The functioning of the brain never ceases to amaze me. I recently came across the term neuroplasticity from an online video and I was so fascinated by it that I went through some articles on it. I am writing about some of it here because I think it is a good read and it will help you. Read on to know why.
The video I mentioned above is about a girl(Jodie) who suddenly started suffering from seizures because the right half of her brain was infected by a rare encephalitis. The doctors had the affected area- half of her brain, surgically removed. Since she was a child then, they were sure that her left brain would compensate for the missing brain functions quickly. And it did. She was free from the seizures and her brain or the part that was retained, eventually took over the brain functions of the missing part, and amazingly quickly too.
This remarkable feature of the brain is called neuroplasticity. Plasticity is the malleable nature of a substance that allows it to take any form that it is shaped into. Neuroplasticity is associated with the brain- the characteristic of the brain to change in structure or function or both, as it learns new things, and to compensate for missing or lost cells due to any accidents or trauma.
If we see this from another angle, what we learn, experience, pick, train, skill up- all result in changing the structure and functions of the brain. Structural changes are when synapses, which are the gaps through which the neurons communicate, grow, and functional changes would be when some events or situations trigger or form different connections, during the firing of a set of neurons used for a distinct function. For example, jugglers’ brains have areas that are advanced in processing moving objects, taxi drivers have a larger hippocampus(the part of the brain that is used in memory related functions) and have high spatial cognition.
The adaptability and the feature of the brain that never stops ‘growing’, changing, is of course wonderful, but more so is knowing that the simplest things can trigger brain ‘growth’. There were a number of activities mentioned for this, like learning a language, learning to play an instrument, but then there are basic, simple and beautifully easy ways too- play and read. Playing games and reading triggers and keeps brain functions active and hence keeps the brain healthy.
The healing part has this too- there are many ways to mend brain cells- physiotherapy, exercise and then the simplest underrated activity – sleep.
So for all the TL;DR people skimming across pages here, let me sum up the post for you-
Sleep well and take some time to read.
