"Moment by moment you create your brain."

That was a statement made at the end of an Ideal Aging lecture at Quail Creek on last week by psychologist Joyce Shaffer, Ph.D, who has spent more than 40 years studying brain activity.

A person can improve how their brain works, Shaffer told the audience, and said that except for some educational and science programs, "watching TV is deadening."

"The brain is plastic; it can change for better or worse depending on lifestyle choices; the goal is to improve on the 23 billion brain cells given at birth," she said.

Shaffer told of a stroke victim who couldn't walk or talk, but after two years of intense physical therapy was back hiking in the mountains and teaching college courses.

When he died six years after having the stroke, an autopsy showed a large area of his brain had been destroyed, yet he was able to hike and teach.

Shaffer said much of "Age Related Cognitive Decline" can be attributed to "diabesity" - diabetes and obesity - but with improved medical care and changes in one's lifestyle the brain's functioning can be improved.

"Without challenge, your brain retires... hearing and sight decline; less clear signals are coming into the brain and it begins to dysfunction... those with hearing loss should try to build in the capacity to hear more clearly," she explained.

To provide challenge to one's brain, Shaffer encourages long-term enriching experiences such as the Japanese mind game Soduku and learning a new language. Both are activities that are new, rewarding - and complex.

With lifestyle choices a person can turn their brain into what she called "a self-fertilizing garden."

"With brain activity you can reverse Age Related Cognitive Decline... humans can create new brain cells at any age.

"Forty minutes of exercise at an aerobic pace four times a week increases neurogenesis in the hippocampus - the critical part of the brain for new memory."

Shaffer also told the audience it's important to keep one's stress level down.

Shaffer is the author of Ideal Aging - 7 Steps to Keep Your Brain Fit. In it she says, "It's comforting to learn that we can increase the number of new brain cells we produce at any age. It's invigorating to realize that 'older and wiser' can be a reality. It's empowering to know that we continually modify our brain architecture with thoughts."

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Ellen Sussman is a freelance writer in Green Valley. Contact her at ellen2414@cox.net