Change Your Brain: #1 Neuroscientist’s Exercise Protocol for Peak Energy and Focus

Order your copy of The Let Them Theory 👉 https://melrob.co/let-them-theory 👈 The #1 Best Selling Book of 2025 🔥 Discover how much power you truly have. It all begins with two simple words. Let Them. — This episode will change your brain forever. World-renowned neuroscientist Dr. Wendy Suzuki is here to share new research around the brain-changing benefits of exercise. Dr. Suzuki is the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at New York University and is a leading researcher known for her areas of memory, psychology, and neurobiology. She's a pioneer in researching how moving your body and exercising improves your brain health, and today she is here to teach you the best exercise is to improve brain function, the #1 way to strengthen your mind, and the antidote to aging. Dr. Suzuki also reveals the 10-minute routine you should do every day to lower your risk of dementia and improve memory. You will get her step-by-step guide to boost energy, focus, and mood. Dr. Suzuki’s practical tips and fascinating insights will empower you to take control of your mind and your life—starting today. And you’re going to want to listen to this entire episode because there is a shocking surprise you won’t want to miss. For more resources related to today’s episode, click here for the podcast episode page: https://www.melrobbins.com/podcasts/episode-218 Follow The Mel Robbins Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/themelrobbinspodcast I’m just your friend. I am not a licensed therapist, and this podcast is NOT intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional. Got it? Good. I’ll see you in the next episode. In this episode: 0:00 Introduction 4:28 What you can do today that will change your brain forever. 6:09 What renowned neuroscience says about your “big fat fluffy brain”. 7:05 What neuroplasticity is and how to use it to change your brain…and your life. 9:12 Brain health 101: why it’s the key to unlocking your potential. 15:27 Dr. Suzuki’s neuroscience epiphany that changed her life forever. 22:03 You’ll never believe what Dr. Suzuki brought in a hat box. 32:11 A bubble bath for your brain: how moving your body supercharges your mind. 35:05 The unbelievable changes exercise makes on your focus, energy, and mood. 37:30 Want to uplevel your morning? Add this to your morning routine. 47:12 What you need to know about the hippocampus. 50:26 The 10-minute routine you should do every day to lower your risk of dementia and improve memory. 55:48 The true power of the phrase “I love you”: why it matters and when to use it. — Follow Mel: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/melrobbins/ TikTok: http://tiktok.com/@UCk2U-Oqn7RXf-ydPqfSxG5g Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/melrobbins LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melrobbins Website: http://melrobbins.com — Sign up for Mel’s newsletter: https://melrob.co/sign-up-newsletter A note from Mel to you, twice a week, sharing simple, practical ways to build the life you want. — Subscribe to Mel’s channel here: https://www.youtube.com/melrobbins?sub_confirmation=1 — Listen to The Mel Robbins Podcast 🎧 New episodes drop every Monday & Thursday! https://melrob.co/spotify https://melrob.co/applepodcasts https://melrob.co/amazonmusic — Looking for Mel’s books on Amazon? Find them here: The Let Them Theory: https://amzn.to/3IQ21Oe The Let Them Theory Audiobook: https://amzn.to/413SObp The High 5 Habit: https://amzn.to/3fMvfPQ The 5 Second Rule: https://amzn.to/4l54fah

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Mel Robbins?

  Hey, it's your friend Mel and welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast.

• 0:08Mel Robbins?

  I just finished recording the conversation that you're about to hear. I don't even know how to describe what just happened in the studio. You're about to go on a journey into your own mind. This is a conversation so powerful and shockingly personal with the incredible neuroscientist, Dr. Wendy Suzuki. Dr. Suzuki, she just left, like the door just shut and now I'm sitting here, my head is spinning. She's going to teach you the astonishing ways you can transform your life just by taking care of one thing, your brain. This conversation is packed with everything that you love, groundbreaking research, mind-blowing

• 0:53Mel Robbins?

  takeaways, deeply personal stories that are truly going to hit home. But here's what I didn't see coming. There were tears, lots of tears, and get this, she brought a human brain, a real human brain into the studio. And I held it.

• 1:15Mel Robbins?

  This isn't just another episode. This is a conversation you're going to remember and thank yourself for listening to for the rest of your life.

• 1:33Mel Robbins?

  Hey, it's your friend Mel. I am so excited that you're here. It is always an honor to spend time with you and to be together. If you're brand new, welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast family. And I also want to acknowledge you for something. Thank you for choosing to spend time listening to something that could truly help you live a better life. I just think that's so cool. And today's guest is someone I have been wanting to sit down with ever since I started this podcast. Who am I talking about? Dr. Wendy Suzuki. Dr. Suzuki is a world-renowned neuroscientist and the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at New York University. She is a leading- Researcher known for her groundbreaking research in the areas of memory, brain plasticity, and the simple things that you can do every single day

• 2:18Mel Robbins?

  to improve your learning, focus, memory, and brain power. She's also a pioneer in researching how moving your body and exercising improves your brain health. And what I love about Dr. Suzuki is that she's just one of those kind of people that you want to hang out with. She's super cool and she makes neuroscience easy to understand. She's so passionate about it. And she has this unbelievable ability to make neuroscience personal and profound.

• 2:49Mel Robbins?

  So please help me welcome Dr. Wendy Suzuki to our Boston studios.

• 2:54Speaker 01

  Thank you for having me. I cannot tell you what a big fan I am of this podcast and of your teachings and on Audible. And so

• 3:04Mel Robbins?

  Really?

• 3:04Speaker 01

  Yes, absolutely.

• 3:05Mel Robbins?

  Holy cow, I have a brain crush on you. So that's, that's a really amazing compliment. Thank you. And what I love about the work that you share is that all of this stuff is free and accessible.

• 3:17Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 3:18Mel Robbins?

  And things that you can put to use as soon as you listen to this.

• 3:21Speaker 01

  Yes, you, you named the thing that is also my favorite thing. You don't have to have lots of money or, or influence. You just need to decide to do these things in your life today. And you have access to the power of neurobiology to change how your brain works.

• 3:41Mel Robbins?

  I have to say, if you're listening to this and not watching YouTube, she is exploding with energy and vitality. And I am so excited to dig into this because you not only walk the talk, as you say, but you can feel it in the energy that you bring just by how you're moving through your day to day life. And one of the things that I also love about your work is that some of the simple changes in the science that you're about to share with us today can impact somebody's mood or focus or well being starting today.

• 4:18Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 4:19Mel Robbins?

  Can you speak a little? Little bit to that, like what somebody might expect is an immediate impact.

• 4:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I mean, what you're gonna learn is really about the power of neurobiology, the power of the neurobiology of movement on your brain, of meditation on your brain. I hope we get to sleep in your brain. I know you talk a lot about the power of social connection. We are social animals. There are so many circuits in our brain that evolved so that I could see what your energy level is. Are you happy? Are you sad? Are you excited about this conversation? And I think anybody watching will say that we are both really excited about this conversation. We can tell that because there are brain areas specific to helping us interpret that facial expression. That is why I love being a neuroscientist.

