becoming so, you would surely develop a likeness towards them.
Swarit Choudhary, The Doon School