Nutritional Neuroscience Used To Support Mental Well Being and Brain Function Featuring Delia McCabe

There is an old saying we are what we eat. It's become even clearer through nutritional Neuroscience. What we eat is related to our body's health, our mental well-being, and our brain health. It has been determined through research that junk food adversely affects our performance. Our diet early on in life can end up having the same effect on our brains as we age.

About Delia

Delia McCabe (PhD) shifted her research focus from clinical psychology to nutritional neuroscience upon discovering nutrition’s critical role in mental wellbeing while completing her Masters. Delia’s research into female stress has been published in a number of peer-reviewed journals, she is a regular featured expert in the media and her two internationally available books are available in four languages.

Using her background in psychology, combined with evidence-based nutritional neuroscience and neurological perspectives, Delia supports behaviour change and stress resiliency within corporates, and for individuals who want to optimize their brain health, via online courses, workshops and tailored events internationally.

www.lby.life

www.AGEUcational.com

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Nutritional Neuroscience Used To Support Mental Well Being and Brain Function Featuring Delia McCabe

Tue, 9/14 6:17PM • 53:32

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

people, brain, aging, older, recall, reasons, psychology, environment, sit, feel, delia, walk, day, speaks, life, put, nutrition, body, roy, podcast

SPEAKERS

Delia, Terry, Roy Barker

Roy Barker 00:02

Hello, and welcome to another episode of AGEUcational This is Roy.

Terry 00:05

This is Terry.

Roy Barker 00:06

So we're the podcast that talks about a lot about aging. We Chronicle our journey through aging. Of course, we have aging parents that we help and, you know, see some of the things that they come up with. So what we want to try to do is help people not only age healthier, but maybe we can give some tips and tricks of things that you may not have to go through some things that we have found out along this journey and we do have professional guests on from time to time today is no different. Terry, I'll let you introduce Delia,

Terry 00:34

Delia McCabe, shifted her research focus from clinical psychology to nutritional neuroscience upon discovering nutritions critical role in mental well being while completing her master's Delia's research into female stress has been published in a number of peer reviewed journals. She's a regular featured expert in the media and her two internationally available books are available in four languages.

Feed your brain and be your brain cookbook are those books using her background in psychology combined with evidence based nutritional neuroscience and neurological perspectives. Delia supports behavior change in stress resiliency within corporates and for individuals who want to optimize their brain health via online courses, workshops and tailored events internationally. Delia, welcome to the show, I should say Dr. Delia, excuse me. That's fine. Terry,

Delia 01:36

thank you very much for the opportunity that you and Roy have given me to be on your second podcast. So I'm really delighted to be here

Roy Barker 01:44

And we're excited to get you on here. Because, you know, there's just, there's so much interaction with our, you know, our bodies, the neuroscience portion in our brains, then, you know, that's one thing. I think that a lot of us are concerned, one thing we've become more concerned about is healthy brain aging. As you know, we reach this point, but before we get too far off in there, tell us a little bit about you know, your history, what what was the turning point of? What got you into this? Have you is this something that you've always been interested in? And kind of gravitated? Or?

Delia 02:18

I think it's a it's a good question, because for me, I really wanted to be a talking therapist, I wanted to be a really great psychologist, you know, that got people into my, into my rooms and say to them, okay, let's overhaul your life. Let's fix it. And in the process of doing that, I just happened to do a research project for my Masters where I looked at underachievement, and I had access to a whole lot of children who were really smart. And many of them were doing poorly at school. You know, the kind of kids that parents and teachers are desperate about. They say, oh, my goodness, this child has got so much potential and I wasted.

So I was developing question is because I was looking at the psychological variables that underpinned the underachievement. Because that's what I was going to be, you know, a psychologist, but I had a little bit of extra space on on my questionnaire and my husband had just invested in a health food store. And I thought, well, food was top of mind for me then. And my mom had always been healthy with healthy food. So I thought, let's throw a question in the question age, let's just take to these kids, what's your favorite food? And that question really changed my destiny. Because every single one of the children in my experimental group, that's the kids who were really smart for doing poorly, they all said they love junk food.

And all the kids in the control group. That's the smart kids, you were doing well didn't love junk food. And for me, that was like an epiphany moment, because very seldom in research, do you find such a clear distinction? Generally, it's a bit more gray. And so I was like, wow, and you know, Destiny stepped in again, because I was very pregnant with my first child. And I thought, look, I'm going to, you know, have my daughter, I'm going to investigate this a little and see if there's anything to this, you know, does what we eat really impact brain function and mood. And, you know, as people say, the rest is history.

Because I couldn't go back to being a talking therapist, I really felt there was part of me that felt that it was morally wrong. And it's only come upon me over the years, that that's really what I felt because instead of asking people about their childhood, or whatever was going on in their lives, I wanted to say to them, Hey, what did you have for breakfast? Because then I started understanding that it was at a much deeper level, that the challenge needed to be addressed because it's very hard to help a malfunctioning brain and a malnourished brain help itself better. It's like trying to push your car uphill with the tires flat, you know, you're just really going against the way the foundation of anything works.

