Curious Conversations, a Research Podcast

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Travis

What do you think about how you think? What do you think can improve how you think? What do you think can improve your brain? Well, according to Virginia Tech's Ben Katz, spring is one of those things. In fact, he was recently a part of an article titled, Spring is Good for Your Brain. So naturally I wanted to know what it is about this season that makes it so magical for my cognition. And thankfully Ben was kind enough to join the podcast to answer that question and many more.

Ben is an Associate Professor of Adult Development and Aging within the Department of Human Development and Family Science at Virginia Tech. His research focuses on interventions to improve executive function capacities including non-invasive brain stimulation, cognitive training, and lifestyle change.

So Ben and I talked a little bit about spring and it turns out that it's actually less about the season itself and more about the choices that you and I are more likely to make during the season. Specifically we talked about cardiovascular exercise, spending time in nature, and how maintaining a healthy diet can actually. He shared with me some of what we do and don't know about those specific exercises and why they're actually good for our brain. And we also talked about the importance of sleep and the benefits of social interaction when it comes to our cognitive abilities. And being an expert in this subject, I was really curious to learn what he does to ensure that his brain functions as good as it possibly can. So I left this podcast with a little to-do list for myself and hopefully you will as well.

I'm Travis Williams and this is Virginia Tech's Curious Conversations.

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Travis

How are you doing navigating the back-to-school season? I don't know about you, but in my family, as the number of events on the calendars rise, so too can the emotions. Maybe that's just us, but I tend to think that's a fairly common problem, and I'm curious as to what it is about this season that can make it so challenging. And more importantly, what can we do about it? Well, thankfully, Virginia Tech's Paul Springer is an expert in this very topic.

Paul is a professor and the head of the Department of Human Development and Family Sciences at Virginia Tech. He's also a licensed marriage and family therapist, so he had a lot of insights on this topic and quite a few tips that I will soon be putting into practice. I'm Travis Williams, and this is Virginia Tech's Curious Conversations.

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Travis

I know when I reached out to you, I I reached out because I personally, when we get to the fall, I feel like my family just gets really busy. And so I know that maybe that in my family causes some issues now and then. So I thought maybe a good place to start this conversation might be to just kind of set the the groundwork and I don't know, hopefully for my case, normalize some of what my experience is. But what are some, common issues that we see arise in the fall when people are going back to school and getting maybe back into fall sports or there's just a the schedules get tight.

Paul

Yeah, I think that that's a that's a great question. You know, I'm a father of four boys, and I think one of the things that we really underestimate is that transitions themselves are really kind of stressful. for parents and kids. It's not just that we have to do more. we just have to change the rhythm of everything we're doing. So I think about me during the summer, my schedule as a professor during the summer is much more relaxed.

And so my rhythm is much more flexible. and then all of a sudden, fall hits and my calendar is packed. my kids are in involved in sports and other extracurricular activities, and then we're doing so much, right? And sometimes the stress isn't that we have too much to do, I think it's that we have to constantly switch between we're doing too many things, which I think is pretty normal for most families as they're getting into fall semester.

Travis

Well, what types of I guess what are some common I don't know, maybe outcomes in families or maybe issues is is a better word, that that you see that that pop up during those time periods?

Paul

Yeah, you know, I think that in general, so when I think about kids who are going to school, that they oftentimes feel so busy and they have to kind of find a new rhythm with their schools. And then it it kind of like wanna introduce this topic of like cognitive load. it's kind of this constant mental effort of that we have to keep tracking of doing so many things. And so kids you know, when they get really, really busy, they sometimes lash out and act out in different ways. And so we can see that when our when our calendars get busier and our lives get busier, we're much more likely to be irritable, much more likely to be frustrated, we're much more likely to kind of lash out at people in our families. And so I think that that's pretty common in most families as we're trying to readjust to the semester or the the new classes we're taking or new activities that we're doing is that we're really trying to balance all of the things that we're doing and that can kind of really impact our mental health and how we kind of interact and engage with our families.

Travis

Thank you for saying that. That makes me feel a lot better about the situations that I encounter here in my family. and it sounds to me like there there's kind of two things going on there. One is the busyness, but also that transition and and life rhythm piece that's disruptive to maybe what we've become accustomed to over over the summer.

