Sugar on the Brain

 

"When we eat sweet foods the brain's reward system — called the mesolimbic dopamine system — gets activated. Dopamine is a brain chemical released by neurons and can signal that an event was positive. ... Dopamine “hits” from eating sugar promote rapid learning to preferentially find more of these foods." Source

Eating a donut, or having an ice cream is not a horrible thing. In fact it's quite fun. However, it's the accumulative amount of dopamine inducing chemical and also dopamine inducing activities combined is becoming a larger problem. 

 •  "If a person experiences hyperarousal while playing Video Games, the brain associates the activity with dopamine." Source 

•  "Social Media mimics human connection, prompting dopamine release when we get likes and comments." Source  

•  "When binge watching your favorite show (TV/Video/YouTube), your brain is continually producing dopamine, and your body experiences a drug-like high. ... your brain produces dopamine." Source

 So in the past few decades, young people have been subjected to vastly increasing amounts of dopamine. Many spend hours a day hyper-stimulating this addictive neurotransmitter. When young people get older, they often find the same brain trigger in Alcohol, Cigarettes and Gambling.

One could easily infer that we expose young people addictive dopamine as Simon Sinek points out. They are pre-disposed to be more likely to experience other addiction as adults. Eventually, one in ten working age adults dies of addiction related causes from drugs like alcohol. (CDC)

What to do? It is impossible to legislate and enforce  laws to control this. Our only hope now is to give our young people better coping skills at navigating past these addictive moneymakers. Help young people change their thinking to focus on their best mental well being. Encouraging positive brain health with a  regular frequency of messaging, ideas, motivations. 

#soberworldorg  Changing Thinking Changes Everything.