And so I really decided to dive into nutritional neuroscience and so 25 years later here, I am. Now have a solid understanding about how nutrition impacts the brain. And why we need to address that first before we try for behavior change. And obviously, I've also gained a lot of knowledge in terms of how the brain works and how it functions and how best to use it. In the world we live in. And of course, I've got my psychology had to put on so I bring all of that to this discussion today.

Roy Barker 05:23

Yeah, that's awesome. And it's, it's really not what we want to talk about today. But I'll just mention that it's, um, after my kids got grown in all, we lived a very structured structured life, you know, homework, we ate by five or six buyers really bad, you know, pretty much the same through the school year. But something I noticed being out is that, you know, you could drive down the street with all the restaurants on it now.

And at nine or 930, at night, their families just now pulling through the drive thru, you know, fixing the load up on some junk food. And I just think about, you know, to your point about that correlation between how did they function in school the next day, because I'm telling you, my kids were in bed at a decent hour, and they were still bears to get up. Now, they did perform well, but it was like it was a fire every morning, getting them out of bed and getting them up and dressed.

And I think, Wow, if we didn't go through McDonald's or Taco Bell drive thru at 10 o'clock at night, they would have never gotten up. And I know that they would have been, you know, dragging and tired and sleepy the next day. So I think that's an interesting point, not only the quality of food, but probably the timing and everything else that goes into that.

Delia 06:42

Fabulous observation, Roy. Absolutely. And there is lots of solid research now to show that that kind of lifestyle in childhood impacts the brain across the lifespan. Yeah, so these parents don't really realize what they're doing. But they're not setting their children up for the best life. Right? Right. Well, so

Roy Barker 07:00

let's jump to the aging brain. And I'll just take mine for just a moment, it's small enough, we should be able to cover most of it. So, you know, can we reverse that? If we've had a poor diet and maybe not done things optimally for most of our life? When we get to a certain point? Is it just too late? Is it hardwired? Or is there still room to make some changes?

Delia 07:24

Well, the wonderful thing about the brain is that it's really neuro plastic. That's the word that used you know, it's a it's a structure that changes shape, continuously throughout our lifespan, because everything that we are exposed to either from within our body or from our environment, changes the structure of the brain, when people have finished listening to this podcast, they Brian will be changed in structure. And it's really it's an amazing thing to think about that. But it's a huge conversation. And I've broken down our discussion today into three main areas, just to make it easier for people to understand the complexity of this, but also to make it as simple as possible. But in answer to your question, can we make a change?

Absolutely, we can continuously changing change our brain, as we get older, however, it gets harder. As we get older, if there's certain things we haven't done. And there's a really good quote, and I pulled it out to read today from Fred Astaire. And the quote is, old age is like everything else, to make a success of it, you have to start young. And I really love it. Yeah, it's a cool quote. But you know, he wasn't speaking about neuroscience. But the truth is that we can make changes, but we have to, it would have to be a very focused change, and it would have, you'd have to be very consistent and disciplined.

So as I say, that I'll explain, we're going to look at the physical or physiological effects of aging, we're going to look at the neurological aspects related to aging. And then we're going to look at the psychological aspects related to aging, and then we're going to put them all together. So at the end of the podcast, your listeners will be able to say, okay, from each of those three areas, these are the things that I can work on. And they'll also be able to see how they fit together. So I took the liberty of making myself a mind map.

Because it's a really complex discussion, and I just want to stick to the most important things that people can action. So so that that I think will be useful to your listener. So just on top of, you know, the last podcast we did, we spoke a lot about nutrition. And obviously, that's the foundation of brain function, and it stays the foundation. No matter how old we get, it's really important. When we eat really well we reduce inflammation. And that inflammatory response, unfortunately, is something that gets hurt. Higher as we get older.

And that's just because cells start breaking down, things don't work as well. But just to give you one example of something that a lot of elderly people complain about some, which is joint pain, and joint pain isn't a given, we don't have to get that as we get older, the chances go up, of course, if our diet isn't good, and if we don't have the right essential fats, so if anyone wants to know about that, we dived into that in a lot in the last podcast.

So without the rock, right? fats, you know, you're going to get sore joints, that's just it, because the sun of your fluid isn't made up of the rock fat molecules. So that's just something you know, the nutrition side is a big, big topic. And that's something that has to be taken care of. But related to that, interestingly, is our capacity to chew. So when we chew, we break our food down into digestible and absorbable compounds, before it gets into our diet. A lot of people that get older, have problems chewing, and then they're not getting the maximum amount of nutrition from the food that they eating.

So I suggest to people when they get older, if they're having a problem with their teeth, fix the problem. And then also just lightly steamed veggies to make sure that you can still chew them really well and get the nutrients. And that's just just the one thing. The other thing is other senses like our ears, you know, when we get older, a lot of people start having problems with with their ears. So what they do is they turn the TV up louder, they put the music up louder. And that just makes it harder, interestingly for the brain to tune in, and make sense of the sound because you make it easier for the brain.

That's that's the best way to explain that. What we want to do, we want to make our ears get better at hearing. And so when elderly people don't want to get hearing aids, they are doing a terrible disservice to their brain. Because when your brain cannot pick up on information, it doesn't respond to that information. And we want to keep our brain as responsive as possible. And the same goes for eyes, if your eyes aren't working well, then you also are not giving your brain the information that it needs. So if elderly people are too vain to wear the glasses, they're doing their brain a disservice. Because their brain isn't picking up the information that it needs.

