Getting There: Growing the Motivation to Make Healthy Changes

Intention and Effort

I want to focus on these two useful aspects of conscious awareness which are important footholds for behaviour change and activation: intention and effort. They are particularly worth focusing on because in our world of distraction and multi-tasking, they aren’t immediately accessible. We are naturally predisposed to following the most rapidly amenable distraction because of our brain’s tendency to attend to new stimuli, prioritised over established ones. Becoming aware of intention and effort, we can nurture our motivation to establish and sustain healthy changes in our lives.

The first step is allowing yourself the time and space to determine your intention. This involves reflecting on your core values and the goals that arise out of them, identifying discrepancies between your current reality and your aspirations. Then you can articulate your intention to move from one to the other being as clear and specific as you can, even visualising what it would take to complete this journey. Intention is reaching into our core selves, our heart and soul, brushing past the external influences or distractions, including our fears and under-confidence, to set ourselves a clear and authentic goal, with the commitment to achieve it.

Next you need to prepare for the effort required to set off on that journey. Again, you can prepare yourself for what it will feel like and visualise what your physical, cognitive and emotional state will be like as you set off. Effort can appear old-fashioned in our leisure focused society, the emphasis on hardship over comfort, tolerating pain rather than averting it. But the modern idea of convenience and leisure is deconditioning us and setting expectations too loosely for a life that remains essentially challenging. So the process of expecting effort and preparing yourself for it is helpful in resetting those expectations and bracing yourself for them.

Intention is being specific about the direction, while effort is the insistence to carry on the path through the mud and rocky terrain, the ascents, and the diversions, to reach the goal. Putting intention into action with this insistence gives rise to the essential confidence which proves your capability to yourself and others that encourages you onwards. 

When living in this aligned way, it is heartening to realise that the effort becomes effortless. Once you have chosen your goal as an expression of your values, you have no other choice but to keep pushing on towards it. You rise above yourself where effort and intention merge, and you become one with your core values and aspirations.

Flavonoids and the Brain; Blueberries, blackcurrants, chamomile and Shiso!

A recent meta-analysis, in October 2023, found that higher flavonoid intake was associated with a 17% lower risk of cognitive impairment and dementia. Mild cognitive impairment is the mild decline in memory and functioning that can often be seen several years before any dementia diagnosis.

This meta analysis looked at 13 observational studies (cohort and cross sectional) , and a further systematic review looked at a total of 27 studies. It looked at the general population aged 47-81.

Notably the flavonoids Anthocyanins and Flavones were found to confer the greatest reduction in risk (27 and 23% respectively). But in which foods do we find these and how can we include them in our diet?

Anthocyanins are most commonly quoted as found in blueberries. But it is important to remember that blackcurrants, Açai berries and pomegranates (fresh, rather than juice) are also particularly concentrated sources.

Flavones are particularly concentrated in chamomile, a great reason to get drinking the chamomile tea! In addition there are a number of herbs containing high levels: Oregano, Mint, Parsley, Rosemary and Shiso top the list, so even a small sprinkle of these to dishes can make an impact. Shiso is an aromatic leaf, related to the mint and basil family. Traditionally used in Japanese dishes, it can be easily grown in the summer months in the UK from seed and sprinkled into salads. It is also known as perilla leaf in English.

This study also showed a dose response relationship; the higher the intake of flavanoids the better- up to 250mg/day, which is quite difficult to achieve!

The drawbacks of this analysis include the common problem with many nutritional studies- that the flavonoid intake was estimated by dietary questionnaires, and some of the studies included did not adjust for confounders. In addition the studies that looked at cognitive impairment and dementia were not separated.

Dietary (Poly)phenols and Cognitive Decline: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Observational Studies

Justyna Godos et al. Mol Nutr Food Res. 2024 Jan.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/QHIEC6AWD97BZDCKAJYR?target=10.1002/mnfr.202300472

Andrew Fisher

May 2024

Tomatoes and Astaxanthin for blood pressure reduction

A study published in January 2024 caught my eye in the past month regards to dietary and supplemental carotenoids.

A meta-analysis of RCTs looked at 1151 adults aged 23-68 with no co-morbidities. They found that lycopene in a dose of 5-30mg, or astaxanthin in a dose of 6-18mg daily (note the FDA does not recommend taking over 12mg astaxanthin for more than a month) reduced systolic blood pressure by an average of 2.5mmHg and diastolic blood pressure by 1.6mmHg. Although these sound like small gains, from experience I know that many individual factors like this can add up to significant reductions for patients with high blood pressure.

Lycopene is well known to occur in large amounts in tomatoes. Ketchup contains 9.9–13.44 mg lycopene/100 g, whereas fresh tomatoes contain anywhere from 0.88-7.44mg lycopene/100 g.

As for Astaxanthin, it's the pink pigment found in fish and shellfish (salmon and rainbow trout are the most concentrated sources with approximately 3mg per portion) but it can also be found in vegetarian sources such as lentils and one of my personal favourites , blueberries! Astaxanthin also has evidence it has a positive effect on dry macular degeneration and also activates NRF2 and AMPK- two well study pathways in longevity research.

The largest reduction was using 15-20mg carotenoids daily.

A reason to get eating those tomatoes!

Behzadi M, Akbarzadeh M, Mohammadi Sartang M, Rabiee M, Bideshki MV. Effect of carotenoid supplementation on blood pressure in adults: a GRADE-assessed systematic review and dose-response meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Nutr Rev. 2024 Jan 14

Dr Andrew Fisher, April 2024