I really appreciate the perspective of older ones who have acquired wisdom through their many years of experience. The passage of time teaches us many lessons, if we are paying attention these lessons become cumulative. We can only learn so much through study and research. Experience adds dimension to knowledge and the combination is what gives birth to real world wisdom.

I would like to share with you the wisdom of an exceptional man. Not only is he 97 years old and still going strong, but the depth of his knowledge and experience is extraordinary. He is one of the worlds oldest physicians and educators, and this is a sampling of what he has learned during his considerable lifetime.

Words of Wisdom From a 97-Year-Old

At the age of 97 years and 4 months, Shigeaki Hinohara is one of the world’s longest-serving physicians and educators. He has been healing patients at St. Luke’s International Hospital in Tokyo and teaching at St. Luke’s College of Nursing since 1941.

He has published around 150 books since his 75th birthday, including one Living Long, Living Good that has sold more than 1.2 million copies. As the founder of the New Elderly Movement, Hinohara encourages others to live a long and happy life, a quest in which no role model is better than the doctor himself:

Energy comes from feeling good, not from eating well or sleeping a lot. Hinohara says we all remember how as children, when we were having fun, we often forgot to eat or sleep. He believes that we can keep that attitude as adults, too, and that it’s best not to tire the body with too many rules such as lunchtime and bedtime.

All people who live long — regardless of nationality, race or gender — share one thing in common: None are overweight. For breakfast Hinohara drinks coffee, a glass of milk and some orange juice with a tablespoon of olive oil in it. His lunch is milk and a few cookies. His dinner is veggies, a bit of fish and rice, and, twice a week, 100 grams of lean meat.

Always plan ahead. His schedule book is already full until 2014. In 2016 he plans to attend the Tokyo Olympics!

There is no need to ever retire, but if one must, it should be a lot later than 65. The current retirement age was set at 65 half a century ago, when the average life-expectancy in Japan was much lower.

Share what you know. Hinohara gives 150 lectures a year, some for 100 elementary-school children, others for 4,500 business people.

When a doctor recommends you take a test or have some surgery, ask whether the doctor would suggest that his or her spouse or children go through such a procedure. Contrary to popular belief, doctors can’t cure everyone — so why cause unnecessary pain with surgery? Hinohara thinks that music and animal therapy can help more than most doctors imagine.

To stay healthy, always take the stairs and carry your own stuff. He take two stairs at a time, to get his muscles moving.

Pain is mysterious, and having fun is the best way to forget it. Hospitals must cater to the basic need of patients, and we all want to have fun.

Don’t be crazy about amassing material things. Remember: You don’t know when your number is up, and you can’t take it with you to the next place.

Hospitals must be designed and prepared for major disasters, and they must accept every patient who appears at their doors. Hinohara helped design St. Luke’s so that it was possible to operate anywhere: in the basement, in the corridors, in the chapel. Most people thought he was crazy, but on March 20, 1995, he was unfortunately proven right when members of the Aum Shinrikyu religious cult launched a terrorist attack in the Tokyo subway. St. Luke’s accepted 740 victims and in two hours figured out that it was sarin gas that had hit them. Sadly they lost one person, but they saved 739 lives.

Science alone can’t cure or help people. Illness is individual. Each person is unique, and diseases are connected to their hearts. To know the illness and help people, there is a need for liberal and visual arts, not just medical ones.

Life is filled with incidents. On March 31, 1970, when Hinohara was 59 years old, he boarded the Yodogo, a flight from Tokyo to Fukuoka. The plane was hijacked by the Japanese Communist League-Red Army Faction. He spent the next four days handcuffed to his seat. As a doctor, he looked at it all as an experiment and was amazed at how his body slowed down in a crisis.

Find a role model and aim to achieve even more than they could ever do. Hinohara’s role model was his father, who went to the United States in 1900 to study at Duke University, in North Carolina.

It’s wonderful to live long. Since the age of 65, Hinohara has worked as a volunteer. He still puts in 18 hours, seven days a week, and loves every minute of it.

Source: The Japan Times

Related articles:
7 Things to Know About Yourself
Keeping Your Life in Balance
7 Traits of Highly Confident People
Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life
Choose the Life You Really Want
Finding Joy In The Journey
20 Ways to Save Your Brain

Do you feel like it is getting more difficult to focus your attention, or calculate numbers in your head? I hope you haven’t accepted the notion that a slowdown in mental acuity is an inevitable part of getting older. It’s not!

Many things can contribute to a decline in mental performance, and one of the major contributors is what I like to call the use it or lose it syndrome.

This article was written by Jeff Nickles of My Super-Charged Life. His mission, and the focus of his blog, is to help people find success and meaning in their life. Jeff is an insightful writer and I encourage you to pay him a visit when you finish here.

Jeff compiled this great list to help us avoid the dreaded use it or lose it syndrome, and I am pleased to share it with you.

20 Ways to Train Your Brain for Peak Performance

In order to stay sharp, it is important that you exercise your brain.  The less we use our minds, the duller they become.  There is a lot of emphasis these days on staying physically healthy, but we should also be concerned for our mental well-being.  Our brains continue to expand and adapt to the stimuli they receive throughout our lives.  The more we take care of our brains, the better thinkers we become.  Here are twenty ways that you can develop a training regimen for your brain!