And tied to that, which is something that I want every listener to go and take note of after this podcast, go and watch children playing. Okay. Little young kids, you know, even kids, even teenagers, watch them play and watch, they move their bodies, you will notice that they move their heads left and right. Continuously, like continuously observing the environment around them, this helps the body find its place in space. Now you say what does that really mean? It means that when your brain is continuously alert to where your body is in space, you have a greater sense of balance and coordination. Okay?

Now, when people get older, they start losing that capacity, because they're not as aware of the environment. So they start looking down when they walk. So they've got like this head down. habit that they get into, and then they start getting nervous about when they walk. And then they start holding on to things as they walk, or they get a walking stick. All of that takes away the brain's capacity to balance itself on its own and keep you upright and observant of your environment. And all of that starts degrading the brain slowly, but surely.

So our suggest to people that feel that they are not very balanced anymore, and feel like they can fall down with ease to start focusing on moving their heads and being very aware of their environment. So there's some things that we can do to make sure that this happens. We can do things like yoga. So I love yoga, because it has I've got a lot of balancing poses. And when you do all these balancing poses, like one on one leg and then on the other leg and twisting the one leg over the other leg.

You keep your brain very much busy blood flow going between your left and right hemisphere, which really gives your brain a workout all the time and things like Tai Chi, a lot of those Asian movements do the same thing. They keep you very focused on on that balance. There are researchers that believe that if you can keep your balance optimal, you will age significantly better. And there's a funny research study that I found that people that lived in a village where they was cobblestones.

And they had to walk over the cobblestones every day. They had better cardiovascular health than the people that didn't. They didn't check brain health but naturally cardiovascular health is related to brain health and why because every single The time those people took a step, they were minute, little movements within the body and brain that keep them upright and keep them moving and help their heart. So this is not just pure luck and opinion, this solid science to to show that the way we move our body and the way we position our body in space, and keeping up this movement of our head, and, and balance all contributes to brain function.

Because all the time we do that we setting off little connections in the brain to make sure that those neurons are still connecting we sitting on blood, we're getting nutrients, we're getting oxygen to all those different parts of the brain that start shutting down when people stop moving their bodies really well. So that's a long, long introduction to the person. That's awesome.

Roy Barker 15:52

Yeah, that's, uh, you know, and I've heard that too, even for, you know, like, if you're more trying to get strength is if you walk in the outside, because you're stepping on rocks and stones and uneven ground, it's much better, because it develops your stabilizer muscles where you know, as when you walk just like on a treadmill, you're really not working much except one foot in front of the other. So interesting that that helps you can help your brain health as well.

Delia 16:21

Yeah, it's extremely important. And I think a lot of elderly people don't realize that they start doing the same old movements, as you say, just putting one foot in front of the other. So, you know, walking upstairs, lifting your feet up really well. And just getting into that child phase, I suggest elderly people even start playing, you know, playing with balls playing with their grandchildren, because all of that movement is stimulating brain activity, which is what we want.

Roy Barker 16:48

Yeah, because I think, you know, I've seen it in people before, you start feeling unstable. So then you don't want to do stuff, then you sit in the chair. And then it's just, you know, it's kind of the beginning of the end of the decline.

Terry 17:01

And you just have those aches, like you were talking about, I mean, just you start having all those joint joint pains, and it's like, oh, no, I just want to sit here. And that is not optimal, as you're telling us right now.

Delia 17:16

Absolutely. And that ties in with the psychology. So we'll get to that in a little while. But the other thing just to talk about the brain from a neurological perspective, you know, the brain is the most sensitive and sophisticated organ that we own. And that's one of the reasons it has the capacity to be plastic to change continuously, you know, in relation to our own environment and our thoughts and what we learn, the challenge is that it is actually an organ that is begging for new information. It always wants new information and stimulation.

And I'd love surprises. Now, what a lot of people do, you know, you've both just mentioned examples of what happens when people get older, you know, they get a little bit nervous about how stable they are, then they sit down. They are still a lot of people who are physically active, but they keep on doing the same activities, brain activity, so outspoken people this No, no, no, you know, I still play cards with my friends. And I do Sudoku every day. And I go and do this particular activity with a friend maybe a particular exercise, but they think they're keeping active and busy.

But what they're doing, they're just doing the same things. Now that means that different parts of the brain aren't being stimulated. And that's what the brain wants, it wants to keep on learning. When it keeps on learning. As I said earlier, what's going to happen same same as what exercise does just a slightly different, it's going to then have to open up new connections between neurons. And then those new connections that open up keep the brain really healthy, because once again, more oxygen, more nutrients to those new places.

So learning a new language, going to a new place and living there for a while, or even just doing a lot of traveling, which I know is a challenge now with COVID. But that's you know, the ultimate goal is learning a new musical instrument, going out with a friend to learn a completely new exercise routine. That is actually what the brain wants. It wants new ideas, it wants new books, it wants new concepts.

One of the reasons that they believe that people that carry on working into old age have better cognitive functioning is because they keep their brain active over time. And they've got to keep on conversing with other people which is actually a very neurologically demanding activity. So it's one of the reasons that the saying of you can't teach old dogs new tricks is such a terrible saying but you can understand why came to be because generally old people don't want to learn new things. They want to take things easy.

