My Creative Brain In The Frying Pan of Life - Oww Vs Wow

Learning a new skill means I have to have someone show me, I try it out, and then I have to practice, practice, practice. I was fortunate to have a mother that gave me music lessons as a kid, and so I learned about skill unconsciously. Once I became conscious of the mechanics of a skill, it helped me a lot in later life. I can be a slow learner, and that's ok as long as I'm learning, because I love life learning.

This post is a continuation of yesterday's, because I am learning the new skill of exercising and how to grow my "Wow Brain".
I thought this picture depicted a good expression of how I feel about my 'Oww Brain', like I am a prisoner of my own brain. I'm not sure who's painting it is. I'm thinking the highly imaginative, talented, funny, and skilled artist  Mark Byran.

Since yesterday, I've been absorbing and contemplating very intently, about Canadian, (yes he's ours!), Todd Herman's eye-poppin, eye-opening explanation of the 'Oww Brain' and the 'Wow Brain'. Todd says, we are all in possession of both aspects of this brain at different times, on a genetic, and hormonal level. The great news is, we can turn things around once we understand how our brain cells work with all those endorphins and dopamine swishin' around. Well isn't that a great thing to find out! Honestly, it was the big aha and eureka moment for me yesterday, after seeing Todd's video on Marie TV.

For those of you who don't want to watch the video, but I suggest you do watch it , a couple of times, cause humans a real good at forgettin', but regardless, let me explain the highlights.

The oww brain or the pain brain I'll call it for now, can kick in when we are trying to make a change in a habit for the better, we protest and say eww! This hurts. We're stuck, bored and want to stay in our safe warm place.

Flip that big gray matter over in the big fryin' pan of life, and we have the wow or pleasure brain. Wowweewoowow! Now were talkin', the fun brain I'll call it, which says, Oh yeah baby! Bring it on! All about the feelin' good.

When that fun brain is workin' it, it's all about Growth, Confidence, and Adventure. Now this is where the magic happens. Now I know it's not exactly magic, but science, though it feels like magic it to me, because it is so darn exciting to know the facts, and to have the knowledge to change ourselves and our lives for the positive. Finally it really does feel like, everything IS really figureoutable, as Marie Forleo's mama says.
God bless our mamas!

So here's the best part.

When Growth and Confidence overlap this gives us Momentum and we get unstuck.

When Confidence and Adventure overlap this gives us Excitement, the opposite of boredom.

When Growth and Adventure overlap this gives us Transformation and at this point we have left our safe warm place.

This brain mash up results in Leadership.
So hopefully all this will help my creative brain to go from the frying pain into the fire in a good way of course.

My Wow Brain - Catherine Meyers

Are You A Neutrino?

Poppa Neutrino

I have a life long friend Rodger, with whom I grew up with in Amherst, Nova Scotia. I've known him since I was a teenager. We were actually both born the same year, 1953.

There was a gaggle of us kids who hung out together at the local hole in the wall, the very funky Y.M.C.A., where we had those big spools for tables you could get from the Power company, and they were covered in carpet. We had old couches and chairs, a pool table, and a ping pong table and even a "Blue Room" for those gals and guys who wanted to catch a few snogs in the corner. Most importantly it was were we learned about ourselves, the real meaning of leadership and we developed our values.

Safe to say we are all pretty grateful for having such a great example that was set for us, by Arden, a compassionate and very intelligent man, a young 27 year old director, then about ten years older than most of us. He was truly a great example and mentor, who went on to bigger and better things, making the world a better place. The Amherst 'Y' would never be the same without him. Arden greatly cared about a bunch of wild and crazy teenagers, got us off the streets, kept us safe and happy as possible, and gave us all a lot of special memories. He made all the difference in all of our lives, in one way or another, and we are all grateful to him. I know we didn't realize then, how very fortunate we were to have him in our lives.

Once our group of friends left the Y.M.C.A. for the day, or on other occasions, my friend Rodger would often invite all of us down to his house, where we would play pool, board games, and eat copious amounts of junk food and just have a lot of clean wholesome fun. His parents always welcomed us, and there was never any illicit substances involved, at least not at Rodger's house.

Of course we all thought we were pretty cool, but weren't, but little did all of us know just how cool Rodger was, and what he was going to do in the future. This blog post is just about that, what my friend Rodger did in 1998. We all need to take risks, face our fears, follow our desires, be ourselves and walk our own path. That takes real guts, and makes us feel fully alive with conviction.

 I'm so proud and happy for my friend Rodger that he faced his fears, took a risk, and how it changed his life forever. He's another example for those of us living on the side lines of life as bystanders, as opposed to participators.
 Here's the link to the preview of what Rodger and the Neutrinos did. http://www.films.com/ecTitleDetail.aspx?TitleID=26238

I found a really compelling blog post about the Neutrinos that gives a great overview.

As the Neutrino website says 'anyone who stays true to their deepest desires and who lives by their own script is indeed a Neutrino.' Rodger certainly has done this, and I hope we all are or will be some time, some where along the way become Neutrinos.