Can an old dog learn new tricks? Can we change in adulthood? Many of us struggle with this question as we make New Year’s resolutions that we fail to meet: eating healthier, exercising, overcoming behavioral habits that keep us from living up to our personal and relational goals.

Sometimes we blame our genetics—it’s our DNA that is keeping us stuck! Or we blame our childhoods—if only we had better parenting, we could reach for the stars! There is no question that we are each born with a temperament, and that genes play a role in our abilities and limitations. And early childhood experience does shape our brains. In fact, neuroscientists these days look at the interplay between genes and environment, or G x E. But does that mean once we have survived childhood we are fixed, set in our ways, determined by our nature and early nurture?

Neuroplasticity in Adulthood

Until a decade or so ago, many scientists thought that while children’s brains are malleable or plastic, neuroplasticity stops after age 25, at which point the brain is fully wired and mature; you lose neurons as you age, and basically it’s all downhill after your mid-twenties. Fortunately, this rather grim view of the aging brain has been upended by more recent research. We now know that the human brain is capable of change throughout life. It’s true that a typical child’s brain is more plastic, more capable of change and new learning than a typical adult brain. And we do lose neurons as we age. But it’s not all downhill; the adult brain can create new neuronal connections and even new neurons born from neuronal stem cells. In addition to these gray matter (neuronal) changes, there can be change in our white matter, the pathways between neurons and the myelin that allows neurons to communicate efficiently.

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What Promotes Neuroplasticity?

We are not guaranteed vibrant, flexible brains as we age, however. A lot depends on how we live our lives. The adult brain needs oxygen and stimulation to stay sharp and capable of change.

Researchers have identified the following three habits as facilitating neuroplasticity as we age: physical exercise (which increases blood flow to the brain, delivering much-needed oxygen), paying attention, and learning new things. Once I learned about the impact of physical movement on neuroplasticity, I increased my exercise to daily from twice a week. And I see the difference in both body and mind! While an aerobic workout is great, even walking briskly for half an hour will increase blood flow and feed oxygen to hungry neurons.

The second factor that increases neuroplasticity, paying attention, is the opposite of acting on automatic pilot. Most of the time we do function on automatic, which is easier and less tiring than thinking through and being aware of our every move. This automaticity can be to our advantage, as we easily ride our bike or whip up our favorite recipe. But living on automatic can mean that we miss precious moments, forget to smell the roses, or take for granted a majestic mountain vista. Waking up to our experience allows us to be present. It also allows the brain to be more active and flexible. One of the best ways to pay attention is to engage in mindfulness practices, whether through a formal practice of meditation or in more informal ways.

The third stimulus to brain plasticity in adulthood is learning new things. This comes naturally to a young child, for whom everything is new. By contrast, adults tend to be less open. We get comfortable with the familiar; we like to kick back, relax, and do the same old, same old. This may feel good, but it does not contribute to neural flexibility. And if we combine same old, same old with not exercising—being a couch potato, television, potato chips and all—we are depriving the brain of the nutrients of neuroplasticity.

Mind-Sets about Change

Some of us are more open to change than others. Carol Dweck’s research offers a fascinating glimpse into our mind-sets about change. Some people, she says, have a fixed mind-set; they are not interested in changing, or assume they are incapable of change as adults. This is epitomized in Popeye’s famous statement, “I yam what I yam.” By contrast, people with a growth mind-set assume they are capable of change and growth in their lives.

Change in Couples

Some folks come eagerly to therapy, looking forward to the possibilities of learning and transformation. Others are hesitant, defending their right to be as they are. It’s not uncommon in a couple that one partner takes the “let’s change and grow” position, while the other comes to therapy reluctantly.

Old habits have quite a hold on us and are hard to change. To wire in a new set of behaviors, we have to repeat them over and over again. Eventually, these new behaviors become the new normal.

For hypothetical example, Tina, feeling increasingly disconnected in her marriage and frustrated that Joe doesn’t share her enthusiasm for deep, emotional conversations, drags him to therapy to improve their relationship. Joe comes to couples therapy because he loves his wife and doesn’t want to lose her. But he is resentful. He says, “I’m the same man you married—the strong and silent type. You’re the one who has changed!” For Joe, Tina’s evolving needs and her pushing him to change are the problem. Joe has a fixed mind-set, and he defends his right to stay the same. Tina has a growth mind-set; for her, transformation and growth are vital nutrients. Their “meeting of the mind-sets” is the first challenge we will face as we work together. I will help Joe see the positive payoffs of change, and I will help Tina back off from her campaign to reform Joe.

Most of us don’t want to “be changed” by someone else. We want to author our own change. Tina sees change as a transitive verb with a direct object: “Tina changes Joe.” But Joe doesn’t want to be the direct object of Tina’s change agenda. He wants some autonomy to choose his change. Family therapists have long observed that the only person you can change is yourself. Both Joe and Tina may decide to change in order to revitalize their relationship—but this needs to be a choice for each of them. Authoring your own change can be empowering; having change foisted on you can breed resentment.

Making Change Last

Let’s come back to those New Year’s resolutions. We have great intentions, and do engage in healthier habits for a while—only to find a few weeks in that we are backsliding. It’s too cold to go to the gym. There’s no time. We are great at coming up with excuses. Why is it so hard to live up to our goals and make new changes last?

Once again, neuroscience points to the answer. Habits become wired into the brain; once established through constant repetition, circuits of neurons keep our habits in place. Old habits have quite a hold on us and are hard to change. To wire in a new set of behaviors, we have to repeat them over and over again. Eventually, these new behaviors become the new normal.