They want to do the same old thing. It's exactly the opposite of what the what the brain wants. It's actually one One of the reasons there's also saying that as you become more of who you really are as you get older, and I don't know if you remember, there was a TV show, it was a British TV show, it was called grumpy old men and grumpy old woman. And one of the reasons that show was so funny is because I think a lot of people recognize themselves or their parents or their grandparents in that show, because as these people got older, they just got crankier.

And this is what happens when you don't keep an open mind and make an effort not to become cranky, because it seems like as we get older, those negative characteristics can really become prominent. So we have to be conscious about what we do, you know, and who we associate with and what we focus on. But the positive thing about this, this neurology of the brain, which I think a lot of people don't realize is that our knowledge and our skill acquisition is cumulative. And that's why very seldom do you find a 20 year old telling you a fascinating story.

Because they don't have that huge base of experience, and memory, all that knowledge, all those skills over a lifetime, they can just tell you what happened at university, you know, yesterday, when so and so said what, but an elderly person will tell you about, you know, what happened in the wall, what happened when they met a person at the age of 20. And then at the age of 70, they were such and such, those are stories that become part of the person's narrative, and allow them to have a very rich and rewarding internal cognitive landscape.

Because then those knowledge and skills are cumulative. So we can think about, you know, the brain aging and neurons dying, which is a natural part of of aging. But we can also think about all the wonderful things that happened with that, which is all this knowledge acquisition, and that we keep on building on top of there was a research project where they went and looked at people in an old age home. And they asked them what else they still had to do. Okay, so what project were they're busy on. And the people that just had one more project that they were trying to finish lived, on average, seven years longer than the people that said they had nothing left to do. And that's pretty powerful.

Terry 22:17

Wow, that is?

Roy Barker 22:18

Yeah, and that's what, you know, like, I think it was my grandmother gave me some good advice, because I was never a big reader, you know, I always wanted to be out running around. But her her mother, was once she got old, or, you know, she didn't have anything to really stimulate her brain. And so, you know, she would basically just sit in the chair, didn't have much conversation or much going on. And so that's, you know, what she always challenged me is like, you know, you need to have something like reading or musical instrument that you can do you know, when you're older, and you're not out, you know, running around climbing trees, things like that.

Delia 22:57

And that was really good advice, because over a lifetime, that would have been a huge benefit. And it obviously has been for you.

Roy Barker 23:06

Yeah, well, not so much. Yeah. That's one thing. I really wish I was a better reader, I can read like three pages. And, you know, conk out fall asleep. When that there's like, Did you just read a paragraph or something? No, no, I tried to read the whole thing. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's, it's no good to have that stimulation. And that's one reason why I don't, you know, I mean, I may adjust my schedule, but I would not mind working, you know, until wait to the end, because it's always this new information.

It's exciting. And there's, I think there's a lot of empirical evidence of yesterday of people retiring, they really don't have any hobbies or activities, they go home, sit on the couch, watch some TV, and they probably tend to die much, much sooner than those that stay active in some capacity.

Delia 24:00

Absolutely. There's a lot of lot of research that points to that ROI. And I think one of the things, reasons that happens which leads us beautifully into the next into the next section, which is the psychology of aging, is because if you don't feel like you are of use anymore, then that affects the way your brain functions. And the capacity for you to control your environment is now also been limited. And that leads to the cons of neurotransmitters not being produced that we need to keep the brain functioning well. So we're not getting any dopamine anymore.

There will be a reduction in serotonin as well which will affect mood and can lead elderly people to become a lot more depressed when they become depressed and they don't eat as well or they eat junk. And they don't move as well because depressed people don't want to move. So there's this negative you know, cascade that happens from that feeling like I can't contribute anymore. Problem is as well and this stuff done some some research on is that the words that we use for elderly people, a lot of them internalize those words.

So words like weakness, or useless or, you know, even stupid. Those are the kinds of words that, unfortunately in our Western society have become commonplace when we even think about elderly people. And they've showed that when elderly people think about themselves in that way, they have a loss in self efficacy.

And self efficacy is just a fancy way of saying, I feel like I can control my life and that I have had things to do. And the minute that happens, we have this negative effect happening in the brain and in the body. So that narrative that we tell ourselves, the words that we use, when we speak about aging need to be very positive, we mustn't have the negative words just because of the unfortunate negative neurological effects that happen. Because that affects our self perception, too. You know, and we can't get away from that.

So it's a it's a huge challenge, because we live in a society that really values us. Yes, and you know, we work, we worship youth, you know, the skincare, anti aging industries with billions of dollars. It's a it's a huge challenge. But there was one of the biggest studies on aging was by the neck, mek, author, MacArthur Foundation. And they found that self efficacy was a primary primary goal to give old people and if they had that, over their lifetime, they're aged significantly better than if they just accepted a old age as just being, you know, useless.

So that's, that's the psychology of attended and unfortunately falls back on the wall, if you're feeling depressed and anxious, you're not going to go and exercise and then it fits that neural pathway. So those three things have to be taken into account, you can't separate one from the other.

