Of Bellies and Brains

Are you doing everything necessary to help your kids succeed in tomorrow's world?Have you ever wondered what your kids have in store for them when they grow up? What will they look like and who will they be? What skills will they need in order to thrive, or even just survive in tomorrow's world? What kind of job will they have? How well will they be prepared after they leave your nest?One thing is for sure. The world that our kids will live in as adults will be very different than what we know today. Just think back to how many new things you have seen come since you were a kid. Remember the days when you actually had to get off the coach to change the channel? Or you had to wait for weeks to see how your pictures turned out?The world is changing very quickly.

We live in times of rapid growth and change. New technical information doubles every two years. Entire industries sprout up and disappear in the time it takes to get a college education. Much of what students learn today is obsolete before they have a chance to use it.

We live in an age of instant gratification, instant results and instant messaging. If Google can't answer your question then who can? We have become accustomed to immediate access to everything. Remember when we actually had to go to the library to find things out?Our kids will have careers that don't even exist today.

What does this mean for your kids' future? They will use technologies not yet invented. Today's challenges require kids to learn more stuff in less time in order to compete. They receive more information every day than our grandparents did in an entire year.

We are constantly bombarding our kids with educational and commercial messages. The amount of information in a single week of the New York Times is more than prior generations saw in a lifetime. How do they sort it all out? How do they focus?The formulas of yesterday no longer apply.

Now more than ever, we must prepare our kids with the tools they need for tomorrow. The best skill we can give our kids today is adaptability. We must train their brains so that they can quickly respond to inevitably changing times.

Kids must learn to face change with excitement and anticipation - not with fear and dread. How many adults today have that skill? How can we can ensure that our kids have these skills necessary for their advancement in tomorrow's world.

Brain fitness is required for our children's success.

Brain Science is discovering that physical and mental exercise, coupled with eating foods that are good for the brain, improves the ability to learn and remember. The brain has the ability to change all the time – but only if we feed it the right stuff.

Brain scientists used to think of the brain as somehow independent of physical health - but now we know that is not true.

The health of the brain reflects the health of the body.

The brain is a physical organ and plays by all the same physical rules as the heart and lungs. We need to nourish, exercise and rest our kids' brains just like the rest of their body.

Yet during a time when we most need to maximize our kids' brain fitness to thrive in their modern world, we are neglecting their physical health. Just look at these facts:

1 out of 5 school age kids are overweight.

1 out of 3 kids born after the year 2000 will likely get diabetes.

1 out of 5 high school age kids have early stages of heart disease.

Millions of kids are on psychiatric medication.

ADHD diagnosis is at a record high.

The recipes for brain and body health have changed.

Several generations ago we didn't worry about getting enough exercise. We all worked physical jobs and walked everywhere we went. We didn't worry about eating right. There were no processed foods - we ate fresh foods from local farms. We didn't worry about getting enough sleep. There were no electronic alarm clocks kicking us out of bed to get to school and work. But these times are gone.

Today it takes action to avoid poor health. We find our grocery stores and restaurants littered with poor choices. It's difficult to find the time to get the exercise we know we all need. We are so busy that we end up stealing hours from our sleep to get everything done.

Focus on brain fitness will optimize the body and the mind.

The brain is the center of everything we do. When we focus on strategies that improve our kids' brain fitness, the physical and mental health of their brains, then we simultaneously improve the health of their bodies as well. The brain is the only organ that is physical, emotional and spiritual.

If we want to give our kids the best chance at success we must give them the tools required to achieve it. We must nourish their brains with all of the necessary ingredients for brain fitness. It may sound cliché, but they are our future. We must start attending to their health to create a future for all of us.