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Daily Platter

The document introduces "The Healthy Mind Platter", which outlines seven daily mental activities that are essential for brain health and well-being: focus time, play time, connecting time, physical time, time in, down time, and sleep time. Engaging in each of these activities daily helps strengthen connections within the brain and with others, promoting mental integration. Just as a balanced diet is important for physical health, balancing these seven mental activities each day nourishes mental wellness. The Healthy Mind Platter was created by neuroscientists Dr. Daniel Siegel and Dr. David Rock to bring awareness to daily mental habits that support optimal brain function and relationships.

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Rajah Kano
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560 views3 pages

Daily Platter

The document introduces "The Healthy Mind Platter", which outlines seven daily mental activities that are essential for brain health and well-being: focus time, play time, connecting time, physical time, time in, down time, and sleep time. Engaging in each of these activities daily helps strengthen connections within the brain and with others, promoting mental integration. Just as a balanced diet is important for physical health, balancing these seven mental activities each day nourishes mental wellness. The Healthy Mind Platter was created by neuroscientists Dr. Daniel Siegel and Dr. David Rock to bring awareness to daily mental habits that support optimal brain function and relationships.

Uploaded by

Rajah Kano
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Seven daily essential mental activities to optimize brain matter and create

well-being
Focus Time

When we closely focus on tasks in a goal-oriented way, we take on


challenges that make deep connections in the brain.

Play Time

When we allow ourselves to be spontaneous or creative, playfully


enjoying novel experiences, we help make new connections in the
brain.

When we connect with other people, ideally in person, and when we


Connecting Time take time to appreciate our connection to the natural world around us,
we activate and reinforce the brain's relational circuitry.
Physical Time

When we move our bodies, aerobically if medically possible, we


strengthen the brain in many ways.

Time In

When we quietly reflect internally, focusing on sensations, images,


feelings and thoughts, we help to better integrate the brain.

Down Time

When we are non-focused, without any specific goal, and let our mind
wander or simply relax, we help the brain recharge.

Sleep Time

When we give the brain the rest it needs, we consolidate learning and
recover from the experiences of the day.

The Healthy Mind Platter Overview


The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently replaced its food pyramid with a needed
revision, a "choose my plate" pictorial example of a dish of food groups to remind us of what
a daily diet should consist of to optimize physical health. What would be the equivalent of a
recommended daily diet for a healthy mind? With an obesity epidemic rampant in the US,
this change is welcome and hopefully will inspire people to be aware of how they compose
their days food intake. Our mind, embodied in our extended neural circuitry and embedded
in our connections to others and even the way we relate to our planet, is also in need of
careful attention to establish and maintain mental health. Poverty, hunger, and homelessness
threaten the essential needs of many throughout the world. War and natural disasters fill
many lives with fear and suffering. And even for individuals in more stable environments,
modern life can be filled with an overwhelming focus on the outer world and an experience
of being isolated from meaningful connections with others. Multi-tasking with its fragmented
attention and the sense of becoming overwhelmed with information overload frequently
fracture a sense of wholeness. In each of these conditions, the embodied and socially
embedded requirements for a healthy mind are not being created in daily life throughout the
world. Many are deficient in a daily regimen necessary for mental well-being.
So what would be included in The Healthy Mind Platter? In the field of interpersonal
neurobiology, we define a core aspect of the mind and also propose that a healthy mind
emerges from a process called integration the linkage of different components of a
system. That system can be, for example, the body as we connect upper and lower regions to
one another. Integration can also include how we connect with others in a family or a
community, honoring differences and promoting compassionate linkages with each other. If
we embrace interpersonal neurobiologys proposed definition of a key facet of mind as an
embodied and relationally embedded process that regulates energy and information flow, how
can we make a practical definition of mental habits that can help people with their diet of
daily essential mental nutrients? How can we use the focus of attention to strengthen
integration in our bodies and in our relationships on a daily basis? What would the
fundamental components of such a health-promoting daily regimen of mental activities be?
To address these questions, my friend and colleague, David Rock, a leader in the
organizational consulting world, and I got together and created what we're calling The
Healthy Mind Platter. Here is how we describe the elements of this plan for a healthy mind.
The Healthy Mind Platter has seven daily essential mental activities necessary for optimum
mental health. These seven daily activities make up the full set of mental nutrients that your
brain and relationships need to function at their best. By engaging every day in each of these
servings, you promote integration in your life and enable your brain to coordinate and
balance its activities. These essential mental activities strengthen your brain's internal
connections and your connections with other people and the world around you. We're not
suggesting specific amounts of time for this recipe for a healthy mind, as each individual is
different, and our needs change over time too. The point is to become aware of the full
spectrum of essential mental activities, and as with essential nutrients, make sure that at least
every day we are bringing the right ingredients into our mental diet, even if for just a bit of
time. Just as you wouldn't eat only pizza every day for days on end, we shouldn't just live on
focus time alone with little time for sleep. The key is balancing the day with each of these
essential mental activities. Mental wellness is all about reinforcing our connections with
others and the world around us; and it is also about strengthening the connections within the

brain itself. When we vary the focus of attention with this spectrum of mental activities, we
give the brain lots of opportunities to develop in different ways.
One way to use the platter idea is to map out an average day and see what amounts of time
you spend in each essential mental activity. Like a balanced diet, there are many
combinations that can work well.
In short, it is important to eat well, and we applaud the new healthy eating plate. As a society
we are sorely lacking in good information about what it takes to have a healthy mind. Since
the mind is both embodied and embedded in our connections with others and our
environmentboth natural and culturalthese seven essential times help strengthen our
internal and relational connections. And since the brain is continually changing in response to
how we focus attention, we can use our awareness in ways that involve the body and our
connections to create a healthy mind across the lifespan! We hope that The Healthy Mind
Platter creates an appetite for increasing awareness of how to nourish our mental well-being
each day too.

The Healthy Mind Platter was created by Dr. Daniel J. Siegel, Executive Director of
the Mindsight Institute and Clinical Professor at the UCLA School of
Medicine in collaboration with Dr. David Rock, Executive Director of the NeuroLeadership
Institute.

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