How to train your brain to become smarter?

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The best way to protect yourself from the increasing inequality, changing job market, and cognitive ageing is to aggressively invest in the best asset you have — your own brain.

The brain we have as homo sapiens is [arguably] great compared to the brains of other species. Yet it has many well-known limitations. We know that in terms of evolution our brain still thinks we live in the Stone Ages. We know that the dumber “part of” our brain is stronger and quicker than the conscious “part”, and that our “conscious brain” resource — as well as willpower — is rather finite and easily depleted. We know that we are predictably wrong about many things, including the most important decisions we make in our lives [and these are the most important decisions, according to ourselves!]. We also know that people vary a lot. Invisible (brain) differences are greater than visible differences across humans. And, speaking about intelligence, we know that IQ is almost as hereditary as height. It’s easy to think that Bill is just lucky and Albert is born that way.

Yet our brain is the most important asset we have. It will help us adapt and — to a large degree — will define our [financial, hierarchical and social] success in future. If you don’t care about success, you probably care about “happiness”. In that case, our brain defines our happiness, but this is not the topic of this post.

So can we change our brain or are we destined to live with whatever we have?

The answer to this question has to do with brain plasticity. Brain plasticity is brain’s ability to change physiologically and functionally as a result of stimulation by forming new neural connections and pathways. The implication is that every person can improve his or her intelligence by deliberately training the brain. Isn’t that beautiful? To me, this is one of the most positive and empowering scientific discoveries of the last decades because it basically means we have certain power over own brains, beyond genetics and evolution.

How can you train your brain?

Generally speaking, we can train our brains by deliberately exposing ourselves to “enriched environments”. Most of this type of research was done on rats (of course!), where “enriched environments” mean harder and more diverse mazes. It has been shown numerous times that rats living in more stimulating environments have physically different brains with significantly more neural connections.

For humans, the often cited “enriched environments” are education (it is proven that the the level of education is correlated with the “size” of the brain), travel, and foreign languages. Then these is the usual talk about good sleep, good food, and exercise, which is— of course — always a good advice. To me, though, it all sounds like basic “feel good” advice, that’s why I don’t like it. These suggestions are too generic, simplistic and seem to miss the most important point.

The most important point is defining what these specific activities are and when they have a significant effect on the brain. According to the research, the conditions for neuroplasticity are the following:

• The stimulations should be unfamiliar
• The stimulations should be regular
• The stimulations should progressively increase in difficulty

Additionally, for the learning to produce sustainable results (=become part of the unconscious brain) the following conditions should be met:

• The learning tasks should be clearly defined
• The feedback should be quick and clear

To illustrate the last two points, think about an anaesthesiologist and a radiologist. The former learns quickly because he gets a very quick and clear feedback from the patient. The latter may never really learn, as the feedback is coming with a long delay and isn’t straightforward. [Now think about your job and the feedback you get.]

So, lets take some examples of activities that are often cited in relation to brain training:

• Education: bachelor degree some X years ago is no longer enough to consider oneself “brain trained” for the rest of the life. Getting a second or nth advanced degree, participating in a high quality business incubator, doing an MBA, preparing for a difficult exam (think CFA type) every 3–4 years is what is probably required to continue growing, or at least maintaining, the brain cells
• Continuous education: reading a 10th book on a relatively familiar topic or having a corporate training session once in a while is unlikely to create new neural pathways, while regularity taking courses in coding, quantum physics or at least reading books like Hawking’s Brief History of Time will probably help keeping the brain busy [assuming this is new to you]
• Foreign languages: taking that French book every 6 months before going to Paris will probably not make it, neither will learning basic Portuguese on top of native Spanish; while learning Chinese 2–3 times a week will probably stimulate your Broca’s area [for a Westerner]
• Travel: comfort travel to yet another European country is unlikely to do enhance the neural connections, especially if your plans are similar to the ones of your prior trip; spending 6 months back-packing around Latin America on $5 a day might do some stimulation magic

Now, all the above activities are quite time consuming, which may make them pretty unsustainable. Here are some long-lasting things we can [shall I say “should”?] do:

