Brain Science Resources

This week at SOSL I taught on brain science. I used a number of books, videos and research articles in generating the teaching and some of the students asked for links to the videos and books. Figuring this may be of interest to a wider audience, I've posted those resources here!

Books

There are a ton of books about the brain, here are the ones I referenced this week (links are to iBookstore).

Videos

I showed clips from several of the videos below.

The brain uses a quarter of the body's entire energy supply, yet only accounts for about two percent of the body's mass. So how does this unique organ receive and, perhaps more importantly, rid itself of vital nutrients? New research suggests it has to do with sleep. Link to YouTube.

Stress isn't always a bad thing; it can be handy for a burst of extra energy and focus, like when you're playing a competitive sport or have to speak in public. But when it's continuous, it actually begins to change your brain. (Great intro to epigenetics.) Link to YouTube.

Video that demonstrates the son's basil ganglia works just fine. Link to YouTube.

Buddy (Will Ferrell) insults the diminutive Miles (Peter Dinklage) when he calls him an elf. Over and over again. Thus demonstrating poor prefrontal cortex function. Link to YouTube.

Your brain on social media. Link to YouTube.

Ever wonder how your brain processes information? These brain tricks and illusions help to demonstrate the two main systems of Fast and Slow Thinking in your brain. Link to YouTube.

Video on perception and visual processing. Link to YouTube.

We don't know much about the human brain on music. Do people instinctively know the sound patterns of the pentatonic scale? Is there a base level of musical knowledge in all of us, just waiting to be tapped? Link to YouTube.

What happened to her emotions when she went through this? What happens to your emotions when you watch this? Your temporal lobes are doing their job! Link to YouTube.

Barbara Arrowsmith-Young is the author of the international best-selling book The Woman Who Changed Her Brain. Link to YouTube.

Here's a good summary of some of the SPECT brain scanning. I didn't get to show this video, but it's a good overview nevertheless. Link to YouTube.

Update (11/7/17): Not mentioned in my teaching, but interesting never the less, is this video about making your brain happy.

Become a Communication Ninja

This week we talked about Life Languages on our podcast. Taking a Life Language profile will give you in-depth insight into your communication styles. This, coupled with the additional information in the document, will help you understand yourself and others and increase your communication skills.

All of our staff at Grace Center take a Life Language profile and it's been one of the most helpful things we've done to boost productivity and reduce communication conflict. If you haven't taken a profile before (or it's been a while since you last did) we've partnered with our friend Allison Hendrickson who is a certified Life Language trainer. If you head over to her site and use the KLLP code jones (all lower case) you can save $5 on a profile. And bonus: if you take your profile before the end of this week, we've invited Allison to share on next week's podcast about Life Languages and answer your questions.

So here's what to do:

1. Go get your profile (use the code jones in the KLLP code box to save $5)
2. Listen to this week's podcast on Life Languages to give yourself an introduction to the concepts
3. Ask Allison a question about Life Languages
4. Listen to next week's podcast to hear her answers

Have a great week!

75 Episodes In

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For episode 75 of Keeping Up With The Joneses we had the wonderful privilege of sitting down with two men with incredible stories. Pastor Surprise has seen eight people raised from the dead; Pastor Franci was raised from the dead. On this episode they talk about their experiences with Jesus. We hope this episode fills you with awe at what Jesus is doing on the earth. Photo credit: Becky Pendergrass.

Heaven Declares 2015

We just wrapped up an incredible conference at Heaven Declares. The presence of God was just wonderful, worship was incredible and the teaching outstanding. If you'd like to catch any of the sessions head over to the conference website to download the MP3s or watch the session videos.

Halloween Update

We get lots of requests for our halloween talk around this time of year. We updated it recently with a cleaned up version of the audio and a video of the talk. If you've been looking for it, you can find it here.

Wonder

Alyn spoke this morning at Grace Center on wonder vs. cynicism. If you missed it, here's the video to catch yourself up.

Forgiveness

If you listened to the podcast this week, you'll know that we were talking about the importance of forgiveness. If you haven't heard AJ's testimony before, we've got a copy of her telling her story and how the power of forgiveness changed her life available for download. It's worth a listen and you can learn more here.

Finding Father Sold Out

If you've tried to order Finding Father in the last few days you'll know this already but we're all sold out! A few weeks ago, in anticipation of our stock being depleted we ordered more copies from our publisher and we were told they were sold out too! So, right now, more copies are being printed; our third run! Thanks for all your support - we'll let you know when we get more in stock.

For now though, you can still purchase electronic versions of the book. We have them in Kindle edition, iOS and an enhanced version for iPad.

An Intro to Honor

I had the privilege of sharing at Grace Center this morning. I chose to share on the topic of honor. If you missed the message you can catch up by watching the video above. It was difficult to condense our week long teaching into one message, but I hope I got the foundation down! If you'd like to hear the rest of the message, head over to our honor teaching page.

Heaven Declares 2015

Grace Center is hosting our annual Heaven Declares conference in October. If you act fast, you can get some pretty sweet deals on tickets.