How many times have you thought there must be a secret to being strong, wise, and happy? Other people seem content and able to glide through life, while you continue to deal with stress and distractions. Neuroscience research now points to changes in your brain as the secret to your happiness.

Best-selling author and friend of the Brain Health Initiative Rick Hanson, PhD, has written extensively about taking control of your brain’s tendency to react to life with fear, frustration, and heartache—and returning it to its natural state of calm, contentment, and caring. In his latest book, Neurodharma, Dr. Hanson provides a guide for helping you handle stress, heal old pain, feel at ease with others, and rest in the sense of your natural goodness.

To guide you, Dr. Hanson suggests looking at the traits of those people who inspire you. They are often mindful, kind, and content, and they maintain an emotional balance through even the hardest times. Their actions suggest that wonderful ways of being lie ahead. And if you look closely, you can see some of the qualities they display deep inside yourself.

The opportunity to nurture those qualities is available to everyone. Dr. Hanson suggests trying to develop these qualities within yourself through these seven practices:

• Focusing and finding your center
• Feeling happiness in your heart
• Feeding your soul
• Finding your complete and harmonious self
• Existing in the present
• Being at one with all things
• Believing life continued beyond your existence

These simple steps can be useful in your everyday life, and they may help put you on the path to the happiness you want—and deserve.

Mindfulness can also help you on your journey. Please join us on November 14 in Lakewood Ranch for the Mindful Triathlon. Learn more and register at lakewoodranch.com/event/lwr-2nd-annual-mindful-triathlon.

The Suncoast region needs your participation in the Brain Health Pilot Study!

Did you receive an invitation to participate in the Brain Health Pilot Study? Randomly selected adult residents from Lakewood Ranch were invited to participate in the BHI Brain Health Pilot Study to learn more about brain health. The pilot study examines the ways you function mentally, socially, cognitively, and overall, as well as the factors in your life that present risk or promote resilience in brain health and performance. Community participation is critical to the study’s success. If you received an invitation, we encourage you to complete the online survey.

About the Brain Health Initiative

The Brain Health Initiative (BHI) is a cutting-edge approach to protecting brain health, optimizing brain performance, and fighting brain illness across the lifespan. The BHI is creating a culture that promotes brain health protective factors and decreases risk factors, thereby improving brain health and optimizing brain performance outcomes for the Florida Suncoast region and beyond. Join the brain health movement, because brain health matters, and lifestyle makes a difference.

To learn more about the Brain Health Initiative and to become a Brain Health Champion, visit brainhealthinitiative.org.