• 5:08Speaker 01

  It is teaching me about myself, about how to be better in this world, to feel better in this world. And this is also why I love being dean of a large undergraduate college, like New York University College of Arts and Science, because I'm the brain health dean. I want every single one of my students to have a big, fat, fluffy brain and to be able to soak in all of the information, all the education. That is my mission as dean.

• 5:37Mel Robbins?

  What is a big, fat, fluffy brain?

• 5:40Speaker 01

  Ah, well, a big, fat, fluffy brain is a brain that has constant, what I call positive brain plasticity going on. So, brain plasticity is the human brain's amazing ability to change and grow in response to the environment. Positive brain plasticity is growing in the positive direction. Unfortunately, there's also negative brain plasticity, where things can shrink and get smaller and functionality can disappear. But imagine that certain choices that you make in your life can improve the brain's anatomy, physiology, and function. And that has been the focus of my neuroscientific research for the last 30-plus years.

• 6:26Mel Robbins?

  That is so cool. And you know, when I hear the word plasticity and neuroplasticity and the fact that your brain can grow.

• 6:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:35Mel Robbins?

  Are you talking about like, it can actually get bigger or smaller? Or are you talking about the like, insides of it can change? What do you mean?

• 6:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:44Mel Robbins?

  Like for a normal person like me?

• 6:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:47Mel Robbins?

  When you say your brain can grow positive or negative?

• 6:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. So let's take the positive. My brain can grow in the positive direction. Certain brain areas, in fact, my very favorite area of the brain called the hippocampus, critical for our ability to form and retain new long-term memories. That is one of only two brain areas in the human brain where brand-new brain cells can be born in adulthood. So you and I are already growing brand-new shiny hippocampal cells. And one of the wonderful magical secrets that we'll talk about later is the fact that physical activity can actually help even more hippocampal cells grow. And yes, that means that your memory will get better.

• 7:32Speaker 01

  So not just cells growing, but positive brain plasticity also means that the connections between the neurons that are already there can grow. So you can have more connections. And that also, we know, can correlate to better performance, say, in your prefrontal cortex for focus and attention.

• 7:51Mel Robbins?

  As you're listening to Dr. Suzuki, I'm sure you're having the same thought I'm having right now, which is, boy, I wish I had taken a class from you in college. I mean, you are so exuberant about the topic that I cannot wait to just start to peel away the layers. Why is it important, just at a top-level baseline understanding, to care about the health of your brain?

• 8:21Speaker 01

  That's such a great question. And my answer is that the human brain is the most complex structure known to humankind. Not Einstein's brain, not Marie Curie's brain, but your brain, Mel's brain, Wendy's brain, every single one of your listeners' brains. Imagine that. The most complex thing known to humankind, and everybody has things they do well, things they don't do well, that is so unique to you. It defines how you see, feel, smell, laugh about the world, and it's unique to you. The reason why you need to take

• 9:01Speaker 01

  care of that brain is really about taking care of who you are as a person. Your personal history is in there. Your future decisions are in there. And it truly is an awesome thing when you think about the structure of the brain. And that is part of my nerdy neuroscientific reason for doing all the things I do to make sure I do take care of my brain.

• 9:26Mel Robbins?

  So how would the person who's listening to us right now feel different in their day to day life if they were to prioritize their brain health as much as we tend to focus on the things we eat or taking care of our muscles? What would happen if you did this?

• 9:49Speaker 01

  So many different things. You would have lower levels of depression and anxiety, higher levels of energy. Your focus would be better. Your memory would be better. Your creativity would go up. All of these things come from the studies that have been done, both in animal model systems and in humans, about the effects of positive brain plasticity and bringing those elements into your life.

• 10:15Mel Robbins?

  Amazing. I would love to hear you share how you got interested in the brain and becoming a neuroscientist in the first place.

• 10:26Speaker 01

  I have a very specific origin story of how I decided I want to become a neuroscientist. It was my first day of my freshman year at UC Berkeley. And I walked into a first year seminar class called "The Brain and Its Potential." Had no idea who taught this class, but I thought the title was interesting. And I remember walking into the class, there's only 15 students. And I saw this professor at the front of the classroom. And I describe her as kind of a neuroscientific Beyonce. She had like control. She was fierce, but in a very positive, welcoming way.

• 11:10Speaker 01

  She controlled that classroom. And she started telling us about how the brain was the most complex structure known to humankind. Then she put on these gloves and slowly and dramatically, she had a hat box in front of her. And she dramatically opened the lid of that hat box. And she pulled out a real preserved human brain, right there in front of all of us students who had never seen one before. And the gasp in that classroom was audible. And she told us about brain plasticity, which turns out she discovered. She discovered. She discovered. Her name was Marion Diamond.

• 11:51Speaker 01

  She was the very first female PhD in neuroanatomy conferred by UC Berkeley ever. And in 1960, she and her colleagues discovered that the adult mammalian brain, she was studying rodents at the time, could change and grow in response to what she described as an enriched environment, which was, I like to describe it as the Disney World of rat cages. You compare the rats in Disney World of rat cages compared to more of a shoebox condition. Both rats got, you know, free food and water. But if the adult brain couldn't change at all, which was the dogma of the time, then those experiences should have no effect on the brain.

• 12:34Speaker 01

  This is where she discovered that the outer covering of the brain, the cortex, actually grew in response to the Disney World of rat cages. And that was one of the very first demonstrations that the adult brain could change because of the environment that you live in. And she told us that, and I'm like, okay. Beyonce of neuroscience, the coolest thing I've ever seen. This is a human brain. I want to be just like her. And so that's when I decided I want to be a neuroscientist.

• 13:02Mel Robbins?

  And now you're even better because you're Dr. Wendy Suzuki, man. I love that. How did you start studying the impact of exercise on the brain?

• 13:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:13Mel Robbins?

  You mentioned earlier that there was this big shift that happened in your life.

• 13:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:19Mel Robbins?

  That had you completely transformed from the inside out.

• 13:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:23Mel Robbins?

  What it felt like to live your life. What happened?

• 13:26Speaker 01

  So I was trying to get tenure at New York University. It's a very stressful thing. It takes six years. And basically you have six years to show that you're a world-class scientist. And if you pass the test, you get a job for life. That's tenure. But if you don't, you're fired and you have to leave in humiliation. And so, you know, for these six years, it's like, oh, my God, am I going to be fired? Or am I going to be part of the club? And my strategy wasn't the best one. It was.

• 13:55Mel Robbins?

  Well, did you get tenure?