Roy Barker 26:56

Yeah, you and I know there's people that get, you know, they may have illnesses or afflictions or things that slow them down. But, you know, one thing I've found is, this is a really good time in life. I mean, you know, the kids are raised, we can do, you know, pretty much whatever we want to do, whenever we want to do it. You don't have to worry about all the, you know, taxi cabin people everywhere, and schedules and things like that.

And so, sometimes I get a little surprise that people struggle in older age, when I feel like it's like, almost gaining youth back again, it's like, you know, a fun and exciting time to be alive, you know. And not only that the internet, I mean, here we are communicating with you. I don't even know how many miles ideas, but it's a lot. It's a lot, you know, we're able to be able to see you just like you're sitting right here. So I don't know, it's like, maybe it's attitude, or maybe it's just your Outlook, but I think there's never been a better time to, you know, be alive and be aging.

Delia 27:58

I agree with you completely. I think it's a complex thing to answer. I think what happens to a lot of people as they get older, they had regrets. And those regrets can unfortunately color their whole life. And you know, we're all adults, I have things that I'm regretful about. And I've come to terms with the fact that I can't turn back time. If people get older, and they can't, you know, internalize that knowledge, then that negativity will affect their attitude and will affect how they look at the world. And that's why, you know, some people get better, and some people get better.

And it's, I would suggest any person that is feeling like they are negative and feeling like they have too many regrets, and they spend too much time thinking about the past, I suggest those people find a good psychotherapist and go and chat about it. Because I agree, we should be able to look at the future with positivity and see how many wonderful things are available to us. But we can't do that if we hemmed in with the past.

So that's where you know, the psychology can definitely become coming useful. And then of course, I would suggest they improve their diet. Because when their diet improves, their mood can improve. And reaching out to other people being in communication with other people, finding a new environment that supportive is also is also great and often extending yourself, not waiting for someone to come and help you.

You go out and help someone that's less fortunate than you and that allows you to also release wonderful neuro chemicals which give you a good mood and help you feel more, you know, increase your self efficacy. So that's a really good point about you know, how people feel that attitude, but it can be addressed.

Terry 29:44

Yeah, volunteering would be a great I mean, if you're, you know, if you've had this long career, you've been working forever, it seemed like and then you're suddenly retiring. I mean, go out and volunteer people need help. There's a lot of people that need help and and Matching peep matching older people with younger people. I mean, just you know, reading whatever. tutoring, that that is a wonderful thing.

Roy Barker 30:14

Yeah, you mentioned that because sorry. No, no, no, your good.

Delia 30:18

That's exactly what my mother does. Every Monday, she goes to school around the corner, and her and another woman, help the children with their religious instruction. So they tell him stories, they give them little examples that have a chat to them. And it's wonderful for her. She doesn't get paid for it. It's a voluntary activity. But it allows me to be with young children. And it allows them to see an older person who's engaged with them. So I agree with you completely. It's a fantastic, fantastic thing to do. Not maybe intuitive. If you you know, you when your grandchildren are grown up, you wouldn't think of doing that. But wonderful activity.

Terry 30:50

Yeah. Well, and you said, we were speaking about your your mother, before the show, and you said she was doing some activity while we were speaking What is that, she decided

Delia 31:03

that she wanted to do some Pilates. Because when my daughter was here a while ago, we did an online Pilates yoga session. And my mum joined in with us because my daughter said, Hey, come Granny, do this with us. And my mom really battled she battled because she wasn't very flexible. So she on her own, went and found the place. And so now she's gone to do Pilates. And that's what my mother does. She just decides, and she goes, so she, she's very capable of, of doing that and being active. And I really applaud that because she lives in this house, I keep on saying to move more do this. Don't do that. And she's very active already. But we laugh about just being more more so of everything.

Roy Barker 31:44

Yeah, you know, and I think maybe too, sometimes we get self conscious, you know, as I'm not as young, I'm not as fit, maybe I can't do this as well as other people. But one thing I will say I've tried the yoga before, and people are so accepting of you, no matter what you can do. And then the other part of that is they they can they try and think of the word they can make adjustments for you. So you know, if you can't like fold yourself up completely, you know, there are things that you can do to keep up.

But you know, I think this is well, this seems to get back to our outlook on life is that, you know, we have to run our own race stay in our own lane. And it doesn't matter. Even if there was somebody there that snickered or whatever, who cares. I'm out here doing my thing, you do your thing, quit worrying about me, you know. And then the other part of that is that sometimes we we get so hung up in what other people are thinking, and maybe that's a little narcissist that nobody else really cares about us. They're doing their own thing, they're really not giving us a second thought.

Terry 32:54

Just, I mean, it's like, you don't even think about that. I feel like the older I get, the less I care about what anybody thinks, except for my mother, of course, no, I'm always, Oh,

Delia 33:09

those are such good points, because I think you 100%, right, that speaks to the psychology of it again, you know, if we, if we going to be nervous about doing something because we're not doing it, well, then that's something that a lot of people feel, and I feel it even when they're young. So when you get older, and your body is less flexible, and you've less capable, you know, it can really stop you from doing all those things.

