Steven Bartlett with Dr. David Eagleman
Your brain is not a static organ but an adaptable terrain that you can consciously rewire to change your habits, learn new skills, and protect your cognitive health as you age.
The biological purpose of dreaming is to defend the brain's visual cortex from being taken over by other senses during the sensory deprivation of sleep.
Your brain functions as a parliament of competing neural networks fighting for control, making it essential to use constraint strategies like the Ulysses contract to lock your future self into positive behaviors.
Actively engaging in novel and socially demanding tasks builds cognitive reserve through new neural pathways, which can mask and protect against the mental decline associated with aging.