This month I am going to follow up on article from last month, as I promised I would. Last month you may remember I made a statement that may have taken some of you by surprise. I told you that recent studies have shown our brains have no less than six levels of activity and five of those work all time. Even when we sleep or are in a stupor from too much from night before. By way alcohol that makes our senses dull works on our brains to prevent electrical signals to travel through it and cause all our mental activity to slow down. No wonder you get blurry vision, strange animals, slowed response time and strange verbal responses after a bit of alcohol in body.

An no wonder you have a headache later. The brain is just trying to get chemicals back in balance. All this to say chemicals inside your brain make it work. Recently you may have seen articles in news magazines or your newspaper about a discovery related to memory and recognition. It seems diet has a direct impact on our mental activity. As we get older we get a waxy substance that builds up on brain connections. These act as insulators to prevent electrical signals in our brains from being transmitted. This energy is activity of our mental process and creates memories we have as well as reactions we need to cause our bodies to work.

For us this translates into ability to remember what makes us feel good, or even where we left keys this last night. Our brains get dull and listless when we don't exercise them and as we get older. To some degree we can defeat this by actively associating something with our actions. Preferably tie memory to an image that is familiar. I do this by always placing my car keys in a basket on my dressing table. When I see my keys drop in basket I make association graphic, rather than just throwing them anywhere without thinking about it. Try it. You will be surprised how this simple exercise demonstrates powers of associative organization. In one way or another all memory gurus use this principle to teach you how to remember about anything.

"Running on Automatic" is what I call ability to visualize what you need to have happen. Automatic because part of your brain that gives us most of our solutions is working all time. When you are asleep or not. Most of us call it our subconscience. This part of your brain is processing what your awake aware or cognitive part of brain is telling it is going on. Our subconscience is not aware of any rational or philosophical system. It just helps us process stuff we see, feel, smell, taste and hear. It is core of our intuition. And most of all it can be exercised and controlled.

When we understand how to feed our subconscious so it will work out our problems and help us get to where we need to be there is nothing you can't achieve. Didn't your mother tell you "There's nothing you can't do, if you just set your mind to it." Listen to your mother, she was right. In fact she gave you best advice you will ever get about how to get ahead in this world. If you can see it, you can do it.

Now you say 'Andrew, that sounds all fine and good, but have you ever got this thinking stuff to work?'

"Yes I have!" In fact reality of this web site is result of my imagining what could be done and then seeing all parts in place and how they will fit together. At this time it is not complete, but I know what I want to see in place and how I will get it done. It is something I did with my brain, but results will be with my hands.

Limber Up The Neurons Let's do a very simple exercise so you can try it out for yourself. Look around room you are in. Find something that someone made. Take a wooden chair for instance. Go back in your mind and see tree that was growing in forest. All green and beautiful. A trunk straight and tall. Then a lumberjack comes along with his or her chain saw and goes about cutting it down. Later a large piece of equipment comes along and gathers up tree trunk that has been trimmed to a log and takes it to a lumber mill. At mill tree is cut into boards with a huge circular saw sorted, stacked, graded and finally boards are placed in a kiln to dry wood.