• 13:56Speaker 01

  I did get tenure, but still my strategy wasn't the best, which was I'm just going to work and put my head down. I'm not going to do anything. I'm living in Manhattan and I love Broadway, but no, I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to have friends. I'm just going to work and I'm just going to, you know, have my research lab. So I did that for many years and I wasn't very happy and I didn't have very many friends. And I was feeling lethargic and I ate too much takeout and, and it was bad. And the thing that started the boat turning around was I gave myself a vacation. I went on vacation by myself because I had no friends and I went on this river rafting

• 14:36Speaker 01

  trip to Peru and it was beautiful and we were rafting every day and there were these triathletes on the trip and it was so much fun, but I quickly realized that I was the weakest person on this trip. Upper body strength was not my forte at that moment. And I came back thinking, okay, I don't want to feel that way on a trip like that. I want to keep going on trips like that. That was exactly what I needed. And to help me not feel like the weakest person on the trip, the most obvious thing for me to do was let's just go to the gym. Let's just add that into my just work all the time, workaholic life. And that's what started the shift. That regular gym going started me feeling better and I started eating less takeout and

• 15:21Speaker 01

  added and added until I realized I did an experiment on myself. Oh my God, I feel so much better, which led me back to looking at the neuroscience of that because I was focused on another form of brain plasticity, which is memory formation. And forming new memories changes your brain and that is really the most common form of brain plasticity. But just getting back to my roots, back to Marion Diamond's experiments, when I went to the gym and changed my life, because it turns out that in the Disney world of rat cages, you can ask, what was it? Was it the rides? Was it the social interaction? It was the running wheel that was in those cages.

• 16:02Speaker 01

  All you had to do was give a rat a running wheel and they got the vast majority of all of those positive brain changes. And I'm like, oh my God, I've discovered my own Disney world of rat cages. It's my gym down the block.

• 16:16Mel Robbins?

  What was the moment where you had an epiphany as both Wendy trying to get herself back in shape and off the kind of miserable track versus Dr. Suzuki going, oh my God, I gotta study exercise. That's it. Like, when did you have that moment?

• 16:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:37Mel Robbins?

  Where you're like,

• 16:38Speaker 01

  I did have that moment and it was a year and a half into my starting to go to the gym. I was feeling good.

• 16:45Mel Robbins?

  Do you remember where you were?

• 16:46Speaker 01

  Yep. I was sitting at my desk and I remember what I was doing. I was writing a grant very hard. It's like a horrible, stressful thing to write a grant. And it was so memorable because as I was sitting there writing a grant, I had this thought that went through my brain that had never gone through my brain before, which was, Gee, grant writing went well today. That was good. That was a good session. You never think that. You're like, "Oh, I'm never gonna get this grant." You know, "I'm gonna be grantless." But I had that thought. And I thought, "Wow, am I just having a good day?" That's an amazing thought for me to have.

• 17:24Mel Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 17:24Speaker 01

  And I thought, "Well, you know what? The one thing that I've changed in my life recently, for the last year and a half, has been my physical activity." And then I started thinking about, "Well, why did grant writing go better that day?" And two things came to mind: my focus, and I felt like my focus was better during that grant writing. But I also have hundreds of journal articles on my desk, trying to pull together my multimillion-dollar idea. And you need memory for all those details. It's like, "I think that was better, too. Gosh, my focus and my memory are better? What's going on here?" I was studying memory in my own lab. And then it's like, "Could the exercise, is that what's happening to

• 18:07Speaker 01

  me?" And so, it wasn't an "aha, I'm gonna study exercise." It's like, "Could that be it?" And it actually sent me to the classroom, because when you want to learn something new, you always have to develop new classes. I decided to create a new class called, "Can exercise change your brain?" And I was gonna answer my own question. "Could exercise change my brain?"

• 18:27Mel Robbins?

  You're a genius. You created a class?

• 18:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 18:30Mel Robbins?

  To help you answer the question, because then the class creates a format where you've gotta dig into the research.

• 18:36Speaker 01

  Yes. Yeah. I mean, two for one, right? I had to do it anyway. And I might as well answer the question that I was trying to answer. And then I thought, "Well, wait a second. If students are coming to my classroom every day, what if we all exercise together? And what if I do a study and test them at the beginning of the class and at the end of the class, but we'll all exercise together? So I'll turn it into an experiment." So I ran to my administrator and I said, "Can I have money to hire an exercise instructor so we'll all do exercise together?" And she said, no. I'm like, oh, and I went back to my desk and thought about it. And then I went back and I said, would you pay for me to get teacher training if I learn how to teach an exercise class? And she said, yes.

• 19:20Speaker 01

  And so I went to the gym and I learned how to teach the favorite class that I was going to in the gym called Intensati that combined physical movements from kickboxing, dance, and yoga and martial arts. It's a very New York class.

• 19:34Mel Robbins?

  Patricia.

• 19:34Speaker 01

  Patricia Moreno.

• 19:35Mel Robbins?

  I know her.

• 19:36Speaker 01

  Yes, you do. Yes. So she, um, she helped change my brain. And so I got training from Patricia. I trained for six months. You know, I, my cats could do Intensati really well because I, I did it so much in my apartment. And I went back and I taught this class. And so I turned the music on and, um, and they did it. They did it with me. And so many things changed in that moment. The invisible wall between the talking head at the front of the classroom and everybody else disappeared. Because when you're shouting affirmations with professors like, oh, you're one of us. You know, we can, we can sweat together. And the level of engagement that I got from those students that first we sweated for

• 20:20Speaker 01

  an hour and then we did an hour and a half of interactive discussion about what do we know about the effects of exercise in the brain? It set my bar for interactions that I want in every single classroom that I go into.

• 20:33Mel Robbins?

  I love that story for so many reasons. Because I would imagine that was hugely out of your comfort zone.

• 20:39Speaker 01

  Yes. Yeah.

• 20:40Mel Robbins?

  And it illustrates the power of just leaning into something. And it also illustrates the fact that a no doesn't mean no.

• 20:49Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 20:50Mel Robbins?

  It just means now I gotta find another way.

• 20:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:53Mel Robbins?

  And you did.

• 20:54Speaker 01

  And the funny question that I had to ask my colleague, because if I'm going to do an experiment, I need a control class. And so I'm not the only one teaching an elective class. So I had to go to my, literally the, the guy that runs the lab next to mine. I'm like, are you teaching your, your elective class? And he said, yes. And I know they, they meet for exactly the same amount of time. And I'm. Do you make your students exercise during class? It's like, no. And I said, would you mind being the control? Because I would take 30 minutes to have them do all the cognitive tests at the beginning and at the end. And he said, okay, I'll be your control class. And so I had my very first experiment.

• 21:32Mel Robbins?

  Dr. Suzuki, before we get into all the research on exercise, I'd like to go back to something that you mentioned about your professor, who was the mentor. You told the story about the hat box. Because I saw that you brought a hat box. And maybe my team is playing a prank on me. Because I see that it is now behind you on the shelf. So I'd love to take a quick break so we can hear a word from our amazing sponsors. And when we come back, I want to talk to you about what is in that hat box. And we're going to do that after a short break. Do not go anywhere. Dr. Suzuki and your buddy Mel Robbins are going to be here waiting for you after a short break.

• 22:17Mel Robbins?

  Welcome back. It's your friend Mel. You and I are spending time today with the incredible Dr. Suzuki. So, Dr. Suzuki, you just told us the story about your professor who inspired you to become a neuroscientist. And you told us the story about how she had this hat box. You know, when you walked in, you were carrying a box.

• 22:36Speaker 01

  I was.

• 22:38Speaker 01

  Yes. And actually, Mel, that box shows that my undergraduate advisor is not the only one that has a hat box. Can I show it to you?

• 22:52Mel Robbins?

  Yes.

• 22:58Mel Robbins?

  And by the way, when you're done listening to this episode, go check out the YouTube episode because you'll be able to watch everything that's happening. Dr. Suzuki is standing up and she has gloves, rubber gloves on top of a hat box.

