Hey Brainiacs,
Welcome to this week's newsletter! I am super excited because this week we will be exploring the inner workings of my book. Plus, check out my three top tips to help reduce stress.
Chapter Breakdown
My book takes you on a journey, starting with identifying and unlearning negative patterns, moving on to shifting your inner narrative about yourself, and finally, maintaining and boosting your new positive thinking patterns and habits. I help you identify where your programming has come from and where you want it to go. And each chapter stands alone, so you can dive come back to them at any point.
The book starts with a little introduction to neuroplasticity, how the brain changes, how the brain develops, and mental heuristics! These themes underlie each chapter that follows.
Then we make our way to Phase 1: Ditch the Negative.
This section will help you to see where negative patterns come from and teach you to dismantle them.
Break the Cycle
This chapter delves into key contributors to the negative patterns in our lives; most importantly, stress! I outline different kinds of stress and explain how to relieve bad stress. Check out the end of this newsletter for a sneak preview.
Negativity Bias
I covered this briefly in a newsletter, so if you want a sneak peek, check that out.
The Power of Your Thoughts
I also covered this briefly in a newsletter! But in this chapter, I develop that further, talking about how the narrative we tell ourselves about ourselves influences everything about us.
Creeping Normality
Here I explain how small negative things that we are told about ourselves can slowly build into a negative narrative, without us even noticing.
You’ll See It When You Believe It
This chapter explains confirmation bias, and how our beliefs affect our attention and focus. I talk about how emotions, behaviours, and thoughts influence one another, the underlying principle of cognitive behavioural therapy.
Endings, Loss, and Grief
Here we get personal. I talk about my own experiences with grief and loss and endings. I explain how endings cause extreme stress and grief, and how we can use different activities to boost neurochemicals that help resolve this.
We move swiftly onto Phase 2: Shift Your Narrative.
This section includes a quick introduction chapter, followed by 7 detailed steps about how to rewire your thinking and shift your narrative to a new positive you!
The final part of the book is Phase 3: Boost the Positive.
Here I help you explore various ways of maintaining the changes you made in Phases 1 and 2. This will help you boost those positive thought patterns that your brain is beginning to rewire.
Increase Mental Resilience
Here I walk you through how we can build mental resilience and increase our threshold for stress. I highlight how this building of resilience is all possible through neuroplasticity.
Growth Mindset
Mindsets again! See my past newsletter to get a better idea of what I’ll be discussing in this chapter.
The Muscle-Brain Axis
In this chapter, I talk about the science behind how exercise improves our mental health. Stay tuned for next week’s newsletter, where there will be more about exercise!
Supercharge your Sleep
We delve into how important sleep is, not just for your overall health but also for neuroplasticity!
Your Happiness Is Now
That’s right, I’m talking all about dopamine in this chapter. And I’ll be teaching you how to use our knowledge about dopamine to your benefit.
Self-Trust and Confidence
Here I guide you through some steps to help you build trust in yourself, helping you to become more confident and consistent in your life.
If this sounds like a bit of you, it would mean the world to me if you pre-ordered!
3 Tools to Navigate Stress
As I’ll discuss in my book, stress can be a good thing1. We need stress to be alert and focused. The problem is prolonged and chronic stress1. So here’s three ways to help relieve the bad stress:
The Physiological Sigh2.
The physiological sigh requires two inhales followed by a long exhale. The two inhales create an increased surface area within your lungs, removing excess CO2, and creating relaxation. The long exhale signals to the brain to reduce heart rate, intensifying the relaxed feeling.
Increase Endorphins through Exercise, Singing, or Dancing3,4,5.
Physical activity, in the form of exercise or dancing, and signing have all been shown to boost endorphins, which in turn reduce stress and pain!
Hobbies to take your mind off stress!
Things like gardening, puzzles, reading, painting and pretty much anything you might enjoy that isn’t related to your stress are great ways of shifting your focus away from stressors.
Until next week,
Nicole x
P.S. Please leave comments with what topics you’d like to be covered in future weeks!
References