So we just have to put ego aside, forget about it. And okay, and I'm at that age as well, I don't care. And when I go to yoga mat, my yoga teacher is fantastic. She always says care about what's going on on your mat, and care about what anyone else is doing. As you said, This is my race, I'm doing this by myself. And it's it's always a good reminder, because some days you do better than others, and some days, you just cannot paint anyway. So it's all good.

Roy Barker 33:54

And I think that we just had to give other people a break to that, that there are still a lot of good people out there that are embracing and helpful and encouraging. And you know, they want, they want to see people like that come out and take take part in whatever the activity is. So I would just say, you know, put put that aside, don't be scared or don't be worried just go out and do you know, fun and new stuff.

Delia 34:23

I think if we could take a leaf out of the book of what the Asians do, you know, they go to parks, and they'll go and do the Tai Chi and it will be from young people to old people and nobody cares. They stand in the park. I don't care who walks past them. Exactly. That kind of attitude. You know, they're just doing their thing and not being concerned about anyone else.

And when you go to a structured place, as you said, where people are really genuinely 99% of the time encouraging and just get on at the end, dude. I mean, this is not a dress rehearsal. I think we come to a certain age where you realize it really isn't. You've got This, Tom, this is all we know for sure we have just met jolly best of it. And your body and your brain will thank you for that.

Roy Barker 35:06

Yeah. Yeah, we talked about that all the time, as you know, we got a lot a bigger list of things to do than we got time to do it. So yeah, we have to make every day count.

Delia 35:17

Absolutely. I mean, I couldn't agree, I need a couple of lifetimes for the things I want to do. I have to make the best like YouTube as well.

Terry 35:26

Can. Okay, so I have a couple of questions. Can we? I guess, not really veer off course, because it's all relative here. But what about retention? How, what if you're having trouble, I have some friends. And we came up with a little questionnaire, a couple questions to throw at you. How can you improve your retention? If you don't feel like you are? You know, keep it you know, if you're trying to learn something, and you're, you're not like me, okay, it's all about me. I have a retention problem. I don't know what that if that has to do with my brain? Or if it's just not doing something, right, what's up? You

Delia 36:17

know, this is a really good question. But you don't actually have a retention problem, you've got a recall problem. And that's what a lot of people get confused about. So it's in there, you know, it's there, you just can't recall it. And there are a couple of reasons that that can happen. When we pay attention to something and we put an emotional component on that thing that we trying to pay attention to, and that we want to go into long term memory, it's a lot easier to to to then be able to recall it as well.

Okay. So for example, I needed to remind myself to buy some carrots when I went to the market. So what are so in my mind, I didn't want to take my phone with me because I've got all my bags at the market. And this is too much of a pain. So I just saw myself as I walked into the market, seeing a giant big Bunny, they're like a giant Big Band, and it will be so ridiculous. And so I didn't forget the carrots. Okay, so those are the little things that you do, you just have an emotional component. The second thing to keep in mind is that we really only retain the things that we pay attention to.

Now, as we get older, that focus and concentration, that capacity to be to hone in on something goes down. Why? Because you've got so much else going on in our brain so much noise. So one of the things to do is when you sit down to focus and concentrate on something, just do that, don't do anything else, just focus on that one thing, you've got a much greater chance of it going into memory, and being able to recall it. The third thing to keep in mind is that it's quite natural, as we get older, when we've got all this information in our brain to have a problem with recalling. However, if we just calm down, and don't get distressed by it, then that thing that we trying to recall will come to us.

And I'm sure that you've noticed that Terry, you will be trying, trying, trying and we'll be doing something else will pop up. Now, the reason that happens is because then your cortisol drops. So let's say you're going somewhere, you really trying to remember something and you can't remember it and it's not stressing you out, your adrenaline rises and your cortisol rises, that stops any recall from being able to happen, then you're off at the market or at the gym, or running the ball or whatever. And up, there comes the name, the name of the movie, the name of the person, the name of the concept, whatever.

So keep those things in mind and just know it's not a matter of not retaining it, it's a matter of recalling it. If you can make sure you focus and concentrate, you will know that it's gone into your memory, then it's just a matter of being able to recall it. And so the lots of little tricks, you know, you've got those memory books, you put a number next to the you put the thing in a house and then you go back and recall it for me, the one that makes the most sense is having an emotion attached to it, whatever that emotion is, if it's excitement, and so on, then do that.

The other thing, which also sounds like a really simple thing, and I think most of us do that, you know, in our house, we've got a place where we put the keys when we come back, you know, after using the court a place where you put it, you got another place where you keep other things that are in the same category. Sometimes you need to do that in your brain as well. So you thinking about something, okay, where does this idea or this concept fit in, and then you put it into the group of all the others. And that just takes a little bit of practice. So when I'm busy studying something new or working with a new concept, I think, okay, where is this gonna fit in?