• 23:12Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 23:12Mel Robbins?

  Okay, so what do we got here?

• 23:14Speaker 01

  A hat.

• 23:16Mel Robbins?

  A little nervous.

• 23:17Speaker 01

  Putting the gloves on.

• 23:22Speaker 01

  I'd love to show you what's in my hat box.

• 23:25Mel Robbins?

  Okay.

• 23:29Speaker 01

  This is a real preserved human brain.

• 23:36Mel Robbins?

  Oh, like a re- like in a person that was in a human being?

• 23:40Speaker 01

  Yes, this is a real preserved human brain. Her name is Betty and she's the most photographed preserved human brain on the east coast. Can I give you some gloves?

• 23:51Mel Robbins?

  You want me to hold it?

• 23:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:53Mel Robbins?

  Um, okay, I think.

• 23:56Speaker 01

  Oh my god, there you go.

• 23:59Mel Robbins?

  Okay, let me put the gloves on.

• 24:00Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 24:02Mel Robbins?

  Oh my god.

• 24:02Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 24:03Mel Robbins?

  Now, do I, like, I'm, I, is it normal to be nervous about handling a brain?

• 24:07Speaker 01

  Well, so, you know, every time I pick this human brain up, I think this was somebody's life. This was, this was somebody's whole personality here. And I feel so lucky that I get to have this specimen that has been in our department for over twenty six years. So it, it's preserved in formaldehyde.

• 24:30Mel Robbins?

  Okay.

• 24:31Speaker 01

  But, but it does represent this person. And so it is, I, I pick it up with reverence every single time. So can I ask you to stand up and come over here so we can show you?

• 24:43Mel Robbins?

  Sure.

• 24:48Mel Robbins?

  Ooh, okay.

• 24:49Speaker 01

  Hey.

• 24:50Mel Robbins?

  I don't, I don't want to drop her.

• 24:51Speaker 01

  Oh, it's lighter?

• 24:52Mel Robbins?

  Oh, no, it's not. It's heavier than I thought.

• 24:56Speaker 01

  Yeah. Look, so here's the right.

• 24:59Mel Robbins?

  This was in a person?

• 25:00Speaker 01

  Yes. But look.

• 25:03Mel Robbins?

  Oh, okay.

• 25:04Speaker 01

  What do you, if you open up?

• 25:05Mel Robbins?

  Okay, can you?

• 25:06Speaker 01

  Now, I'll have to say, I can definitely look, I'm not gonna drop it, but I.

• 25:10Mel Robbins?

  So she is pulling apart the top of the brain. It's just, does everybody's brain do that? Like, you can pull it up? It's supposed to do that?

• 25:17Speaker 01

  It's supposed to do that, there's a right and a left hemisphere. But I'm just pulling it apart so you can see how deep the folds of the outer covering go. You know how much surface area is, is represented in this fold of thing? If I put it out, it's probably as big as this dining room table.

• 25:35Mel Robbins?

  Meaning if you took the macarons?

• 25:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, and put it as one big noodle.

• 25:39Mel Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 25:39Speaker 01

  It would cover the table.

• 25:40Mel Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 25:41Speaker 01

  No way.

• 25:41Mel Robbins?

  Yep.

• 25:42Speaker 01

  And what is in, are those like tubes?

• 25:44Mel Robbins?

  What is, what is the macaroni?

• 25:46Speaker 01

  These are folds of um, a sheet of what's called the outer covering, the neocortex. And we get more bang for our buck because it's folded in. A rat cortex is completely smooth. Sorry rats, you don't have as much computing power as you do from all of this. Yes.

• 26:07Mel Robbins?

  It's, it's kind of like, I can't believe how heavy it is.

• 26:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, there's a lot densely packed in there. This is controlling everything from our breathing, to our movement, to our memories, to the way you feel right now, holding a human brain for the very first time.

• 26:25Mel Robbins?

  So weird. Well, only because I don't think about my brain. And to think that there is something this heavy, I would say, I'm trying to think of an object. Like, it's literally like a um, like a, if you were to put not a half gallon, but a quart of milk. In your hands, is that about the right?

• 26:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think that's right.

• 26:46Mel Robbins?

  It's like three pounds.

• 26:47Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 26:48Mel Robbins?

  Yeah.

• 26:48Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 26:49Mel Robbins?

  And it's, it is like two chicken breast bone in, like in terms of the size. It's like in my full palm. Now, where, where's the front of it?

• 26:57Speaker 01

  Frontal lobe here.

• 26:58Mel Robbins?

  Yep.

• 26:59Speaker 01

  Then parotal lobe, visual spatial functions, where things are in space. Occipital lobe, primary visual cortex is back here.

• 27:06Mel Robbins?

  Visual?

• 27:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:07Mel Robbins?

  We see from the back of the brain?

• 27:08Speaker 01

  See from this part of the brain. If this part of the brain is damaged, you, you are blind.

• 27:14Mel Robbins?

  What, so when a parent or grandparent says, I got eyes in the back of my head, they weren't kidding. Like, almost like for real. It's like it's back there.

• 27:23Speaker 01

  It's, yeah, they have their visual cortex in the back of the head. They are seen from the back of their head. Absolutely.

• 27:29Mel Robbins?

  If you had a concussion.

• 27:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:31Mel Robbins?

  Would you see damage to the surface or?

• 27:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know, sometimes it, it causes a bruise kind of thing. But what I always tell people is, have you had that experience where you bonk the back of your head?

• 27:43Mel Robbins?

  Yes.

• 27:43Speaker 01

  See stars?

• 27:44Mel Robbins?

  Yes.

• 27:45Speaker 01

  It's because you are physically stimulating the visual cortex. And that physical stimulation is causing visual imagery of the stars. That, that's what's happening. That's not normal vision, of course.

• 27:58Mel Robbins?

  And is every human being's brain pretty much the same color?

• 28:02Speaker 01

  Yes. This is the temporal lobe, here, the last lobe. Okay. And if we flip it over. Oh, God, what is that ugly thing on the bottom? The nub is the start of the spinal cord. Oh. So it goes, yeah, it got cut off. Whoa. Sorry. Okay. And then this thing. I feel like I shouldn't be looking at this part of Betty. This is like, oh, my God. It's all good. It's all good. This is the cerebellum, critical for fine motor movement. So we can walk smoothly because of our cerebellum. But I love the bottom part of the brain because right here is the bottom part of the temporal lobe. And right below this cortex here and below this cortex here, that's where the hippocampus sits.

• 28:47Speaker 01

  Your favorite part. My favorite part. You can't see it from the surface, but it's right below this area right here. Okay, where is that annoying little amygdala? A part that is creating fight or flight. Yes. A part that keeps us in an alarm state, also protects us, but where is that sucker? It is right in front of the hippocampus. It's an almond-shaped structure, right about here, but below the surface. Gotcha. So the hippocampus is like a curved structure like this, so here and here. And the amygdala is just my fist that sits right here. This is the front of the temporal lobe, so it goes like that. Wow, and what is, like, this here looks different than like the foldy stuff, so what is?

