The document summarizes 10 key threads or insights from Norman Doidge's work on neuroplasticity. The threads discuss how plasticity affects the entire brain, the role of the nucleus basilis in attention and memory, how learning a new language in old age improves memory, and how limited sensory feedback from shoes can impact walking in old age. Other threads discuss how unlearning is harder than learning, why addictive experiences are more exciting than satisfying, why we enjoy being in love, and how psychotherapy involves turning past relationships that haunt us into parts of our history. The final threads discuss the left hemisphere's tendency to inhibit the right, and how love creates a generous state of mind.

1. The Enchanted Loom
Teasing sturdy threads from
neuroscience masterworks

2. Teasing 10
threads from
Norman
Doidge’s…

3. Thread 1:
Plasticity is a property of all brain tissue.
And you can’t have plasticity in isolation.
Grow new cells or connections in one area,
and you affect the cells and connections in
other
areas.
(pg. 97)

4. Thread 2:
The nucleus basilis helps us pay attention
and remember what we are experiencing.
It’s like a teacher
in your brain
saying,
“This is really
important –you
have to know
this for the
exam of life.”
(pg. 80)

5. Thread 3:
Learning a new language in old age is good
for improving and maintaining memory in
general.
(pg. 87)

6. Thread 4:
Shoes worn for decades, limit the sensory
feedback from our feet to our brain.
In old age we’re
forced to use canes,
walkers or crutches
to compensate.
Walking barefoot
over uneven terrain
can work to restore
the connections.
(pg. 90)

7. Thread 5:
Competitive plasticity is why “unlearning”
is harder than learning, and why it is best
to get early
childhood
education
right,
before bad
habits get a
competitive
advantage.
(pg. 60)

8. Thread 6:
Addictive experiences are more exciting
than satisfying because we have two
separate pleasure systems in the brain,
one that has to do with exciting pleasure
and the
other
that has
to do with
satisfying
pleasure.
(pg. 108)

9. Thread 7:
We love being in
love not only
because it
makes it easy for
us to be happy,
but also because
it makes it harder
for us to be
unhappy.
(pg. 114)

10. Thread 8:
The left hemisphere normally acts like a
bully, inhibiting and suppressing the right.
When the left
hemisphere is
intentionally
quieted, the
right’s
uninhibited
potential
can emerge.
(pg. 115)

11. Thread 9:
Psychotherapy is often about turning our
ghosts into ancestors. We are often haunted
by unconscious
relationships from
the past. Working
them through
means they go
from haunting us
to simply being
part of our history.
(pg. 243)

12. Thread 10:
Love creates a globally generous state of
mind.
(pg. 154)

13. Image Credits:
Title Page: http://www.rappler.com/science-nature/23193-personality-traits-brain-scans
Slide 3 - http://roddh.deviantart.com/art/Neural-Network-210215720
Slide 12 - http://bit.ly/1G9j9Wd
Slide 2 - http://tvo.org/guest/norman-doidge
Slide 6 - http://blog.febc.org/barefoot-souls-gave-shoes-anyway/
Slide 5 - http://bit.ly/1Jo6EZi
Slide 11 - http://bit.ly/1H4fxWl
Slide 10 - http://clickandtreat.com/wordpress/?p=1365
Slide 14 - http://www.rappler.com/science-nature/23193-personality-traits-brain-scans
Slide 9 - http://bit.ly/1SYb2kQ
Slide 8 - http://www.deviantart.com/art/guilty-pleasure-95860358
Slide 7 - http://globalmeditation.net/blog/
Slide 4 - http://www.oddee.com/item_99059.aspx

14. Mark Brady, PhD
TheEnchantedLoom@gmail.com
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