1.  Read a good book. Reading a book stimulates the imagination.  Your brain can’t keep from drawing mental pictures when you read.  Reading gets your mind off its butt and to work.  I love to let a book carry me away.  I always have a book that I’m reading and sometimes I have 3 or 4!  I get most of my books from the library to avoid the cost of buying each one.  This also allows me to try a wide variety of books without risk.

2.  Big Brain Academy. Video games have a bad reputation for causing brain rot, but there are some that will actually help you strengthen your mind.  I like Big Brain Academy for the Wii.  It is a collection of brain teasers that tests your mental acuity.  The tests are entertaining and addicting.  You can even compete with others which will make for some great family fun.

3. Practice meditation. Don’t worry; I’m not going off the new age deep-end here.  There are a lot of different forms of meditation.  To me, in its most simple form, meditation is about spending a little time alone to relax and center your thoughts.  It is amazingly therapeutic.

4. Get plenty of rest. A lack of sleep can interfere with your ability to assimilate new information.  This means those all-nighters you pulled back in college were much less effective than you thought.  Your brain needs rest to operate at its peak performance.  This may be why things always seem clearer and brighter after a good night’s sleep.

5. Exercise regularly. You didn’t think you were going to get away without a little time on the treadmill did you?  Cardiovascular exercise improves blood flow to the brain which improves brain functioning.  One study found that physical exercise actually helped to increase the volume of the brain.  So, if you want a bigger, better brain, then get to exercising!

6. Eat a good breakfast. It is not a myth.  Eating a good breakfast does get you off to a better start.  You should eat a breakfast high in protein and good carbohydrates.  A couple of pieces of whole-grain toast with peanut butter will fit the bill.  Eggs are also an excellent source of protein.  Nuts, milk, and fresh fruit are also great ways to feed your brain.

7. Think positive thoughts. Encourage yourself.  I am convinced that positive thinking increases the effectiveness of the brain and helps to avoid things like depression.  I like to say that your brain works much like a computer, garbage-in, garbage-out.  Find positive, encouraging people to hang around, read material that jazzes you up, do whatever it is that makes you feel good about yourself.  These things will also help you be more mentally productive.

8. Be a continual learner. Never stop being curious about your world.  Seek out new experiences, skills, and knowledge.  Think of something that you’ve always wanted to learn to do and then get started.  A now famous study, showed that certain areas of the brains of London cab drivers were more developed compared to the average citizen.  This was due to their need to learn how to navigate the maze of downtown streets.  We can use this technique of challenging our brains to improve our abilities.

9. Lay off the alcohol. Alcohol is of course a depressant.  It slows down mental functions.  The negative effects of alcohol on a person’s cognitive ability are well-documented.  If you need peak mental performance, then stop drinking alcohol.  In addition to its obvious effects, it also decreases the restfulness of one’s sleep which, as we have already discussed, impedes your ability to think clearly.

10. Get romantic (especially if you’re a woman). Studies have shown that there may be a link between regular sex and improved brain performance in women.  Love-making increases a woman’s estrogen levels and higher estrogen levels are tied to better mental performance.  Of course, the mental benefits probably do not outweigh the risks, unless you are in a faithful, monogamous relationship.

11. Break your routines. Drive a new way to work.  Try writing with your less dominant hand.  Mix things up a little.  This perks up your brain because it requires you to think more.  You aren’t just running on auto-pilot.  Challenge your brain by getting out of your routines and it will respond.  This is a great way to get your mental juices flowing.

12. Stop watching so much television. Researchers have found that too much television between the ages of 1 and 3 leads to attention problems later in childhood.  Let’s face it, TV is mind-numbing.  Get up off the couch and away from the television.  Sure, there is some good educational stuff for children and adults, but the average American watches way too much TV.  If you want peak mental performance, then turn off the boob tube.

13. Work with numbers. Do math problems in your head instead of on a calculator.  For many of us, it is use it or lose it.  We have become mentally lazy.  We rely on our gadgets instead of thinking for ourselves.  Working with and memorizing numbers is a great way to get your brain back in shape.  This could pay off big dividends down the road!

14. Stop relying on your GPS to tell you where to go. Remember the cab drivers in #8 above?  Using your brain to figure out how to get from Point A to Point B is good mental exercise.  You have to use your brain’s ability to determine spatial relationships to effectively read a map and navigate a city.  Traveling in an unfamiliar area is even better!

15. Recall old memories. Get out those old picture albums and start thumbing through them.  This taps into your brains memory banks.  Pictures will help you recall things that you thought you forgot.  Dig deep to see just what all you remember.  If you have other ways to stimulate your memory, like old letters or home movies, then by all means use those too.

16. Make beautiful music. Learning to play a musical instrument is a great way to super-charge your brain.  It requires a number of different parts of your brain to work together to make the melodies that you desire.  Of course, if you are already a musician, then learn a new piece.  Push yourself to learn new techniques.  Music is a great workout for the mind.