• 29:29Speaker 01

  This is the orbital frontal cortex, and the olfactory bulb got pulled off of this brain. So it looks a little bit different because there's a little bit of damage. But can you see this, this X right here? That is the optic nerve. No way. Yes, yes, and the optic chiasm, chiasm means cross. So the cross you see right there is the crossing of all the fibers from one side of your visual field going to the other side of your visual cortex.

• 30:02Mel Robbins?

  Is that why, this is a random question, but is that like when somebody has a stroke, is that what gets impacted if they're?

• 30:08Speaker 01

  Well, the whole brain gets impacted in different parts. So the strokes that cause motor impairment, you can't move your arm anymore. It's damaging the arm motor area of your motor cortex.

• 30:21Mel Robbins?

  That's wild. Dr. Suzuki, Betty and I are going on a walk, right? And so we're moving our bodies. How does that cause just the movement itself in the limbs triggers information that goes up into your brain? Is that how that works?

• 30:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's a great question. The exact mechanism of how dopamine and serotonin is triggered with physical activity is not that well known. But I go back evolutionarily to the fact that we are physical beings, despite the fact that all of us are just sitting in chairs all the time. And that is a long-term survival mechanism. That's why it makes us feel good because we were made to move our bodies. And I guess we could just take advantage of it more because we're not moving enough. But that's what you get every single time.

• 31:14Mel Robbins?

  That is so cool.

• 31:16Speaker 01

  The other thing, sorry, we have to go back to the bottom. This is the brainstem area right here, right before the spinal cord. This is that area that controls our heartbeat, our respiration. And so brainstem damage, if this goes, then your heartbeat will no longer beat. That is lethal, but such a critical part of the brain.

• 31:40Mel Robbins?

  I'm still shocked by what just happened in this studio. And honestly, I feel like it's time for me to take these gloves off and go give my hands a good wash. I'm going to go do that. And let's take a quick pause so you can hear a word from our amazing sponsors. But when we come back, you and I are going to cover the specifics on how moving your body improves brain function. And it'll give you that big, fat, fluffy brain that Dr. Suzuki has been telling us about. So stay with us.

• 32:16Mel Robbins?

  Welcome back. It's your friend Mel Robbins and you and I are spending time with the amazing Dr. Wendy Suzuki, who is now going to do a deep dive into how exercise improves pretty much everything when it comes to your brain function and brain health. So you have now taught the class, you've done the experiments, you've written the international bestselling books on the topic, what does the power of moving your body do to your brain?

• 32:43Speaker 01

  Every single time you move your body, you are releasing literally a flood of neurochemicals in your brain. That is the physical thing that happens. And I'm not talking about run a marathon. I'm talking about even taking a walk. A 10 minute walk gets that flood of neurochemicals going. Is it different if you do get your heart rate up? Yes, it is. But the power starts with a 10 minute walk. That is, one of the take homes from our conversation today, Mel, is the neurochemical flood starts with a 10 minute walk. What is in that flood of neurochemicals? Dopamine, serotonin, noradrenaline, endorphins, growth

• 33:27Speaker 01

  factors. The first three, dopamine, serotonin, noradrenaline, what's that gonna, it's gonna make you feel great. Well, you've just given your brain this flood of neurochemicals that I like to call a neurochemical bubble bath for your brain. And I love that image, because if you move regularly, think of it as a regular bubble bath for your brain, these neurochemicals that are making you feel good, the growth factors go to your hippocampus, that is what's growing those brand new hippocampal cells. The power of exercise comes from that neurochemical bubble bath.

• 34:04Mel Robbins?

  I love that image. I love the image of being outside for just a 10-minute walk. Every one of us can find 10 minutes and you can imagine that flood happening. And I also, I personally am a bath person.

• 34:22Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 34:23Mel Robbins?

  So when you say bubbles and the, like a bath in my brain and bubbles are fluffy.

• 34:29Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 34:29Mel Robbins?

  And I don't know that I wanted a body part to be big and fluffy, but now I do want a big and fluffy brain. That a 10-minute walk at a minimum causes that flood of really positive chemicals. And this goes back to what you were saying, which is neuroplasticity and growing your brain works in the positive.

• 34:49Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 34:50Mel Robbins?

  And not doing these things, I suppose, works in the negative.

• 34:52Speaker 01

  Well, you know, the, the negative comes from the most common negative brain plasticity drivers, very familiar to all of us, stress, chronic stress, chronic anxiety are two things that will, that will cause retraction.

• 35:09Mel Robbins?

  So is the flood of all of those like superpower, do you call them chemicals or what are they called?

• 35:17Speaker 01

  Neurochemicals, neurotransmitters.

• 35:19Mel Robbins?

  Gotcha. So does the flood of all those neurochemicals relieve anxiety? Is that why taking a 10-minute walk, if you're feeling anxious, can make you feel better? It's because of the release of the neurochemicals?

• 35:31Speaker 01

  Yes. Yeah. The most common drugs that one gets prescribed for depression or anxiety are releasing forms of noradrenaline and dopamine and serotonin. So this is a natural way to get that. It's free. You don't even have to change your clothes. So that, that is just the magical power of moving your body for your brain.

• 35:55Mel Robbins?

  I love that. How does exercise improve focus?

• 36:00Speaker 01

  Improved focus is the most common positive effect that has been reported from studies of exercise on the brain. Easiest to find improved focus. We know it's affecting the prefrontal cortex and The mechanism of that and what exactly is happening is less clear than some of the other brain areas. We think that growth factors are also involved and that it involves not growth of new brain cells in the prefrontal cortex, but new synapses. You get an immediate positive effect of focus from that same 10 minute walk and with long-term, regular exercise, your baseline levels of focus and attention go up. And that's where you expect to get, you know, real physical change in your brain.

• 36:45Mel Robbins?

  Wow. I personally notice a increase in energy, which I always find to be weird because I'm usually dragging myself to the gym or dragging myself out of bed to go on a walk or a hike.

• 36:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:58Mel Robbins?

  But when I'm done, even though I'm tired, I feel this boost of energy. Can you explain why exercise increases your energy?

• 37:07Speaker 01

  One of my favorite findings is in groups that were assigned the exercise condition, the motivation to exercise increased in them. So more exercise improves motivation to exercise. And the energy piece that you're talking about is likely due to the flood of dopamine and serotonin that go to your brain. Do you feel more energized when you're happy and when the reward that you get with dopamine? Yes, you are. So I'm going to say that it's probably most likely due to those same neurochemicals we've been talking about.

• 37:41Mel Robbins?

  Well, I was just thinking about this morning. So this morning, the alarm goes off at 5:35.

• 37:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:47Mel Robbins?

  We've got a huge day in the studio. I'm super excited to meet you and to talk to you. And as I was rolling out of the hotel bed, my husband was down here with me. He's like, where are you going? I'm like, I gotta go exercise. He's like, but you have a huge day. And I'm like, because I need to be energized. And I know that if I go exercise at 6 o'clock in the morning, when I walk in that studio, I will be a different person. And so it was something that I realize I'm doing, especially on days that I want to perform.

• 38:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, me too.

• 38:22Mel Robbins?

  And can you explain a little bit about? Why, if you've got something big going on today?

• 38:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:28Mel Robbins?