Paul

Yeah, you know, I kind of think about w when I think about the fall semester, you know, all of a sudden students are on campus, it's much harder to tr get around Blacksburg. we're trying to we just have so much more that we have to do. And our brain is basically saying, I'm overloaded, right? Our brain loves predictability, even when we're excited about the new season of our lives or the new school year, we still have to adapt and change to what's happening. And this adaptation requires kind of mental and emotional in energy. And if we take on too much too quickly, we're gonna kind of experience some of the consequences with that because it takes a lot out on us to kind of do all of the things that we need to do, especially as parents, because we're not only managing our schedule, we're managing all of our kids' schedules. And and that can be a lot to handle, especially if we jump right into things so quickly.

Travis

Yeah. Well, and can this is compounded by the parking situation, which we didn't even talk about. The mental load of that is enough some days to just drive me a little bit crazy. but when we're thinking about these these situations or we're heading into this stuff, what are some preventative things we can do? I know I talk in my family a a lot, we talk a lot, my my wife and I, about how can we put out the fires before they even start? and so maybe what are some preventative strategies that people can take.

Paul

Yeah, that's a great question. So I think during fall semester or during the start of a new new season, there's so many good things that we can be doing. And I talk to my clients, you know, I'm a marriage and family therapist as well, but I talk to them about this notion of good, better, and best. There's lots of good things that we can be engaged in, and then there's a lot of better things, and then there's the best things that we can be engaged in. And so we really have to sit and think about. What are the activities that meet our values? Right? What are the activities that actually fill us and help us want to we we find exciting and important to us? And then really choosing between those things. And sometimes that means we have to say no. And that we have to tell our kids that, you know, you have to choose between football or band, right? We can't do both. Or I have to choose between. Accepting to be on this committee or doing something else. And so I really encourage people to sit down and say, what are the best things that we can be involved in? Because if not, we're going to spend most of our time doing really good things, but they're not the better or best things in our lives. And so really sitting down and having those conversations and figuring those things out will solve a lot of those problems because then we're doing the things that we really value as opposed to doing things that we think we have to do or that our boss wants us to do, you know, so kind of thinking about that.

Travis

Yeah. Well, what about when things do maybe get a little bit out of control? What can we do to maybe reel some of it back in?

Paul

Yeah, I I think that a lot of this is about setting good boundaries and really learning to say no, right? And so sometimes we have to help our kids kind of say, well, this isn't a really good thing for me to do, and I'm gonna have to step back. And or I'm gonna have to figure out how to time manage better. And time management is a challenging thing because we we all have so many things that we're involved in.

And we only have so much time that we can do it. And so if we don't learn to kind of reel back, like you said, or say no, what we're doing was we're essentially just overloading ourselves with activities that may not actually be bringing value back to ourselves. And that's a challenge.

Travis

Yeah. Well, I'm curious because you are in the the the marriage and family space. And when I open up my any social media feed, there are probably a fifteen different quote unquote experts trying to tell me how to navigate whether it be mental health, relationships, all these things. I'm curious what is something that you don't see people talking about enough related to these topics?

Paul

Yeah, related to not getting over busy and overloaded.

Travis

Over busy, just getting along better with your family, navigating family drama. What's what's something maybe that we just don't talk about enough?

Paul

Yeah, I think that one of the things that we can help our kids and our family is helping us stay more connected with each other. you know, kids thrive when we have really good structure and they can count on things. And so you know, do we have time that we can have dinner together and talk and kind of decompress? Do we have activities we do as a family that actually helps us get away?

From the busyness that we're involved in and helping helping people kind of step back and do things that will actually regenerate ourselves, right? and so downtime is really important. And I think that sometimes we kind of glorify being busy. That being busy kind of helps us feel important. We get a we get a lot of accolades for doing a lot of things.

But the reality is, is we need to really set good boundaries and help our kids see what are the things that we value most. And I would say whether you're in a relationship with your partner, with a partner or with your kids, it's how can you stay connected to them in these times that you're busy? Because that should be your value, right? And as you set those structures and consistent kind of things that your kids can depend on.

Yeah, I think it really helps alleviate the stress and anxiety because we we can be around people where we can talk about our challenges and we can feel supported.

Travis

Is there a benefit, you think, to to having some of those structures in place also when the rest of your existence or schedule gets crazy? When is is there something the two being like, well, I know I can count on doing this thing with mom and dad at this time on this?

