The Curious Mind Episode 4
For most of human history our brains dealt with pretty straight forward problems. But that brain is the exact same one we now use to post pictures of our pets on social media, fill out Excel spreadsheets and worry about the next payment on our credit card. We live in an amazingly complex world our ancestors could never have imagined. So it’s no great surprise our stone aged brains are often overwhelmed - stress, anxiety and depression are the cost we all pay, in all kinds of ways, for our relentlessly demanding digital-age lives. Every single one of us has weird thoughts and they can lead us into darker territory - anxiety, depression and stress. Nigel explores how this happens and importantly - what we can do about it. To do that he experiences the stress of being submerged underwater in a helicopter, upside down, in the pitch dark, we talk with people who’ve been taken to the very brink by stress and anxiety, and fought their way back, and we’ll see an amazing programme in a school which isn’t just helping kids deal better with stress, but also to learn more effectively, to have less conflict, and to live happier lives. It turns out that there really is a very simple way to look after your amazingly complex brain. It’s backed up by decades of science, and any of us can do it anywhere, anytime.