  Starting your day with exercise is a really smart thing to do.

• 38:31Speaker 01

  Well, so it is going back to that wonderful flood of neurochemicals. You are starting your day in a good mood. You're improved your focus and attention, which we all need for a big day. You're also increasing your adrenaline in your body with, with exercise. What I love to do to supercharge that, that adrenaline boost every morning is hot, cold contrast showers. So I do my regular hot shower, but at the end I push it all the way to maximum cold and boost. Okay, it was hard the first time I did it. It's really, but once, once you get used to it, that's a natural adrenaline boost and that is like, I need that. If I forget, I go back into the shower.

• 39:16Mel Robbins?

  No.

• 39:17Speaker 01

  I do. I do go back into the shower to get it if I, I forget it. Because just like you, you need to be up, you need to be ready for that day. And that, together with, with exercise are, are really powerful ways to get that energy up.

• 39:33Mel Robbins?

  So Dr. Suzuki, I want to stop you right there because that is a second huge free takeaway. We talked about the 10 minute walk.

• 39:40Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 39:40Mel Robbins?

  We have talked about this flood of neurochemicals that you can get by moving your body. Now you are talking about a habit that you have as a neuroscientist.

• 39:50Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 39:50Mel Robbins?

  Where you end every shower by spinning the dial from that amazing steamy.

• 39:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:57Mel Robbins?

  Awesome, warm shower. Oh, I love that feeling, don't you? And you start to feel a little tired. You're like, oh, do I really want to get out of the shower? And then Dr. Suzuki's like, right, and she turns it up cold and now she's staring at freezing cold water. How long do you stand there?

• 40:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:14Mel Robbins?

  And do you actually let it hit your head or do you cheat like I do and you hit a shoulder?

• 40:18Speaker 01

  So I let it hit everywhere, but I'm, now I'm used to it. The first time it was only a tiny little shoulder.

• 40:29Speaker 01

  But you get used to it and now, now it's longer. I, I could do it much, much longer. And now I'm much more sensitive because different places you take showers have different coldness of the water. So, so yeah, I, I like it when places are really cold. So I could really test myself because the colder it is, the bigger adrenaline boost that you get. And so now I'm sensitive to what that feels like in me. So the cold doesn't bother me. What I'm kind of addicted to is the adrenaline that comes with it.

• 41:03Mel Robbins?

  So for the person listening, if they wanted to try this.

• 41:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:06Mel Robbins?

  And they're gonna do it today or first thing tomorrow morning and you turn the shower to cold.

• 41:12Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 41:14Mel Robbins?

  How long would you want them to try to stay in there? And what does it feel like?

• 41:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:19Mel Robbins?

  When that adrenaline rush hits? Cause I think when you do it the first time, your immediate reaction is get out of the shower.

• 41:24Speaker 01

  Right, right.

• 41:25Mel Robbins?

  Is that what you're waiting to feel? Or is it the get out of the shower thing? And then you stay for a second or two to feel this like, ah, hit your body. Like, what are you looking for so the person listening can try this at home?

• 41:40Speaker 01

  Yeah. So it is a shock, as everybody imagined, the very first time. And so you do feel shocked and you wanna kind of try to stay as long as you could handle it. But, but if you felt the shock, that's, that's the point. Get out, you know, dry yourself off. That is gonna last, I'm gonna say easy, the rest of the morning. You are gonna feel that adrenaline. I mean, that's why I do it. If it only lasted for two seconds, I wouldn't bother to do it. I do it because this is a boost of physiological adrenaline that is natural from this cold and, and it stays in your system. And I feel the energy difference when I do that.

• 42:24Mel Robbins?

  In case it's helpful, the way that I have developed this as a habit in my life, because I agree with you, it's shocking.

• 42:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 42:31Mel Robbins?

  Both what it feels like and it is shocking, the difference that you feel. Like I can go from super sleepy to laser focus.

• 42:40Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 42:41Mel Robbins?

  By simply turning the dial on the shower. And the way that I do it is, once you put the conditioner in your hair. When you go to rinse it out during the shower to cold.

• 42:50Speaker 01

  Uh huh. Wow. That's a good, long.

• 42:52Mel Robbins?

  Yeah, it's 20 seconds about. I can, I'm pretty fast at rinsing it out now. But it's a way to really try this and get the brain changing and life affirming and focus increasing benefits that you're talking about.

• 43:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:09Mel Robbins?

  That's so cool. How does movement and exercise improve your memory exactly?

• 43:14Speaker 01

  When you move your body and, and here, there is a level that's very important aerobic activity, that is any kind of movement that gets your heart rate up. Think dancing, think power walking, those count for aerobic activity. Aerobic activity is critical because there are these growth factors that you need to get that hippocampal growth. They come from muscle movement, so you have to have enough muscle movement. They come from release of ketones from your liver and these growth factors get released kind of peripherally, go up into the brain, go directly to your hippocampus and go into that part of the hippocampus

• 43:55Speaker 01

  where new brain cells are being born all the time for anybody, whether you exercise or never exercise, you get new brain cells. But with more exercise, more growth factors get released and more new brain cells are born. And those new brain cells grow and integrate. And the cool thing we know about these new brain cells that are born in adulthood is they're kind of like teenage brain cells. They're really hyperactive and they want to get involved in all the memory circuits that the hippocampus is involved in. So they make your hippocampus work better. And we know an enormous amount about the physiology, the detailed physiology of the power of those brand new adult hippocampal brain cells.

• 44:35Mel Robbins?

  What type of memory does it help? Cause you know, like, you know, if you think about memory, there's, I, I'm one of these people that. I think due to chronic anxiety and undiagnosed ADHD, I don't have a lot of memories from my childhood, at least not that I'm conscious of. I know they're like in there somewhere,

• 44:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:54Mel Robbins?

  but I can't quite access them. I know I was there for my childhood, but I can't quite remember a lot of it. And I know that's a very common thing. So is it impacting that kind of memory or the short-term working memory that you need if you're learning a new subject and you gotta take a test?

• 45:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, it is affecting your ability to form new, long-term memories for facts and events. All the things you learn, all the students learning stuff in school right now, that is because you have a working hippocampus. And more shiny new hippocampal cells will make those memories easier to form. That kind of memories for facts and events. Also, I need to emphasize that the hippocampus is critical for spatial memory. Your ability to wayfind is also really, really dependent on the particular kinds of...

• 45:44Mel Robbins?

  What does that mean, spatial memory?

• 45:45Speaker 01

  Spatial memory means how to get from here to the subway, how to get from one place to the other, where the supermarket is relative to my childhood home. That memory or learning a new route, highly, highly dependent on the hippocampus.

• 46:00Mel Robbins?

  Have you done any research on the impact of exercise and dementia or Alzheimer's? Like, you know, like how, I don't even know the technical way you describe

• 46:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 46:11Mel Robbins?

  that type of memory impairment that people face?

• 46:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. So, you know, I haven't done direct research. A lot of my research is done in younger populations for the reason that I want to change the movement patterns in younger people. Because the longer and the more you move your body, the better off your brain is in older age. What we haven't said, which is key to understand, is that the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus are most susceptible to both aging and neurodegenerative disease states. That is, cells... Die synapses kind of melt away in these two brain areas.

