i’m currently reading livewired by david eagleman. it mentioned an interesting research which although has a small sample size, is worth thinking about. the researchers basically had nuns volunteer to donate their brains after death. what the researchers found was that some of the nuns had alzheimers disease but never knew because their brains were plastic. their brains were plastic becuase even in old age, they lived a social life with a purpose. they faced new challenges regularly, which kept their brains healthy.

i read something similar in a substack blogpost today. that our perception of time is based on memories. if you have a high density of memories from a period, you’ll remember it to be long. and vice versa. the author then mentioned that to ‘expand’ life, one should seek novelty. take new routes that you haven’t taken before. visit places in your city you didn’t before, etc.

so seek novelty. novel challenges, novel experiences.