Possibly the most important factor when it comes to brain power is what we eat. It's literally the fuel our brain cells (and every other cell in our body) use. It's not surprising, then, that what we eat has an impact on our ability to focus, our memory, and ultimately our productivity.
I am a researcher, so focused analytical work is my bread and butter. For a long time, I thought I couldn't buckle down and get things done because I lacked discipline. When I said this out loud, I realised it didn't make sense at all. You see, I am my own lab rat, and I have a lot of data on this lab rat, including testimonials identifying me as a shockingly disciplined person. Why, then, could I never concentrate and why did I have huge fluctuations in my productivity?
One important factor is diet.
Foods to Boost Brain Power and Increase Memory
The health and wellness industry has overcomplicated things over the years. In such a busy world with a million things on our plates (haha, pun intended), complicated food advice is the last thing we need (including me.)
So here is the simple answer to the foods you should eat to boost your brain power:
Avoid processed foods: This will help you avoid toxins and inflammation in the body, which negatively affect brain performance.
Eat whole, fresh foods: A varied diet of whole, fresh foods cooked up into delicious meals will do your brain power endless good.
If you want a more comprehensive, targeted approach to foods specifically excellent for boosting brain power and increasing memory, here it is:
Blueberries: They help fight free radicals in your body.
Green leafy vegetables: They are rich in nutrients excellent for the brain and help prevent cognitive decline.
Oily fish: These are fish like fresh tuna, salmon, and mackerel, rich in omega-3s and 6.
Green tea and coffee: There is some evidence that they help support prolonged mental clarity when you need it.
Eggs or milk: They both help regulate your sleep cycle, and better sleep helps you better concentrate.
Nuts and dark chocolate: Dark chocolate has antioxidants, which have anti-aging effects, therefore helping you stay alert. Nuts are again full of good fats that your brain needs.
You can read more about the nutritional properties of these foods if you are interested here and here.
How to Develop Healthy Eating Habits
Information is all well and fine, but implementation is what matters when it comes to looking after our brains.
Personally, I've found the real challenge when it comes to looking after our body and mind is lack of time. This is why we have to systematically embed healthy eating habits to boost our brain power.
Habits stop tasks from being difficult and prevent us from having to spend time thinking about them and using the valuable resources of our hippocampus. Instead, habits move tasks into the autopilot function of our brain, into our basal ganglia. This is the part that helps us do things without thinking. For example, it's how you put your jeans on without really paying attention or immediately flick on the kettle when you enter the kitchen in the morning.
Autopiloting your way to better memory and being more focused and productive sounds great, right? So let's break down how you can build the healthy eating habits you need to improve your focus.
Step 1: One Meal At A Time
Anyone who knows me has heard me say this a million times, and I'll say it again because it's key.
To make healthy eating a habit, we have to break it down and focus on one meal at a time. This is a longer process, I know. Everyone wants to attack everything at once and usually thinks, "I'll start on Monday, no sugar for me, and salads all around," but by Wednesday, we've slipped up. Been there, done that. Here's the science behind why.
Our brain only has so much capacity to think, process, and make decisions. This is why we naturally form habits (some good, some bad) because we reach decision fatigue. Now think about the number of things on your plate: deadlines at work, the argument you're having with your sister, your kid's friend's birthday present you need to pick, the holiday you need to plan, and on and on it goes. What you're eating is one more decision you have to make, and when you're exhausted and have already made a thousand decisions, it's easy to default to your bad habits and pick something that isn't great for you.
Secondly, the key to forming healthy eating habits is identifying where things are going wrong and correcting them. That can be more complicated than it sounds because it's unique to each person. For instance, you might end up choosing to order in again because you're an emotional eater and want comfort food, maybe you didn't plan ahead so you don't have the ingredients or time you need, or you simply can't decide, what to make.
You would need to pause your life if you were to successfully make all these decisions, stick to them, and identify the challenges you face with each of your meals.
Take one meal and allocate the minimum time needed to make lasting changes.
Step 2: Understanding Your Current Habit Loop
When we think about improving our diets and supporting our health, we tend to think we need to make new, healthy habits. In reality, we don't need to make new habits; we need to change existing ones.