And for me, it's always it's just going to be in the psychology or the neurology or the nutrition buckets, and then we're not going to recall it. I have a big category that I can gonna look into to go and recall that thing. And that's just a matter of practicing. So don't get hung up on the fact that you can't recall things. It's not a huge disaster. It's just something that naturally happens with age and we just have to find a workaround to that. Okay,

Roy Barker 40:17

so what about, you know, we talked earlier, or you were saying, you know, things like using the cane or not using the hearing aids, things that may work opposite, you know, may not be helping our brain. So, in this case, what about like taking notes? Or what about trying to find ways to help us? Is that really harmonists more than helping us? Well, it

Delia 40:41

can be a stepping stone. So if you know that there's under certain circumstances you keep on being unable to recall something you keep on forgetting it, make a note, but don't make a long note, just have one word. And let that one would be the trigger for the whole thing that you're trying to remember. Okay? Absolutely. It is better not to have notes, and not to keep on relying on technology, which we've unfortunately started doing. So our brain is not getting the workout that it needs to get. One of the things that I suggest people do is when they go for a walk, don't listen to a podcast, and don't have a conversation with somebody while you're going for a walk, pay very close attention to your environment.

Notice the tree there, how it's been losing leaves, notice that the neighbors painting their house, take note of all of those things that you busy seeing it's part of your environment, and your brain changes and keeps track of your environment in that way. You're just giving your brain a bit of a workout, you're not doing something automatic, what we're trying to get away from is Trump is doing things automatically, because that puts the brain on slow mode, we want to keep the brain on high mode, but not stress mode.

So good question about the notes. Try not to rely on them do things like the bunny, think about a green person standing outside the shopping mall, when you need to remember a green t shirt, if you know what I'm saying just link those things together. It's just a matter of building a bit more of a robust connection between what you're trying to recall and the thing that you're putting into your memory.

Roy Barker 42:16

Now the funny thing is not working, because ever since you said that, I think about a chocolate covered by filled with Carmel. That's what I think sitting around the grocery store, right? the grocery store, when I log in,

Delia 42:29

buy me buy me.

Roy Barker 42:33

Awesome example of this is like phone numbers. You know, when I was a kid, we knew our number grandparents, friend's dad's work. I mean, we knew all these numbers. Now. I don't know anybody's phone number. If I didn't have my phone to recall that I couldn't even call Terry I get I could get her first two or three numbers. And then I'm just done.

Delia 42:55

Roy, it's a very sobering comment that you've just made, we're not getting that, that memory anymore. One of the things that, you know, as you remember from your childhood and mine, when we were at school, they'd make us memorize these long poems, either for concerts, or for doing stuff in class, whatever. I don't know if they do that anymore. And it was a way to make our hippocampus really robust to be able to practice and hone that skill of memory. So I think we've probably got a perfect storm brewing here.

Because even if you look at the maps, you know, I don't memorize the place, I'm going to I just put it into Google and Google takes me there. But I never do that twice to the same place. I do it once. And as I'm going and watching landmarks, so I've made that that kind of like rule with myself. I don't know how it's gonna work when I live in America. Let's see how we go. This is the problem. I think we rely on technology a lot.

And we're not keeping those telephone numbers in our head. And interestingly, telephone numbers are seven or a derivative of seven so you'll have three and then you'll have four. I know that that that was the case, I think in America, it's three for the code, and then three to start and then for the brain is really good at chunking down into seven pieces of information. And I don't know if that's why they designed telephone numbers like that, but it is interesting. It's the seven pieces that the brain is good at but we're not even doing that anymore.

Terry 44:28

I still can recall my phone number. A couple of different phone numbers from growing up. Yeah, so there you go. There's my recall it is

Delia 44:39

a little bit of a tuna carry that's all

Terry 44:43

well and I'm doing that with I I have to tell you the past probably four days I have not done your seven your seven steps to a calmer What is it seven steps to see I'm having the Ricoh bro,

Delia 44:57

there we go. It's a

Terry 44:58

chocolate energized. You To be

Delia 45:00

lighter and brighter, yes, no, yes. Well, if you haven't been doing that, that means that your cortisol is probably higher than it should be. So that means that your memory won't be working as well either. But it is a work in progress area. And that's the wonderful thing about the brain.

Roy Barker 45:18

And that's you're never too late to change and never too late to shape up. And, yeah, you know, and I think a lot of it's mindset and attitude that even if we do have some things that are slowing us down, or holding us back, still plenty of things that we can do. And so we just have to look at, you know, what a great place do we live in what a great time to be alive and just, life is exciting, it really is. And we need to find things to make it that way.

Delia 45:42

I agree with you, we need to actually look for them, if we can't see them immediately. They don't get us between the hours, we need to go look for them. And we need to be in environments and be with people that foster that belief and that feeling because there's a beautiful positive domino effect that will happen when we start doing that. And every single cell in our body will respond to that, including our beautiful brain.

Roy Barker 46:05

Yeah, yeah, cuz we are, I think in a lot of instances, you know, like, professionally, especially, but we are like, what the some of the five people that we hang out with, so it's important we be with positive people have the same mindset. And, you know, I think that's a big, big help. It is.

Delia 46:25

And I think, you know, we come back to that research about just having one more thing to do extended the labs by seven years. And that means that they were also healthier, they were focused on you know, the future, they weren't living in the past, they had someone they were doing something for or something, somebody they were doing something with, all of that speaks to communication, it speaks to connection, it speaks to giving from yourself, all of those things, which foster a good laugh across the lifespan.

Roy Barker 46:53

Do you we're running way late. I know we appreciate. It's always such great information. And is there anything, any other points that you wanted to make before we wrap up?

