I\u2019ve also seen lots of people who got so wound up in the tracking and judging of their \u201cprogress\u201d that they got frustrated when they \u201cweren\u2019t making any.\u201d Not all progress is graphable. And it\u2019s not, in my experience, necessary to cognitively interact with a process to have it be beneficial. Meditation, for example, goes the other direction and has many of the same effects.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
For my money, a client who starts the walking program and finds pleasure in it and does it for fun is at least as likely to continue it long term\u2013much less likely to become obsessive about it\u2013and, as we both agree, probably equally likely to benefit from it, even if he can\u2019t explain how or why.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
I once received an email from someone worried about my anti-scientific bent as relates to neurofeedback and my tendency to avoid getting all involved in tracking. For those who don\u2019t already know this, I have an MBA in Finance and Economics from Northwestern University, so I\u2019m not in any way unfamiliar with the concepts of tracking numerically. But I also spent a dozen years doing turn-arounds in hospitals for a large hospital management company\u2013my real preparation for doing neurofeedback. In those situations, I learned that the number-watching that many of my bosses and colleagues did ended up missing the really important things happening around them. Enron had great numbers right up to the day when it imploded, because people there focused on the numbers. And there are hundreds of companies that make superb products, compete effectively, take care of their clients and workers and don\u2019t ever achieve those \u201cgreat numbers\u201d because that\u2019s not what they focus on. That I guess is my point: focus on what you want to change.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
It should be possible to conceive\u2013even to a scientist who wants hard objective data (though quantum physics, which I think qualifies as a rather advanced science, seems to suggest that ALL of what we perceive as reality is actually quite subjective)\u2013that the exercise itself is the outcome. My wife has plantar fasciitis in her foot. She does stretching exercises every day, and it is improving. What do we measure to be scientifically certain that she is getting better, or that there is some relationship between the stretching and the improvement in function? I don\u2019t know. The MD doesn\u2019t know. My wife doesn\u2019t care.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
In the same way, when I trained for improved ability to stay focused on sequential tasks years ago, I didn\u2019t seek to change my personality. I didn\u2019t want to switch from an artist to an accountant. I was simply improving my range, so that I was able to shift into and sustain for longer periods of time a state of higher activation that allowed me to do those tasks. I intuitively understood that there might well be a difference in some brain measures between my steady state and my ability to activate when desired. The one was easily measured in an assessment; the other perhaps not.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
The part of my EEG I was training (theta\/beta ratio) didn\u2019t change very much. It\u2019s still \u201chigh\u201d for an adult. But what I can do with my brain changed, and how long I can do it changed. It\u2019s possible that if I wanted to do an fMRI or a full QEEG to measure what my brain did at task, I\u2019d see the changes. Frankly (maybe because I have a healthy dose of slow-wave and alpha activity) it was never worth the time, trouble or expense to me.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
I didn\u2019t train to change my brain. I trained to change my performance. Training the brain was the medium, just like my wife\u2019s stretching exercises, just like doing aerobics to change stamina. Or taking medications that have never been clinically proven to have an effect on a particular problem (off-label uses) to change that problem.<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Identifying Progress I\u2019ve also seen lots of people who got so wound up in the tracking and judging of their \u201cprogress\u201d that they got frustrated when they \u201cweren\u2019t making any.\u201d Not all progress is graphable. And it\u2019s not, in my experience, necessary to cognitively interact with a process to have it be beneficial. Meditation, for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":112,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":3,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"topic":[786],"class_list":["post-39792","answer","type-answer","status-publish","hentry","answer_topic-tracking-changes-from-training"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n