32 Quotes by John J. Ratey

What it means is that you have the power to change your brain. All you have to do is lace up your running shoes.

People think of exercise in terms of physical health, but not mental health,” says Jennifer Shaw, an obstetrician-gynecologist in Brookline, Massachusetts, who is a clinical instructor at Harvard Medical School.

If everyone knew that exercise worked as well as Zoloft, I think we could put a real dent in the disease. Reading.

Humans cannot be born with fully formed brains simply because the resulting head would not fit through the birth canal. Rather, our brains are built and formed after we are born, like a ship in a bottle, a process that takes fifteen, maybe twenty years.

For a short time, one or two hours, stress does wonderful things for the brain,” Sapolsky told the conference. “More oxygen and glucose are delivered to the brain. The hippocampus, which is involved in memory, works better when you are stressed for a little while. Your brain releases more dopamine, which plays a role in the experience of pleasure, early on during stress; it feels wonderful, and your brain works better.