Episode 1. The Neuroscience Behind Change - Dr Gabija Toleikyte

Want to gain insights into the neuroscience behind creating change, habits,  decision making and gain a better understanding of some of our actions? Dr Gabija Toleikyte discussed this and much more on Episode 1 of the Reframe & Reset Your Career podcast. In this episode, we will learn about: Habits -  why we form them, what needs they serve, why it’s so difficult to change them and potentially looking for alternatives to those habits. Forming new habits takes time and repetition. Emotions - The role of emotions and learning how to understand our emotions and their underlying cause. Activities such as meditation, physical exercise, and time with loved ones may help to calm emotions. Motivation versus Inspiration – finding those activities and work which inspire you may help to increase motivation. Procrastination – it’s important to understand the root causes of procrastination and then tackle the cause to improve productivity. Decision making – when we have too many decisions to make, we may become stuck in analysis paralysis, and eliminating the decisions that don’t matter may help.  The “Amygdala hijack” may lead to us saying or doing things we regret so it’s best to not make any important decisions at this time! Overwhelming levels of stress are not good for performance but there are certain levels of stress which may help focus. The importance of sleep, exercise, and nutrition for brain health. Finally as an extra bonus, insights into personal relationships and why we are attracted to certain people. Dr Gabija Toleikyte is a neuroscientist, lecturer, and performance and wellbeing coach.  She is currently a lecturer in psychology at Sheffield Hallam University and her first book, “Why the F*ck can’t I change?”, will be published in January 2021. There were two significant events that helped develop Gabija’s interest in neuroscience, Firstly, when she was around 8 years old, she went to see a neurologist to deal with some migraines and he explained to her in detail how the brain worked, which fascinated her. There was a second slightly more sad event as her father had a stroke which severely affected him, fortunately, after intense therapy for three months he made a good recovery.  Gabija completed her PhD at University College London and her PhD findings were published in one of the highest impact research journals, Nature Neuroscience, in 2017. Prior to that, she undertook award-winning research on Parkinson’s disease at the University of Helsinki. During her PhD, Gabija also qualified as a business coach and coached UCL academics and administrative staff. Combining her neuroscience background with coaching experience Gabija started her own consulting company, providing coaching and seminars for organizations and the general public. Gabija is also a TEDx speaker and her work has been featured in the Guardian.   I first met Gabija in 2017 at one of her evening lectures and quickly became a huge fan of hers and neuroscience and have attended a number of her lectures and workshops since then. I was so pleased when she agreed to appear as the first guest on my podcast and we had such a fun conversation. Gabija discussed the importance of motivation or inspiration in relation to personal productivity and told me "I like to move from motivation to inspiration. So motivation is pumping yourself up to do the task you don't want to do which requires constant energy in order to do so. Now if you really get clear what things you really enjoy doing, what things are truly important to you and link that task to those things … you would naturally feel more inspired to do that task and being motivated would just follow naturally from it. So I find that a much more long-lasting effect."   People & Resources Mentioned Daniel Kahneman – “Thinking, Fast and Slow” Antonio Damasio – “Descartes’ Error”   Contact Gabija Website: http://www.mybrainduringtheday.com/ LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/phd-gabija-toleikyte Twitter: htt