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Good afternoon.
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I am so excited to be here.
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I actually film all my shows here
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at the Orange County Performing Arts Center.
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So, innovation is a brain function.
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It is dependent on the physical health of your brain.
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So, did you know obviously, your brain is involved in everything you do:
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how you think, how you feel, how you act, how you get along with other people.
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At the Amen Clinics, we have looked
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at over 63,000 brain scans over the last 20 years,
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and it is very clear to me that your brain is the organ of judgment,
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personality, character, and innovation.
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And when you brain works right,
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you work right.
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And when your brain is troubled,
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you are much more likely to have trouble in your life.
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So what you see on the screen are two brain SPECT scans.
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SPECT is the study that we do in our clinic.
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It is a very sophisticated brain imaging study
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that looks at blood flow and activity patterns.
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It looks at how your brain works.
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And it basically shows us three things: areas of the brain that work well,
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areas of the brain that are low in activity,
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and areas of the brain that are high in activity.
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So good activity, too little, or too much.
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And then our job becomes balancing it.
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The image on your left is a healthy scan.
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It shows full, even, symmetrical activity.
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The color doesn't mean anything, it's the shape.
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The image on the right is an alcoholic scan.
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Alcohol is directly toxic to brain function.
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I know many of you believe
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you have to have your two glasses of red wine a day
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because it's good for your heart.
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It is not good for your brain.
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With a healthy brain, it's very clear to me
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you're happier, healthier, wealthier, you're wiser,
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you're more creative, more innovative.
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When your brain is not healthy, for whatever reason:
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you had a brain injury, you have a terrible diet,
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you live in a toxic environment,
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you're sadder, sicker, poorer, not as smart.
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You're more rigid, and you're inflexible,
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which is the opposite of innovation.
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I've said this tens of thousands of times, and it always blows me away.
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Your brain is the most complicated organ in the universe.
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There is nothing as complex as the human brain, nothing.
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It is estimated we have 100 billion nerve cells.
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And each nerve cell is connected to other nerve cells,
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not in a one-to-one connection,
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but up to 10,000 individual connections between cells.
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Which means you have more connection in your skull
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than there are stars in the Universe.
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Information in your brain travels at about 268 miles an hour.
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Unless, of course, you're drunk.
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And even though your brain is only 2% of your body's weight,
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it uses 20 to 30% of the calories that you consume.
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So, of the breakfast you had this morning, or the lunch you had this afternoon,
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almost a third of it goes to feed 2% of your body's weight.
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Your brain is the most expensive real estate in your body.
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On average, you lose 85,000 brain cells a day.
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And what we've discovered at the Amen Clinics
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is you can accelerate the aging process with your behavior,
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or you can decelerate it.
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How exciting is that?
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The health of your brain also decelerates innovation,
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or it accelerates it.
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So what are the things that hurt your brain?
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Brain injury should be obvious.
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I just finished the largest NFL study,
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brain imaging study on retired NFL players.
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The NFL is no longer lying about brain injuries.
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They're taking it much more seriously.
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Do not let your kids play tackle football, or hit soccer balls with their head.
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Come on, the brain is very soft, about the consistency of soft butter.
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And your skull is really hard,
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and it has many sharp, bony ridges.
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You have to protect it.
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Drugs and alcohol should be obvious,
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but what our country has no clue yet, but is learning,
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is that obesity damages brain function.
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There are now ten studies.
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We just published a study in the Nature journal, "Obesity",
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that says as your weight goes up,
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the actual physical size and function of your brain goes down.
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Whoa.
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That should scare the fat off anyone.
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(Laughter)
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I read that study, the first one that came out about three years ago,
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I dropped 25 pounds.
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I was serious, when it comes to the brain, size matters.
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You do not want a smaller brain.
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(Laughter)
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Smoking constricts blood flow to the brain.
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Like it prematurely ages your skin, it prematurely ages the brain.
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High blood pressure, as your blood pressure goes up,
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the blood flow to your brain goes down.
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So you need to know your blood pressure on a regular basis,
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and if it's high, take it seriously.
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Diabetes, standard American diet, environmental toxins,
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lack of exercise, and something I call ANTs - Automatic Negative Thoughts,
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the thoughts that come into your mind automatically and ruin your day.
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They are the seeds of anxiety disorders and depression.
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So if this is true, it is,
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what are the things you can do to help your brain?
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Positive social connections.
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Unbelievable, the people you spend time with
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determine your longevity.
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Isn't that interesting?
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If you spend time with people
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who have healthy health habits,
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you pick those up, because people are contagious.
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If you spend time with people who do not have healthy habits,
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you die early.
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Become very serious about who you spend your time with.
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New learning, so TED is perfect for this.
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Whenever you learn something new, your brain makes a new connection.
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When you stop learning, your brain actually starts to disconnect itself.
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Diet is absolutely essential.
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You are consuming the nutrients that are helping you,
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or the toxins that hurt you.
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The SAD diet, the Standard American Diet,
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is not only associated with heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.
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It's associated with depression,
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attentional problems, and Alzheimer's disease.
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Food is medicine, or it is poison.