Delia 47:04

No, but I think that there's a word the two words that I want people to take away from this podcast. And then these are words that sound very complex, but they're not. The words are embodied cognition. And those are not words that people are used to hearing. But it's basically saying that our bodies help our brains, work beta, and respond to AI environment. And so the words are embodied cognition, we can't get away from the fact that we have to move our bodies so that our brains work really well.

To get our bodies and our brains to work really well, we have to eat really well, we have to look at our mindset, we have to focus on what we've got to offer and what and the control of our life. So think about embodied cognition, when you go out, I'm not telling anyone to throw away their cane, I'm telling them to think about how they're using their bodies, and the more efficiently they use their bodies, they may be able to leave that candidate home soon.

Roy Barker 48:02

All right, awesome. Advice. Well, so what is a habit or a tool, what is something that you use in your daily life that you feel adds a lot of value, it could be professional, or personally, the one

Delia 48:15

something that I've started doing now, because the wind has been blind, you're so terribly no afternoon, I normally go for a walk. And I really enjoy that. But I started jumping on my trampoline. And I do that on and off. And I really liked it because it does a few things. It keeps me balanced. It obviously increases our steps for the day. And it's a fun thing to do. When you jump on a trampoline, you actually you actually are happy. It's something that kids do, you know. So that's just a silly little thing that I do. So I don't know, if that's what you meant. That's kind of like a fun thing for me.

Roy Barker 48:51

Yeah, no, that's great. I think any, you know, especially with what we've been through, and maybe even, you know, lingering a little bit, finding those things like that, that we can do inside and you know, maybe even out in the bag by yourself to get that motion, because that's one thing I've noticed for myself is, you know, needing to get up for shorter periods, you know, throughout the day, don't sit here all day. And then, you know, try to go out and do something at for five or six o'clock, but try to break it up and have those incremental movements through the day seem to help me a whole lot.

Delia 49:26

Yeah, they do. And you know, Terrry, you mentioned the seven point checklist, and you can add that link to the show notes so anybody can go and download it because there are things that I do still do every day. And one of those is the stretching, you know, for my back. I do that stretch in the I don't know if you've done a stretch is a good one.

Terry 49:45

It really is. I could have stayed there all day.

Delia 49:49

It's a very, it's a great one because it stretches you but it also calms you down and then the forward fold one is a one from yoga as well. I suggest Hey, I'm glad that you've enjoyed that. Those are the little things I do those every single day on that list. But then I didn't do the walks, I did the jumping instead. And I do the jumping as well on top of you know, but if people do those things they will find, as you say, you don't sit for so long, you get up and you do all those other activities. Right? So,

Terry 50:20

yeah, and the breathing and the breathing part of it, too. That's huge.

Delia 50:25

That is very, very important, especially when people are feeling stressed. And as we get older, we can get into a very bad habit of breathing very shallowly. And that's why I put that the the breathing exercise into that simply because it's a habit and you know, a neural pathway, we can create a new one. Yeah,

Roy Barker 50:43

yes. All right, well tell everybody where they can reach out and you know, who who do you like to work with? How can you help them? And of course, how can they reach out and get a hold of you?

Delia 50:55

Thank you, yes, people can visit my website, which is www.LBY.life. And that stands for Lighter, Brighter You.life. People can reach out to me in that way as well. And they'll get that as a gift in exchange for the email address. People can also find me on Instagram. If they're on Instagram, I put recipes and little thoughts and ideas into into that they can find me on Facebook as well under my author name. And also under Lighter, Brighter You and people can find me on LinkedIn. If they want to work with me, either personally, or in a business capacity, they can go to my contact form on my website page, and they can send me an email and we can chat about how I can support them in any way that they may need support.

Roy Barker 51:50

Right?

Terry 51:50

And let's mention your books also. Let's

Delia 51:54

Oh yes, thank you, Terry. My books. Yes. The first book is the Book about the science of how the food that we eat impacts the brain. If people don't want to read about the science, and then just want to take me at my word, after 25 years of research, they can buy the cookbook, which is my second book, which is basically taking the science into the kitchen and using food to keep our mood stable to get our weight under control to prove our sleeping, and of course to get our brain functioning really well so that we can focus and concentrate. So thanks for the reminder, Terry about my books.

Terry 52:29

I look at me recalling.

Delia 52:32

There we go. See there's nothing wrong with your report.

Roy Barker 52:37

Well, as always, it's a pleasure. We love speaking with you and we hope to get you back on again soon. It's always good, a lot of great information, good stuff to think about. So thank you for your time. We appreciate it.

Delia 52:48

It's a pleasure, Roy. It's a pleasure, Terry. Enjoy your evening.

Roy Barker 52:51

Okay, yes. Okay, so that's gonna do it for another episode of AGEUcational. Of course, I'm Roy. You can find us at www.AGEUcational.com. We're on all the social media platforms, probably hanging out on Instagram a little bit more than others. We're also in all the major podcast platforms, iTunes, Stitcher, Google Spotify. If we're not a one that you listen to reach out, I'd be glad to add it. Make your listening easier. Also, a video of this interview will go up when the episode goes live. Check us out on our YouTube channel and some of our past guests as well. So until next time, take care of yourself and take care of your health.

www.lby.life

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