Best way to improve brain power
So today I’m going to teach you how to build up the most important neurotransmitter in your brain, OK? And it’s called acetylcholine. Acetylcholine is a neurotransmitter, which means that it’s like a hormone, but it works through the nervous system.
So it’s a communication particle that creates different effects and it’s involved in your memory and your ability to learn with sleep, attention, focus, feeling alert, and your ability to be awake. So you can imagine if you’re deficient in acetylcholine, you’re going to have a lot of issues.
And acetylcholine is the main neurotransmitter of the parasympathetic nervous system, which is all about rest and digestion. It’s a neurotransmitter that works through the vagus nerve that innervates a lot of different visceral organs.
And visceral organs are all the organs in the cavity, in your stomach and your chest. And anticholinergic drugs like medications to control your bladder, medications for Parkinson’s disease, and COPD all have side effects of a loss of memory, probably because they create a deficiency in acetylcholine.
And I remember my mother-in-law, unfortunately, she had dementia and she passed away. But I do remember her being on bladder medication and I always wondered how much that contributed to her dementia.
But unfortunately, when people get on several medications, they don’t know what is causing what anymore. There are also several conditions that you need to be aware of that nearly always have lowered acetylcholine. Autism, Alzheimer’s and dementia, ms, and Parkinson’s disease.
Let me go through all the things that can increase acetylcholine in your brain as far as food goes, right? You want to eat foods high in choline, which is a precursor for acetylcholine. And the food that has the most choline is egg yolks. Okay?
So this is another reason why you should be eating eggs. I consume a lot of eggs. I probably consume three to four eggs every single day. And it’s probably a really good thing. I have been doing this because recently on my DNA test that I did, which I’m going to be doing a deep dive on that to explain what that is and how you can benefit from it.
But for me, one big problem is choline, right? Even though I consume choline, I need a lot of choline to allow that choline to work in its pathways. So it’s been a good thing that I’ve been consuming eggs with choline unknowingly for all these years.
But you can also get choline from beef liver and blueberries, and it’s in a lot of other foods as well, but egg yolks would give you a good amount. Now, acetylcholine also needs helper molecules to allow it to be produced or synthesized.
And so one helper molecule is vitamin B five. And it’s very easy to get vitamin B Five from just eating pretty much any food. But here’s the thing about B5 . One of the most common ways that someone becomes deficient in B5 is by drinking alcohol. Right?
So if someone is drinking alcohol even several times a week, they’re usually going to be deficient in B5 , which can indirectly affect that acetylcholine. You also need zinc to build acetylcholine.
So if you’re deficient in zinc, that could be one reason why you’re not producing enough. And so you get zinc from shellfish as well as grass-fed, beef. MagnesiumMagnesium is another mineral that is needed to make acetylcholine.
And you get magnesium when you consume chlorophyll that’s in all the leafy greens. So you can get enough magnesium if you’re having salads on a regular basis. And then you have a trace mineral called manganese, which is also important in making acetylcholine.
A couple of good sources of manganese. There are a lot of different sources, but hazelnuts, macadamia, nuts, as well as leafy greens, but you can also get it from sea kelp and shellfish and many different things. Now, another thing that’s important is consuming enough omega three fatty acids.
That can be in sardines, that can be in Colliver oil, that can be in salmon. But omega three is important as well. Now, green tea has certain phytonutrients that can help build up your levels of CETL choline as well. So you might want to drink some of that during the day.
As far as actual choline supplements, there are two that I recommend. I wouldn’t do both. I would do either, and they’re both very similar. One is called Citicoline. Another name for that would be CDP choline, and the other one is called Alpha GPC. Either one of those could be a good supplement if you wanted to take a supplement.
Now, believe it or not, drinking coffee can help raise your CETO choline levels. Getting enough sleep because you have enough melatonin can also build up your levels of fetal choline. But this next point is very interesting and surprising. Insulin increases your CETO choline.
Now, I know you’re saying Dutch burg, am I supposed to start eating all these carbs? You get insulin. No. All you want is a natural amount of insulin that your body produces when you don’t consume carbs. You see, when you eat carbs over a period of time, you develop insulin resistance, and that creates a deficiency of insulin, especially in your brain.
This is why the cell cells die because they’re not able to get the fuel that’s dependent on that insulin. So eating more carbs, okay, creates a compensation that literally starves your cells of insulin. Since we’re on the topic of brain power, if you haven’t seen this video on the brain, that’s the next one you should check out. I put it up right here.