• 46:58Speaker 01

  I go, oh, so that means that if I'm moving my body and get aerobic exercise, I'm making these two key vulnerable brain areas as big and fat as fluffy as possible. I'm not curing aging or dementia, but I'm staving it off. That is the power of long-term, regular movement in your life related to aging.

• 47:22Mel Robbins?

  If somebody's listening to this and they're thinking, oh, Dr. Suzuki, I am living that life you described of you in a lab with no friends, and I am alone on a raft trip in the river of life, and I have not been exercising for decades. Is it too late?

• 47:42Speaker 01

  No, it's never too late to start moving. And the reason I say that is that we know people that have mild cognitive impairment, which is on the way to more severe levels of dementia. Put on an exercise program, you can see the improvement in them. So never too late. Movement is gonna continue to have this great thing. It's always there for us. It's amazing.

• 48:08Mel Robbins?

  I love that. So tell us what to do. I'm imagining you in your exercise clothes. Dr. Suzuki, tell us what kind of exercise?

• 48:18Speaker 01

  Okay, so what kind of exercise? What I would recommend, and this comes from studies that I've done in my lab. First, we did studies in people that are low fit. So they move their bodies less than 20 minutes a week for the last three months. And we put them on an exercise regimen. Aerobic exercise, 45 minutes, three times a week.

• 48:40Mel Robbins?

  Okay.

• 48:41Speaker 01

  It was a spin class, so 45-minute spin class. But the point is that it was aerobic. They did that and compared to 45 minutes, three times a week of power scrabble competition in my lab. So that was the non aerobic, you know, control experiment. And what we found is that three times a week, 45 minutes aerobic activity would improve their mood, improve their focus and improve certain forms of hippocampal function. So is it effective? Yes. We saw it in three months and there is a number for everybody. Three times a week, 45 minutes. That's a doable thing. Three times a week, 45 minutes, you get brain effects.

• 49:25Speaker 01

  Now you say, well, I'm, you know, I don't, I don't work out that little. And so we did the next study in kind of mid fit people already working out two, three times a week.

• 49:35Mel Robbins?

  Okay. So mid fit.

• 49:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:37Mel Robbins?

  Trying to see if I actually fit in that category.

• 49:39Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 49:40Mel Robbins?

  Two to three times a week you're working out. And that could be lifting weights.

• 49:44Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 49:44Mel Robbins?

  It could be going for a long walk.

• 49:46Speaker 01

  Right.

• 49:46Mel Robbins?

  It could be yoga class. Like you're just doing something.

• 49:49Speaker 01

  Yes. Yes. Okay. So we asked what will change their brain and we said, okay, you could go to the spin class as many times as you want during the week. And so we had people staying at two to three times a week and those that went up to seven times a week. The take home from that study is that the more you worked out, the more brain changes you got. And that's great. It's democratic. You earn what you get. So it works on a continuum. And I used to say every drop of sweat count, but then turns out there's a lot more people than I realized that don't sweat. So now I say every turn of the, you know, exercise bike route wheel, that counts.

• 50:33Speaker 01

  What I'm doing counts, walking, dancing, gardening, all of that counts. And the inspiration is just do it a little bit more. You're going to get the benefit. It's not like it's not going to count. It is going to count. Just find a way to get it into your life importantly in a way that you enjoy and in a way that you're going to do.

• 50:54Mel Robbins?

  If somebody is wheelchair bound, or they are like injured,

• 50:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:59Mel Robbins?

  or they're combating an illness, so they are very sedentary. Is there some kind of something that you can do? I mean, I'd imagine like if you're wheeling yourself, that's a very aerobic activity.

• 51:12Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 51:13Mel Robbins?

  So you are moving your body, but where do you recommend somebody start?

• 51:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:17Mel Robbins?

  If they are sending this episode to someone that they're worried about?

• 51:21Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 51:21Mel Robbins?

  And the person who is listening to this is thinking, I can't do any of that.

• 51:27Speaker 01

  Right, right. For most of us that we might send this episode to, it's that there is lack of a habit of movement. And there, I say so many times, walking counts. Do you walk? Wow, I walk, I walk to the car. Can you walk a little bit more? Can you park the car farther away? All these things that you're already going to do. Can you take the stairs up so that it doesn't feel so much like gym going? That is, you know, off putting to people, and I understand that. But it turns out that, you know, maybe it's a walk with a loved one, a walk with your pet. Maybe it is a walk at the museum. Maybe you love the museum. Okay, well, there I'll walk around.

• 52:11Speaker 01

  There's so many ways to be creative about getting movement into anybody's life.

• 52:17Mel Robbins?

  What I really love about your message and your research is the visual of this flood of neurochemicals. And the fact that so many of us reach for something in a bottle, and you have something in your body that you can unleash. And I'm not shaming anybody at all because medications save lives. They're a very important tool in the toolkit.

• 52:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:41Mel Robbins?

  But don't forget about the one that's actually designed by your own body.

• 52:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:46Mel Robbins?

  And when you understand the science, it makes your resignation. Over the fact that you've let yourself go, or you don't have a lot of time, or what difference is a 10-minute walk, or turning the dial to cold to get the blast of adrenaline? It actually makes a profound difference.

• 53:04Speaker 01

  It does make a profound difference. Little things, that's the thing. You don't have to completely change your lifestyle. In fact, it might be scary to say, "I completely changed my life." But it started with that first class that I went. I still remember it was a hip-hop dance class. I'm a terrible hip-hop dancer, but I still went. And I was like, even though I was terrible, I still feel better. It might be different for you. It might be, "I love this park, and I'm just gonna walk around this park that's near my house. It's convenient. The park's not going anywhere. It's always gonna be there." What is that thing that you can do that will be easy for you to do to move your body?

• 53:42Mel Robbins?

  How does exercise improve longevity and decrease your risk for disease?

• 53:50Speaker 01

  So I have to turn to my friend, Robert Wallinger, when you talk about longevity, because his wonderful studies at Harvard that he oversees shows how important social connection is for longevity. That is the number-one thing. And of course, physical activity that increases your heart rate and decreases your propensity for getting cardiovascular disease, that's great, too. But for longevity, it is social connection. And so, taking those walks with a friend, including your pets, you know, all those things. I like to multiply all these effects that come from great science. My father, a very smart guy.