17. Speak a new tongue. Many people agree that learning to speak a new language is a powerful way to give the mind a stretch.  If you’ve ever tried to learn even a few new words, then you know this can be difficult.  Of course, the harder something is for the brain, the better!  You have so much more mental capacity than you might imagine.  Give it a try!

18. Memorize a song. Many of us have lots of old songs stored in our heads, but why not expand your memory by learning a few new tunes?  It may take awhile at first, but if you keep at it, you will find it gets easier.  This is your brain getting back in shape.

19. Walk around the house blindfolded. It might seem like a strange activity, but your brain can handle it.  Once you try it a few times, you will probably find it fun and challenging.  Again, this one draws on your memory, motor skills, and reasoning abilities.  What a workout!

20. Expand your vocabulary. Decide to learn one new word a day.  There are several websites out there that can help you with this endeavor.  You’ll not only be expanding your mind, but you’ll also be able to impress your friends and co-workers when you work one of your new words into a conversation.

Get started today and be smarter tomorrow!

There you have it!  I have just given you 20 very practical ways to sharpen your mind.  These suggestions will have your brain back in tip-top shape in no time.  Why are you waiting?  It is time to start exercising your mental muscles!

How do you keep your brain in perfect working order?
Do you have something to add to the list?
The lines are open!

If you enjoyed this article, consider email or RSS updates!?

No one can function very well for very long without a good night’s sleep.  Sure, you may drag yourself to work or otherwise fulfill your daily obligations, but your mind and body will suffer in the long run.

When you aren’t getting quality sleep every night it will affect your relationships, your work and it will definitely affect your health.

Sadly, more and more people are dealing with some form of insomnia these days. Whether it’s restless sleep or something more sever. Our stress levels are only compounded when our sleep is disturbed.

Is a insomnia taking a toll on your life?

It might be if your answer to any of these questions is yes.

1) Do you have trouble going to sleep at night because you can’t switch off your brain?
2) If you wake up during the night do you have trouble getting back to sleep no matter how little sleep you’ve had?
3) Do you wake up in the morning feeling tired and exhausted?

If you answered yes to one or more of those questions…
then I have a great resource to share it with you.

What makes it so great?

* It’s so simple you won’t believe it.
* You can benefit from it starting tonight.
* It won’t cost you anything, and it works.

End insomnia by changing your brain wave frequencies

Everything you do has a dominant brain wave frequency associated with it. When you are in a state of relaxation your brain waves have a certain frequency. When you are awake and alert they have a totally different frequency.

If you have trouble sleeping then you need to slow down your brain wave frequencies from gamma and beta (the 2 high frequencies) to alpha then theta and finally delta (the low frequencies). One very effective way to control your brain wave frequencies is a technology called…

Binaural Beats and here’s how this technology works

Two tones at slightly different frequencies are presented separately, one into each of your ears, using stereo headphones. A beating tone will be perceived, as if the two tones mixed naturally, within the brain.

These two frequencies, when mixed together, result in a different frequency, which aligns your brain waves into a different thinking pattern. This technology allows you to effortlessly coax your brain into the desired state simply by introducing the corresponding Binaural Beats.

For example you can lower your brainwave frequency without going into a ’sleep’ state so you will feel calm and relaxed in just a few minutes. You can also mimic your natural sleep frequencies to be assured of a healthy and relaxing sleep.

There are many other applications for this technology but this free offer deals with relaxation and sleep. I am always on the lookout for simple ways to improve the your quality of life. It doesn’t get much simpler than this.

There are of course other exercises and programs designed to help you sleep but this one is so fast and scientifically sound that I am excited to be able to share it with you. Not to mention that it’s free.

So, if you want to receive three 1 hour Binaural audios at zero cost and end insomnia tonight – here’s the link for this amazing program: Free Binaural Sleep Audios

If you take advantage of this free offer please share your results.

If you have trouble sleeping and would like to discover how to finally end without resorting to sleeping pills, even if you’ve struggled with sleep problems for years, I have a free 41 page special report to help you.

If you enjoyed this article, consider email or RSS updates!

Emotional memories of traumatic life events are stored in a particularly robust way by your brain, making effective treatment very difficult.

Researchers have now successfully tracked down the molecular bases of these strong, persistent memories.

It has long been known that emotional memories of both a positive and a negative kind make strong impressions on your brain, and consequently have a very large effect on your behavior.

The biological component

A research group has shown that the enzyme calcineurin and the gene regulation factor Zif268 decisively determine the intensity of emotional memories. For the first time, this has enabled the regulatory processes at the synapse, which are important for emotional memories, to be linked to the processes in the cell nucleus.

Researchers found that although traumatic memories can be overcome slowly through intensive training, they are not replaced. Negative memories, they say, need to be actively replaced by positive memories.

While the research has no clinical applications at present, it could eventually lead to an understanding of the mechanisms underlying psychological traumas or brain diseases related to memory problems.

Source: Nature Neuroscience

This video is about a form of tapping called EFT. It works on chronic pain, stress, anxiety, weight loss, emotional trauma and just about anything else that you can think of. I was impressed and thought you might be also

Click Here to Learn More - This truly works on everything.