Habit Loop Diagram
This is how habits are made, good ones and bad ones. The second step to developing healthy eating habits is really understanding your current eating habits. You may have come across this before - it's commonly known as the 'Habit Loop.'
Here is how it works, based on the research carried out by Charles Duhigg in his book 'The Power of Habit.'
Trigger
This is the reason you are eating the way you are right now. There can be many reasons for why you are the way you are. You might be triggered to eat the way you do by stress, feelings of extreme hunger, time pressures, or all three. You need to identify your current triggers for why you are eating the way you are.
Routine
Now, you need to observe your current behaviour. What are you doing when you are triggered to eat? Are you reaching for your packed lunch of great-brain foods or ordering food too many times a week? Are you replacing meals with junk food desk grazing?
Reward
Finally, you need to identify what reward you get from your behaviour. Habits form because we have satisfied a craving, and when we do that, our brain registers it as a reward.
You might think the reward for your action is obvious. You were hungry, and now you are not hungry. If it were only hunger, wouldn't a hearty salad with some grilled salmon satisfy it? If it were just wanting help to focus, would a cup of green tea not suffice? If it were a break, would sitting in front of the TV not do? You need to get real about what you are craving.
What you are craving might surprise you. When I went through this exercise myself, I discovered that my craving was...rest! I got into a habit of eating too much junk food (and having a hard time settling at my desk) because I was exhausted and wanted a break from difficult mental tasks.
It's worth taking notes at this stage to help you identify your patterns. It may surprise you to learn your craving has absolutely nothing to do with food.
Understanding your current habit loop will help you identify if you are deviating from a way of eating that will support your brain power and ability to concentrate.
Step 3: Modifying Your Habit Loop (Making Healthy Eating Habits)
If you have spent years thinking you need to learn to like healthy foods, modify your cravings, and form an attachment to kale, then I'm here to tell you that's simply not true. You can't make yourself crave something you don't, but you can reward yourself differently.
To embed healthy eating habits you have to adjust your existing habit loop. Here's how:
Trigger
Your trigger is your trigger, whether it's time of the day (lunchtime!), the feeling of hunger, or the occasion (like socializing with friends or family). If you are being triggered to eat foods that don't support your brain power, you need to plan how you will respond to them to avoid falling into your old, bad habits. This is backed by science. People who plan are more successful at building the habits they want.
Whatever the trigger is, boredom, feeling hungry, or wanting a break, you need to plan how you are going to address them without turning to unhealthy foods that destroy your brain power and focus.
Alternatively, if you can, avoid your triggers by changing up your day. If you know you always grab crisps after lunch when you walk into the kitchen, don't go to the kitchen; go elsewhere first.
Routine
This is the important one. When it comes to changing your habits, you need to decide what your new behaviour is going to be. For instance, if your trigger is feeling extremely hungry, which makes you want food fast, your new behaviour might be to keep your lunch packed and ready to eat in the fridge.
Reward
Your routine should be rewarding. What you were really craving needs to be satisfied for you to embed a habit.
When I started working on filtering out my bad snacking habit, I realised that didn't mean I didn't think about junk food. You could say I still craved it but simply had a well-laid plan to avoid the trap. At first, this is the case because, as they say, 'old habits die hard.' You are literally rewiring your brain after all.
Giving yourself a satisfying reward will help you stay on track to continue practising until the habit is formed. It doesn't help you completely forget your old ways immediately.
Summary
Here is a quick guide to the 4 steps you need to follow to build healthy eating habits to boost brain power:
1. Pick one meal at a time to fix: Pick one meal to fix at a time. This might be breakfast, morning snack, lunch, post-lunch snack, dinner, or post-dinner snack. It depends on what your eating schedule is like.
2. Identify your current eating habits: To do this you need to identify your triggers, your current routine and the reward you are looking for.
3. Adjust your habit loop: Create healthy eating habits that support your brain power by planning ahead for your triggers, setting up new routines, and making sure you satisfy your real cravings.
4. Boost your brain power: Try incorporating brain-boosting foods like blueberries, leafy greens, oily fish, green tea, eggs, nuts, and dark chocolate into your new healthy eating habits.
