Brain's Dual Engines: Wired Neural Broadband

The brain's a dual structure, like eyes, ears, lungs and kidneys, but with a difference. We're geared with two brains, right and left, which Gene Cohen (The Mature Mind, 2005) says are "connected by a kind of broadband neural link called the corpus callosum."

Functional differences between the left and right side of the brain's hemispheres are well-known. Language comprehension, speech, logical and mathematical reasoning is largely handled in the left hemisphere, while face recognition, body language, musical recognition and intuitive/holistic operations are handled by the right. But the left and right hemispheres work in concert because no one activity is completely dominant on one side of the brain and this tends to increase as people mature.

You've no doubt heard talk about some people being left-brained or right-brained, which goes so far as to say that men are left-brained and women are right-brained. This is mostly metaphor, however. Men and women continuously tap into both sides of the brain throughout a day, no matter the activity. So to show career choices favoring one side of the brain or the other according to Gene Cohen, misrepresents current knowledge.

Throughout early life, the brain typically uses one side at a time for things like decoding written language, generating speech or recognizing patterns. As people mature, these tasks are usually performed in both hemispheres.

To keep your brain functioning well throughout life people need both mental and physical exercise. "Engaging in challenging new learning experiences boosts the development of the brain in the second half of life," according to Joseph LeDoux, NYU behavioral neuroscientist, since novel experiences create new synapses and other natural structures within the brain. Good news is that taking on mental challenges in new areas improves information processing and memory storage. And people who engage in regular physical exercise are less likely to develop Alzheimer's and dementia or suffer a stroke.

So fire up your dual engines to keep learning and exercising throughout life. I bought a Frisbee game to play with my grandsons and I often take on new technological challenges. At some point I want to take up painting. Hmm... what field would you like to explore or what new activity will you try?

Brain's Left Side - Tames and Organizes

The last post scanned an artist’s right brain hemisphere - when it brims over with colors and shapes. Leave your art there, though, and you’ll likely see chaos at best. So what’s missing?

That’s where the left brain organizer steps in. You could see it as a mental master of sorts – equipped to corral and tame.

Left brain taming is rather exciting when an artist draws on its capability. It shakes up colors and shapes as a kaleidoscope does and places them into designs of brilliance, under a master’s hand. Or it takes random words quickly jotted down in a brainstorming session to see patterns and logical order.

Peoples' left brains help them to analyze, judge, organize and choose between one good and another. Mark McGuinness reveals how creativity's grounded in a logical process.

It’s as much in the shift here, as the dance is in the hitch. Inspiration can run wild in the brain, unless the left brain taming tactics come alive. Incredible left brain booty includes:


When artists depend on their left brains for composition, they make winning choices for …

Essential elements – through infinite details that form and focus your eye on landscape or a person’s face in the finished piece.

Proportion - where rhythm creates cadence in proportions that emote pleasure, sadness, or shock

Value – in lights and darks played for different effects

Color – through selections that establish moods and integrate relationships

Texture – which shows up to the touch through heavy, soft, rough or smooth

Perspectives and angles - that point, slant, straighten up and curve to the human eye in art we love

An artist’s brain moves back and forth between the magical right and the logical left. It’s all part of the master’s polish to a final work that’s uniquely hers.

Thoughts?

Stay tuned for more on your brain's dual engines.

Brain's Amazing Right Side

A curiosity about the world around him drives designer David Airey to create ideas that come to life through a wide range of media. David enjoys more creative autonomy because he chose to leave the world of "design by committee." Even now, when clients fail to tap into his experience, David claims that they miss full benefits of his artistic design. Could it be that he finds insights between the world and design because he uses his right brain more in the process?

Similarly Ellen Weber's main thrust as a writer targets brain research as it relates to learning and leadership. But, Ellen sought the wonder of creativity so she began writing a novel. Note how she describes it...

After living in Baffin Island’s High Arctic communities for two years, as researcher and professor with McGill, I wrote a novel to capture both the nuances and the mysteries from life on a frozen tundra. This story earmarks lessons learned and lived among Inuit friends and colleagues. I’d been excited to relate fictitious events about a fascinating Inuit people within real life settings. While all events and characters are my own creation, issues in the book arose from several Baffin Island community concerns I witnessed while there. My book was written for both white and Inuit readers who care about cultural conversations for deeper understanding across differences and in responses to struggles encountered there.

Ellen remarked that the characters in her novel took on lives of their own and almost moved her hands to type the words they wanted rather than her own choices. Did Ellen tap into her right brain more as she let her characters take charge? Seems like Ellen's right brain fought to take charge...

Ideas inspired from your right brain look different than ideas that draw from your left. Here’s why…

Think of your right brain as your playground for insights – that make you, you, and you’ll begin to see its use in art. Here’s the clincher. Your right brain kicks in when you observe and draw from past experiences during the creative process.

Miraculously, the right brain holds a few tricks for your art that tend to remain hidden until you rub the magic jar, so to speak, and that genie appears. Your muse, like the genie, can release gold as seen in this diagram:


Think of your right brain at its best when not interrupted by constant criticisms and editorial coming from the left side. Intuitively, it comes up with color and lines that work. Holistically, it pieces together parts of a complex plot. Concretely, it meshes mood and body language into characters of a novel.

You get the picture, it’s a bit like creativity run wild in a sense. For the novice artist less magic will be available. To the successful artist, the magic comes quicker, and yet taming will soon be required from the left side of the brain before art takes shape.

Stay tuned for the next post to find out how that logical organizer – your left brain operates.

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