More brain work please...and make it difficult!

"One should not pursue goals that are easily achieved. One must develop an instinct for what one can just barely achieve through one's greatest efforts." —Albert Einstein

Weeks ago, I read this Scientific American guest article in bed and then drifted to sleep. The article was all about making the mind work and since that night it's been working on my mind. The author, behavioral therapist and autism expert Andrea Kuszewski, began by sharing a fantastic story about increasing IQ in kids with autism by over 20 points! Then, the article went into different ways of putting your neurons to work. Finally, I was dazzled by her works cited. I'm a geek, but so what?

I loved this article because it explored the mind, one of my favorite topics, and the article also made me a little uncomfortable. It was the same kind of discomfort caused by that The Atlantic article about Google's effect on the mind called "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" I don't think Google makes us stupider, but it does make us more complacent by making everything easier. Kuszewski would argue that makes your mind a lazy sh*t (my words, not hers.) I also experienced a similar type of discomfort after reading Malcolm Gladwell's book Blink.

Kuszewski's article touches on a couple things that hit very close to home for me. For example, I will forever curse the invention of Autocorrect and blame it for my atrocious spelling (truth be told - I misspelled "atrocious" AND "misspelled" during the creation of this blog post). My buddy Carlie once told me she would always backspace and retry to spell those words with the little red squiggles under them. I wish I would've had the smarts to have done the same. It would have saved me a lot of grief.

This article covered so many parts of my interest about the mind and the human abilities to think, remember and learn. I've read, reread and recommended this article to many. I STRONGLY urge you to enjoy this article and learn a couple of great ways to make your brain do work!

Read: You can increase your intelligence: 5 ways to maximize your cognitive potential