Why our minds need progressive overload too

Is Mental Education on the curriculum yet?

I enjoyed PE (physical education) at school. I’m competitive and love sport. I less enjoyed the dodgy kit and getting hit on my already blue knees with a hockey ball in sub-zero temperatures.

You learn the basics of team work, playing by the rules and it reinforces how physical activity is key to being fit and healthy — a good lesson to learn. My school did its best to make sure water was our drink of choice and a piece of fruit was on hand for break time.

All well and good but what about our mental education? The curriculum and methods of teaching have no doubt (I hope) progressed since I left school, but I don’t recall learning how to use my brain or look after my mind. That may sound daft but even through university, it felt as though the purpose was to fill your brain but no instruction on how to use it. Or did I not do it properly? Too late now — I’m almost done with my student loan.

I get understanding yourself and how you absorb information comes with age, maturity and perhaps even depends on how developed our brain actually is. When we’re younger and our brain is developing, essentially a sponge soaking up information but what we do with it, is a different matter.

It’s only in the last five years I’ve realised how I learn. Partly through my work, partly through my own wanky self-development. Unsurprisingly, I best absorb information through reading then writing it down — whether verbatim or in random notes. I can also take in a lot of information when listening to podcasts, radio or audio books but only when I’m on the move. When I hear something interesting I pause it, stop walking to make a note in my phone. Yep, I am an annoying person to commute behind. If I need to Google instructions for something, I will opt to read a 10-step guide over watching a YouTube demo. It’s how I absorb information.

Did you know that our brains can change? Mind blown.

Neuroplasticity, also known as brain plasticity, neuroelasticity, or neural plasticity, is the ability of the brain to change continuously throughout an individual’s life.

I’m ashamed to say I only found this out two years ago. I knew I should have done Psychology.

Without sounding too grandiose — our mind is the most powerful part of who we are, but for some reason we don’t value the growth of it as much as we do our bodies. To transform the way our body looks and feels, we can build muscle; which has lots of benefits beyond aesthetics. Building muscle requires consistent progressive overload of weight, over a considerable period of time. It requires planning ahead to ensure your programme hits each muscle group, you’re adequately fuelling yourself, and including time for recovery.

Many of us wouldn’t think twice about this level of effort in the quest for #bodygoals, but the same people can’t fathom spending 10 minutes a day on their own to check in with what’s going on in their head. Why? Probably because it’s not tangible and there is no immediate payoff — but the same applies to building muscle or changing your body. You don’t eat one salad and lose weight. You don’t to the gym once and grow biceps. You show up daily — if your lucky you’ll get an endorphin hit which keeps you coming back the following day. The bigger pay-off is the months, years later down the line when it’s become part of who you are.

We need to view meditation, jotting down our thoughts or a quiet moment to ourselves as our mental progressive overload. It needs to be as much a part of our daily routine as going to the gym or preparing healthy snacks. Again, the payoff won’t be immediate but it will in the long-term.

The conversation around mental health continues to grow and I’m sure or hope the education system will play significant role in that change.

Because we should first work on our mind before we go about changing our body.

By the time I was 15, PE lessons became that bit awkward as everyone (including boys) start to become aware of our body and self-conscious about all the bits you deem imperfect or not up to scratch. 15 years old and we’re already picking ourselves apart, thinking this needs to get smaller and these definitely need to get bigger.

This is where mental resilient and an understanding on how we think, process our thoughts becomes invaluable. When impressionable girls and boys are being fed misinformation, it could save a lot of their time and angst chasing an unattainable body for a reason they don’t know. Beyond ‘that’s what everyone else is doing’, let’s encourage them to understand themselves, their values to start directing the conversation in the right way.

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