• Choose a stimulating job: a job that constantly changes or you have an ability to redefine it, a job where you can grow to take on more responsibility and learn truly new skills, a job that is intellectually challenging (in my case, this is why I chose management consulting)
• Move to a new country every 5 years or so, or at least move within the country or the city often; learn the ins and outs of the new culture, select and adopt the parts of the culture that make sense to your conscious self
• Have a very [!] ambitious goal and pursue it religiously: again, let’s not mean a “to do” list that you know you can do, and lets not mean another set of French lessons or yet another self-help book or another 10 days of a new diet; let’s think about something which can bring you to a new level, something for what you will have to think differently if you are to succeed; change your career, get a significantly more senior role, start a new business [that gives you at least as much money as your current job]
• Surround yourself with people who are way smarter than you are: and I mean significantly smarter. Have you ever experienced this feeling when you speak to someone about a topic you think you know quite well just to realise that that person has a way deeper levels understanding? If not (or not in the last couple of weeks), you are missing out on your brain development; being “the smartest person in the room” is destroying our brains’ ability to grow
• Surround yourself with people who do what you think is impossible for you: if you think that having a high flying career and raising kids at the same time or earning a 7-digit income is impossible, talk to the people who do it, understand what they believe and do that makes it possible; don’t just listen to their stories like a fiction audio book
• Incorporate stimulating activities into your every day tasks: if you have activities that are in your head “men’s tasks” or “my wife’s domain” type of activities, it’s time you reconsider for the sake of brain plasticity; try drilling holes, assembling IKEA furniture, drawing birthday cards, baking a child’s elaborate birthday cake, learn to optimise your taxes… and, eh, do it every week

Now, let’s talk about formal train training solutions available on the market:

1. BrainHQ — this is [arguably] the only brain training program that was developed in cooperation with by top tier neuroscientists (Merzenich) and has some proofs of the effects beyond the game itself
2. Cofnifit — testing and training tool that also has some studies supporting its effectiveness. I have not tried it myself yet, but I think the tests are useful for initial diagnostics. There are also some medical tools and tools for kids, check them out

3. Brainworks — tool developed in cooperation with Carol Dwek, the author of the best-selling book Mindset about the fixed and growing mindsets. While I do not recommend her book (read The Brain that Changes Itself instead), the tool gives a good overview of how the brain works and is dedicated to kids (to whom it may concern). I am not sure if it helps with school performance (as they claim in the book), but the tool is definitely useful for the kids to acquire the basic knowledge and vocabulary to talk and think about thinking.

4. Lumosity (app) — the effect beyond the game has not been proven and the company had to pay $2M for “false claims”, but the app is very well designed and feels stimulating; I am not sure if I can trust this feeling but playing is definitely fun. Train of Though game is pure joy. And yes, I do not totally buy “false claims” argument [in the world of abundant junk food, false news, misleading results calls, and outrageous investor presentations].

6. FastforWord is a tool initially designed for people with substantial language impairments. Michael Merzenich — one of the world’s top neurosciences — contributed as a co-founder. I have not tried this tool myself (meaning on my son), but again there is real science and clinical results behind it.

7. Tailored solutions exist for people with specific difficulties that are usually distributed directly to schools or other educational institutions. It is important to understand that all these tools started mostly for people with learning disabilities, which does not mean that they should only be used for these people. I cant stress this enough. Improving own intelligence and brain’s function is a must for everyone who has certain ambitions, simply because it will be necessary for the success in our “100-year-lives”.

The best example of a tailored school (that I am aware of) is the school of Barbara Arrowsmith Young. Her own story is amazing proof of what’s possible in terms of improving one’s brain. At school Barbara could not tell time or understand any abstract ideas (that includes jokes, fractions, concepts like “aunt”, cause-and-effect, you name it), she had poor control of her whole left part of her body, and had difficulty reading the maps and orienting in the tree-dimensional space. She tried to commit suicide but was not physically able to do so. Faced with no professional help, she designed exercises for herself to learn reading the watch. And she became so good at it, that the effect spread to other skills, such as understanding philosophy books and ultimately becoming a fully functional human with achievements beyond those of “average” people. Her TED talk is highly recommended.

So, her school is in Canada, there is some cooperation with international schools. The school is offline and primarily focuses on learning disabilities. I am convinced, however, that this kind of education has a mass market potential for “regular” people or people with slight weaknesses in various parts of our brains (which includes all of us).

When I decide that my consulting job is not intellectually stimulating enough, I would love to make these kind of tools accessible to all interested! Stay tuned. And train your brain.