• 54:35Speaker 01

  He was an engineer. And one day, he drove back from the 7-Eleven. That's only about eight blocks from our house. He would go there to get his afternoon cup of coffee. And he told my mom that he had a hard time finding his way back home. That's the spatial memory I was talking about that's so dependent on the hippocampus. And as a hippocampal expert, when my mother told me that, I knew immediately there was a problem with his hippocampus. That is the structure that is first affected in dementia, including Alzheimer's dementia. And that is what, that is what he ended up being diagnosed

• 55:16Speaker 01

  with. I wish I could say, so therefore I had him immediately on an exercise plan. He was in his early 80s, maybe late 70s when that happened. I can't remember exactly his age. He was a little bit wobbly on his feet. He did like going for a walk, so he would, he would go do that. But there was a little bit of danger. As we all know with older people, there's, you know, a little risk taking. Again, going back to social interaction, the more time that I could spend with him, the more time that we can get him together with family where he came alive and he could think and talk about, you know, all the memories that he had, is a great way to go. As Japanese Americans, I'm a third generation Japanese

• 56:01Speaker 01

  American, my, my parents are second generation Japanese Americans, other Japanese Americans out there will know, we don't say I love you to each other, not because we don't love each other, it's just that you don't have to say that. It's, you know, it's just not part of our culture. But when my father had this dementia diagnosis, I said, gosh, you know what, I want to start saying it. But it's very awkward when you're an adult child and you've never said, I love you to your parents as an adult. Do you just like blurt it out? It's like, what should I do? I had a long, you know, internal conversation about this and I realized that I should ask permission. Like, let's talk about it. And I didn't want

• 56:44Speaker 01

  to say, oh, because you have dementia, I want to say I love you. I was like, let's keep it light. Let's, let's just ask and, you know, but I wanted to do it for my mom and my dad. And I would call every Sunday. And when I called, my mom would always answer the phone and I would tell her about the week and then she would hand the phone to my dad and I'd tell him all the same stories. And then, you know, that's how the conversation went. But this Sunday, I decided I'm going to ask, you know, whether we can start saying I love you. For the first time in our whole adult lives. So it started out normally and at some point in the middle, I said, you know, Mom, we, I realized we never say, I love you at the end of these conversations. What do you think about saying, I love you?

• 57:29Speaker 01

  Silence, silence on the other end of the phone. What is she asking me? She's never asked me that before. And of course, I was just terrified that she would say no, because she might. I mean, she's, she may not be comfortable. I didn't, I didn't know. I'd never asked her that question before. But after what seemed like hours, it was just a few seconds. She said, I, I think that's a great idea. I said, oh, okay, great. And so we kind of finished up our conversation. And then both of us realized at the same time, I think, that we had nothing more to say to each other. And we both knew that we had both agreed to, to say this thing.

• 58:12Speaker 01

  I kind of describe it as, you know, it felt like two lions kind of circling each other. What's, what's gonna happen? Who goes first? And, you know, it was my ask. So I said, okay, I love you. And she said, I love you too, in our very Disney voices, so we can get through it. And so I had the conversation with my dad and it was a little less awkward with him because I knew my mom says yes, and I knew my dad would say yes. And so we agreed with my dad.

• 58:52Speaker 01

  I said, we said, I love you, hung up the phone and burst into tears. Because I had kind of changed the whole family dynamic of generations of not saying, I love you. And that was the tipping point in my family kind of history from not saying, I love you, to saying, I love you. But the, the reason why I started telling the story is that the following week I called back again and my, I love you with my mother was significantly less awkward. But

• 59:32Speaker 01

  My father said, "I love you" first. And he remembered, after a whole week, he was in the middle of dementia. He didn't remember anything. But he remembered that we had agreed to say, "I love you." And he said it first. And because I'm a neuroscientist that studies memory, I know why. And it's because emotional resonance makes hippocampal-dependent memories stick. And his hippocampus was not working well. But the emotional resonance of his adult daughter asking for the very first time to say, "I love you," it formed a new memory in my dad.

• 1:00:13Speaker 01

  And that, that was obviously something that I'll always remember. Because the last time I spoke to him, we also said, "I love you."

• 1:00:24Mel Robbins?

  That's so beautiful. Oh, my God. I think I'm crying over the brain for crying out loud. I, I'm really proud of you.

• 1:00:36Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 1:00:38Mel Robbins?

  For recognizing what you needed. And also recognizing what your parents needed.

• 1:00:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:46Mel Robbins?

  And asking for it.

• 1:00:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:49Mel Robbins?

  And the story demonstrates something you said earlier, which is, the brain is the most intricate, complicated, amazing, beautiful thing about a human.

• 1:01:05Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:01:06Mel Robbins?

  And you have the ability to change it for the better.

• 1:01:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:11Mel Robbins?

  And for anyone that's listening, that feels like you are in a family dynamic that you wish would change, all it takes is one person to do it.

• 1:01:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:26Mel Robbins?

  What a gift you gave to your parents and to yourself.

• 1:01:30Speaker 01

  Yes, it was. And I still enjoy that gift in my regular conversations with my mother. So, yes, I think about that, that day, often.

• 1:01:42Mel Robbins?

  What did it teach you as a scientist to have that personal experience?

• 1:01:48Speaker 01

  It really brought home

• 1:01:52Speaker 01

  How precious our memories are. It defines who we are. It defines our personal histories. And if you lose that personal history, you still have your same personality characteristics. But that's what's so sad to see as the family member, those memories slip away. But when they come back, or when one is created anew, you celebrate it in a different way. So it really kind of brought all of my science home to me.

• 1:02:29Mel Robbins?

  It's beautiful. So beautiful. I am so struck by what a profound experience this has been to be with you. And, you know, one of my missions is to take the smartest people in the world, like you, and some of the most complicated research, and to try to make it personal and useful. And you have done that for us today.

• 1:03:04Speaker 01

  Oh, thank you.

• 1:03:05Mel Robbins?

  In a way that not only I know that I personally feel so much more empowered and motivated, but I have a bigger reason for why this truly matters. And is there anything that you want to say to the person listening as your parting words?

• 1:03:27Speaker 01

  So my parting words for everybody listening to this podcast is that you have a beautiful brain. We all have beautiful brains. That is the message that I try and bring. And the recommendations that I give are so that you can keep that beautiful, big, fat, and fluffy brain going as long as you can.

• 1:03:52Mel Robbins?

  Well, you certainly empowered us to do that. It is such an honor to meet you, to get to spend time with you. Thank you, thank you, thank you for being with us.

• 1:04:02Speaker 01

  The honor is mine. Thank you so much.

• 1:04:04Mel Robbins?

  And for you, I just wanted to say In case no one else does, that I love you and I believe in you and I believe in your ability to create a better life. And it has been such an honor to spend time together today and to learn from Dr. Suzuki. And I know that if you take to heart everything she just shared with you, not only from her brain, but her heart, that you hold the keys in your hands to take better care of your brain, which will lead you to living a better life. And I truly hope you do. I'll see you in the next episode.

• 1:04:46Mel Robbins?

  All right. Now you want us to be quiet, Kevin? Kindergarten teacher Kevin.

• 1:04:54Mel Robbins?

  Like in the library. Yeah.

• 1:04:55Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:04:56Mel Robbins?

  Shh.

• 1:04:57Speaker 01

  We're just having fun.

• 1:04:59Mel Robbins?

  Cranking it down.

• 1:05:04Mel Robbins?

  Yeah, it's like, you're right. It's like the way a semi truck when it turns off like.

• 1:05:10Mel Robbins?

  Is that good? Oh, gotcha. I like that. Great call. Okay, great. Okay, great. Yeah, no problem. I love it. It's great. Great.

• 1:05:24Mel Robbins?

  Oh, and one more thing. And no, this is not a blooper. This is the legal language. You know what the lawyers write and what I need to read to you. This podcast is presented solely for educational and entertainment purposes. I'm just your friend. I am not a licensed therapist and this podcast is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional. Got it? Good. I'll see you in the next episode.