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Sleep, again it's absolutely essential.
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Because you know, in 1900, we got, on average, nine hours of sleep at night.
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In 2011, we get six hours of sleep at night.
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Less than seven hours of sleep, you get lower overall blood flow to the brain.
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Your brain cannot go through that kind of transition
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in such a short period of human history,
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without there being very serious consequences.
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And as sleep goes down, weight goes up,
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because your cravings get out of control.
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So, being physically healthy is important.
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But having anxiety is important.
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Did you know there are great studies with longevity,
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and the children who were
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the "Don't worry, be happy" children die early,
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because they didn't take their health seriously enough.
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I hope I give you a little anxiety.
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You know, I'm a psychiatrist by training.
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I was teaching people to chill out, and what I came to realize,
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is I need to motivate them a little bit and just increase their fear,
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so that the double cheeseburgers are not calling their name.
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Meditation fooled us.
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What we thought, you know, meditate, zone out, brain calms down.
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Absolutely not like that at all.
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When people meditate, it activates the front part of their brain
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which is the most human, thoughtful part of their brain.
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You want the best antidepressant?
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It's not Prozac, it's gratitude.
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You write down three things you're grateful for every day.
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Within three weeks you'll notice
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a significant difference in your level of happiness.
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ANT-killing means don't believe every stupid thought you have.
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You go, "OK, Dr. Amen, you've been a psychiatrist for 30 years.
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Single most important thing people can do?"
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Don't believe every stupid thought you have.
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Have this little question, in your head, "Is it true?"
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So when you feel like your husband doesn't love you, is it true?
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Because when you question your thoughts, you live in a more rational world.
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Here are examples of three 60-year-old brains.
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One with Alzheimer's disease.
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One that is overweight, that has sleep apnea,
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which is a disaster for brain function.
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And a healthy scan.
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Which brain do you want?
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I know which brain I want.
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Here are five ways brain imaging will change everything you do.
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The first thing, it will give you brain envy.
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(Laughter)
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So, I started doing scans in 1991.
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I was 37 years old, and I scanned my own brain.
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And I looked at it, compared to a lot of other scans,
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and I went, "Yuck, too many bumps, bumpy places."
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And I've actually never drank.
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I got drunk when I was 16, I had a hangover for five days.
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I went, "This is not for me."
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Never smoked, never did drugs.
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I'm like, "Why does my brain look so bad?"
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But at the time, I had a lot of bad brain habits.
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I only slept four or five hours a night
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because I was driven.
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I was drinking diet soda like she was my best friend.
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And I carried more weight,
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was under chronic stress, and it showed.
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And so, since I saw my scan, and developed brain envy,
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at 52, I scanned myself again, and it's much younger.
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My brain looks better.
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And you know, you can do that.
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That's the cool thing about the brain.
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You've probably heard about brain plasticity.
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But if you make good decisions today,
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we found this out with our NFL study,
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that you can start to improve your brain within two months.
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It's like, how exciting is that?
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And, with a better brain, everything in your life is better;
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from your body to your money, to your relationships,
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to the level of innovation.
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The second thing is, since brain imaging,
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I would never let my kids play tackle football.
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When does the brain finish developing?
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Twenty-five.
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Your brain, and in males,
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some people think it's more like 28.
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So the idea that you are an adult at 18,
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from the neuroscience perspective, is just flat-out stupid.
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And the insurance companies know that.
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When do your insurance rates change and stabilize? Twenty-five.
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Why? Because you're making better decisions.
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And the decisions you make are a brain function.
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So do not let your kids put their brains at risk.
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You'll take environmental toxins so much more seriously.
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This is one of the firefighters that we scanned recently.
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And you see this overall low activity.
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Those holes? He doesn't have physical holes in his brain.
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What he has is serious overall low activity.
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You'll take your weight a whole bunch more seriously.
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And you'll think about the early detection and prevention of Alzheimer's disease.
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Alzheimer's disease is expected to triple in the next 25 years
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We cannot afford this.
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And how you prevent Alzheimer's disease?
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Is you prevent all the illnesses that are associated with it,
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like heart disease, cancer, diabetes,
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depression, and high blood pressure.
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So, how to create a brain-smart world to accelerate individuals?
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This is my goal.
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And we see individuals and families at the Amen Clinics,
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but we're very interested in schools,
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in churches, businesses, and communities.
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And, I love this.
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Andy came to see me about four months ago.
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First time, about ten years ago,
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when he was 53, and his brain just looked awful.
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And I got him to buy into the program of brain health.
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And, this is what his brain looked like ten years later.
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Isn't that cool?
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And I want to talk about getting systems involved.
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So, I was working on my new show.
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And while I was working on my show, I went to church.
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And my wife said she'd drop Chloe off,
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our seven-year-old, at children's church, and I would go save us seats.
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And, it's at a very large church nearby, and it's not Saddleback.
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And as I walked into church,
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I passed 500 donuts for sale.
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And I was just irritated.
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And then I walked by bacon and sausage cooking on the grill.
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And I'm furious.
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And right before I go into the sanctuary,
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they're cooking hundreds of hot dogs
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for something after church.