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24 Power Up Your Mind

brain becomes alert over a short period, explaining why coffee helps
to keep you awake at night. Too much coffee, however, causes dizzi-
ness, headaches, and difficulty in concentrating. Coffee is also a
diuretic, so for every cup you drink you need at least two of water.
Alcohol is widely enjoyed and, in reasonable amounts, is a
useful element of a balanced diet. It causes a loss of inhibitions and
so, for some, enhances confidence and helps them to be more
creative. Alcohol is also a depressant and too much of it reduces the
flow of blood to the front cortex area of your brain, so making you
less effective as a thinker. In addition, it is a diuretic, as anyone who
has drunk too much knows to their cost when they wake up the next
morning.
Various additives commonly found in processed food affect
the brain adversely. This is most pronounced when you are young:
for example, there is ample research to connect additives with
unhelpful levels of hyperactivity in school pupils, at an age when
their brains are much more demanding of energy and must have
good food and drink to create this.
We need a balanced diet of all the ingredients above. For
many of us this means eating less fat, less salt, and less chocolate,
and drinking less coffee, less tea, and less alcohol. For some of us it
may mean reviewing the amount of protein we eat. And for most of
us it means eating more fresh fruit and vegetables.
The third principle is to eat little and often, what is some-
times describes as a “grazing” diet.
After a big meal, your stomach and digestive system are hun-
grily consuming oxygenated blood. This is why you tend to feel
sleepy after a big meal: your brain is literally being denied enough
blood to function at a high level of alertness. Although grazing has
unfortunate associations with snacking on chocolate and potato
chips, if the basic ingredients are good it ensures consistent levels of
energy through the day.

What is your own diet like? Are you conscious of the cause and effect of what you eat and how
your mind works? Do you sag after lunch? Could you change your diet to help you perform
more consistently at any time of day?