Ok, I promise that my next post will not include a reference to Clay, but again he recommended an excellent book, and again I took him up on it. And in a further reference to my last post, I’ve already been beaten to the punch in terms of reviewing this book, by the author of the last book I reviewed.

First check out Garr Reynold’s Awesome Review of Brain Rules on SlideShare…

So now that you’ve seen that, let me talk about a couple more of the brain rules that are pretty cool. Stressed brains don’t function as well as non-stressed brains. Why? Well, that ties in with our evolution, where stress was meant to be a passing thing which gave us adrenalin to deal with the tiger that was getting ready to eat us. Constant stress and the body eventually starts going haywire. I know that this is true of me, I think much better when I’m not stressed out.

And for my all time favorite brain rule, sleep well – think well. This is great, so it turns out that we really do need 8 hours of sleep to function at our optimum everyday (making allowances for personal variance). You know that post lunch coma that you thought was due to your turkey sandwich? Well, that actually happens independent of what you eat. More importantly, if you take that nap that your brain is asking for your performance will increase by 34%!

“What other management strategy will improve people’s performance by 34% in just 26 minutes?” – Mark Rosekind, NASA Scientist on the value of an afternoon nap

Well if you haven’t fallen asleep yet, go check out the cool videos at the Brain Rules site.

Here’s the thing about Brain Rules, its an incredible read. I did a bit of analysis to try and figure out why it was so easy to read. Dr. Medina, actually employs his own rules when writing, so that we don’t get bored while reading. He practices what he preaches. Brilliant!