Paul

Yeah, I I think that there's things that you can set up for your kids. And I also think that it's really important that you take care of yourself, right? The idea that rest is a reward, that's really not a a good way to live your life, right? We work hard, and then we give ourselves permission to kind of take care of ourselves, but that's really backwards. I think that we need to spend time doing things for ourselves that feels ourselves, and then we need to Engage in activities that build connection with the people that we love, right? So there's things that I do, like I work out every morning, and that's kind of my time to kind of take care of my mental health. But then there's certain days during the week that I do activities with my kids, right? Or that we have one-on-one time things, and then I definitely have a date night with my spouse, right? I set aside those things during my busy schedule so I can say. This is what I value and this is what centers me. and I talk a lot about clients about how are we choosing the things that actually fill us, right? So for example, I could spend 20 an hour scrolling on social media and it actually hurts my mental health and it actually doesn't help me. or I could be watching a show on Netflix and those sorts of things don't actually fill me. And so I you have to find what are those things, whether it's going on a walk or a run, lifting, or just being with your partner. You know, 20 to 30 minutes of doing that may actually help you get more focused and more centered than maybe doing an hour of watching a movie or one of your favorite shows. So finding what those things are will actually really help you center you so you can Go back and engage in the busyness that we're all dealing with on a daily basis.

Travis

Yeah, I love I love that idea that the rest is not a reward. it's these were not your words, but almost it's like the fuel that's gonna allow you to do the the thing. It's it's very necessary. that's a that's a hard thing for a lot of folks to to embrace. but I really I really love that you said that. Well, kind of the other side of of that coin, I'm wondering if there is anything out there kind of just in the the popular culture, the the social media world, a trend maybe, that people focus on maybe a little bit too much when it comes to to relationships.

Paul

Yeah, so I think that there's a couple of things that I'll talk about. Is one is that on social media, every relationship looks perfect, right? So we see that, everyone else is having a perfect relationship, their kids are never fighting, they're doing their homework, they're star athletes, and you know, other people are always going on these romantic dates and doing those sorts of things. And so there is this misconception that everyone has it together. And that's really challenging when we're talking about the chaos of a new school year, is that we we tend to believe that everyone is doing better than we are. And that can be really damaging for us and your our own psyche, that we kind of feel like we're the only ones who are struggling. When the reality is, is everyone's trying to figure it out. It's just social social media makes it look like that person really has their life together.

And so kind of recognizing and realizing that, well, that's not true. No one really has it together. And everyone's just trying their best to figure it out. Right. And so I think that there's that piece related to social media. And then I think there's this other piece where we reward people for being busy and looking important. Right. So we can see certain people talking about, like, look, I'm, you know, I spent all day. In meetings and look at how important I am, or I was with the dean this afternoon, or I was doing this and this. And then we start comparing, and comparison is a thief of joy, right? We start comparing our lives with others, and we start thinking, well, I need to be busier. I need to make sure my schedule is just as busy as everyone else, because there is an immediate social reward, right? For saying, I'm busy, or for saying yes to things. And then all of a sudden we're doing things that may not actually be benefiting us. And we're going to be functioning from this place of overload. And then then that's where the problems happen, the spillover within relationships, that we have less time for our spouses and our kids. And we're more irritable and frustrated. And so those are kind of the two things that I see on social media that contribute to this problem.

Travis

Yeah, I I definitely see both of those. I was gonna I was actually gonna ask you because in one of the the tip sheets that we have put out at Virginia Tech News, you they refer to you as a a marriage and family expert. And I was just curious w if that's like a heavy label for you to carry. Because I feel like we could you could tell me that, you know, I could tell you I was an expert in math, but that's probably not on display in some of these platforms.

Paul

Yeah, no, absolutely. You know, I kind of cringe being an expert in anything because we're all mini experts in topics, but we're definitely not experts in everyone's lives and every situation. And so I think some of it is kind of coming to terms with that that's okay. and working with couples, you you have to figure things out with them, right? Everyone comes with their own set of challenges and with their own history that contributes to the problems that we're dealing with. So yeah.

Travis

Well, I will not label you as an expert in the show notes, to help to help alleviate some of that.

Paul

well thank you. I appreciate it.