In Make Your Brain Smarter the author of this incredible book explains how you can become your own CEO (aka Cognitive Entrepreneur Officer). The book was written by Sandra Bond Chapman Ph.D. and released in December 2012.

Dr. Chapman is the Founder and Chief Director of the Center for Brain Health at the University of Texas at Dallas. “She has dedicated her life to discovering how the brain bests absorbs complex information, learns to think strategically, and innovates at its optimal level”.

One way I would label this book is to say that I think it is the best self-help book I certainly have ever read!  OMG it is so incredibly ‘right on’ to teaching us things that I think Boomers want to hear and learn about.  I am inspired. I am getting very excited just imagining the series of posts I will write about covering different aspects that Dr. Chapman covers in the book.

Dr. Chapman talks about making your brain smarter at any age.  She offers specific insights for five age groups she calls: The Immediates (13-24 yrs.), The Finders (25-35), The Seekers (36-45), The Thinkers (46-65) and the Knowers (66-100+).  Her research and work focuses on what goes on so to speak in the Frontal Lobe of our Brains.

In future posts I will discuss more of the fascinating scientific work that they have done and plan to continue to perform at the Center for Brain Health. I will also publish a ‘Reader’s Digest’ of ways we can all work on making our brains smarter. My post today will focus on some of the information she shares specifically targeted to the cohort of The Thinkers (biological ages of 46-64).

The Thinkers 

Dr. Chapman labels Boomers as The Thinkers because she says that we view ourselves as thinking from a very unique and different perspective from the generations that came before us. She states that we are part of the healthiest and wealthiest generation and that we feel that with hard work we can change the world and our own standard of living. Cool beans.

She reports that according to a recent MetLife study, our number one health concern is memory problems. We apparently worry about our memory more than any other disease. She says, “we rarely stop to take inventory of all the things our brain remembered at the end of the day-instead we remember the few things that we forgot. Fascinating that we remember what we forgot”.

She states that “memory is important but how a person strategically manipulates information is more vital than how much one remembers”.

She advises us to start investing daily in our brain’s health. “A Thinker’s idea of fitness stops at the neck”.

Thinkers cognitive performance holds up well in 3 core cognitive areas:

• Strategic Attention
• Integrated Reasoning
• And Innovation

Dr. Chapman advises Thinkers to take notice: “You can nurture and improve your mental productivity by strengthening our frontal lobe powers – powers that were difficult to master at younger ages.”

I cannot wait to write more blog posts about the lessons to be learned from this book. I hope you feel that you can’t wait to read them!