When I started swimming as an adult, every trip to the pool was an effort as I worked to coordinate my breathing with my strokes. My brain and body were not accustomed to an aquatic life. Now, after years of regular visits to the pool, I crave my morning swim; I feel so natural in the water, I wonder if I was a fish in a former life.

Embracing a Growth Mind-Set

Whether we like it or not, things change. Our brains and bodies are evolving all the time—getting stronger as we exercise mentally and physically, getting weaker as we age or become couch potatoes. We can’t stop the process of time and aging, but we do have some choices over how we deal with our lives and relationships.

We can opt to live in a way that nurtures neuroplasticity—or we can close our hearts and minds to the new. We can exercise body and mind, or we can let our physical and mental faculties slide. Our mind-sets and our habits affect the brain, for better or worse. Choosing change, a growth mind-set, allows us to nurture neuroplasticity in our brains and promotes flexibility in our personal and relational lives.

Which mind-set will you choose?

References:

1. Doidge, N. (2007). The brain that changes itself. NY: Viking.
2. Dweck, C. (2006). Mindset: The new psychology of success. NY: Ballantine.
3. Fishbane, M.D. (2013). Loving with the brain in mind: Neurobiology & couple therapy. NY: WW Norton.
4. Ratey, J.J. (2008). Spark: The revolutionary new science of exercise and the brain. NY: Little, Brown & Co.

Have you ever tried to shed an old, troublesome habit? Ever made a New Year’s resolution you couldn’t keep? If so, welcome to the human race. And welcome to your brain.

We Are Creatures of Habit

A few weeks ago, I made a mixture of nuts and dried fruit and settled in for a few minutes of television in the evening. The next night, I did the same. By the third night, I was craving the nuts as I contemplated watching a show I had recorded. I was astonished how quickly I had developed the nutty TV habit. I felt like Pavlov’s dog, salivating when the bell rang. Or, in my case, salivating as I thought of TV, now associated with my new favorite snack.

While on the first night I was genuinely hungry, by the third I was eating out of habit, mindlessly heading to the nuts even though I was still pretty full from dinner. Neuroscience gives us insight into the power of habit in our lives—and why we can become victims of our own habitual behaviors.

The Anatomy of Habit

Everything we do, feel, or think is reflected in circuits of neurons in our brains. Neurons, or brain cells, communicate with each other at a gap, called the synapse. One neuron releases chemicals—neurotransmitters—into the synaptic space, where it is picked up by the receptors of the next neuron. There are billions of neurons in the human brain; each neuron connects with up to 10,000 other neurons, resulting in trillions of synaptic connections. These interconnected neurons become circuits that underlie our habits.

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The more we do something—eat nuts while watching TV, ride a bike, play an instrument, study a new language—the stronger the neuronal circuit becomes that supports that habit. Donald Hebb, a Canadian neuroscientist in the 1940s, noted that once a circuit of neurons is formed, when one neuron fires, the others fire as well—strengthening the whole circuit. This has come to be known as Hebbian theory: “Neurons that fire together wire together.” Circuits of neurons maintain our habits, and our habits strengthen those neuronal circuits. The bio-behavioral influence goes both ways.

You Are What You Do

Scientists have shown that experience changes the connection between neurons. Everything you do changes your brain. If I continue my nightly TV-with-nuts ritual, that habit will become “wired” into my neuronal circuits. My behavior will change the structure of my brain. This is a rather sobering thought. From this perspective, you are what you do … so be careful what you do!

The more you do something, the more likely you are to do it in the future. The habit-driven brain doesn’t distinguish between good and problematic behaviors; it just builds repeated behaviors, thoughts, and feelings into stronger and stronger neuronal circuits. So what’s a person to do? Are we doomed to live on automatic pilot, driven by our lower brain and our habits?

While my nuts-and-TV behavior affects only me, other habits can cause damage to relationships. If I repetitively treat my husband with disrespect, that behavior becomes a part of who I am in the relationship. And it may evoke a less-than-ideal response in him, creating a negative relational dance that can erode our bond. We then become victims of our own relationship behaviors.

Prisoners of Our Habits?

We do have a choice: We can mindlessly play out problematic behaviors over and over again, becoming essentially prisoners of our own habits. Or we can step back, use our higher brains, and reflect on our actions. After three nights of my new TV-nuts habit, I realized I was acting like an automaton, and I didn’t like it. So I made a choice, using my prefrontal cortex, the part of my brain that allows me to think about what I do. I thought about the extra calories and, more importantly, the fact I didn’t want to engage in mindless eating. I stopped my habit in its tracks. Now if I decide to eat nuts, it’s when I’m actually hungry, not because I’m Pavlov’s salivating dog.

In my marriage, I work hard not to act mindlessly or to get caught up in habits of emotional reactivity. I try to think about my higher goals and to behave in accordance with my values. I don’t have to be a prisoner of my automatic response. I have learned to pause, take a breath, and think about how I want to be in my relationship. I have the power to choose, and the ability to change when I fall into thoughtless relational habits.

We Are Creatures of Change and Adaptation

It turns out that although we are creatures of habit, humans are also creatures of change and adaptation. Our brains are constantly changing in response to our changing environment. Our adaptability is the secret to our success as a species. The challenge is to harness our adaptability and use it toward positive ends, to make choices about who we want to be in our world.

You don’t have complete freedom to create yourself; you do come with genetic gifts and limitations, or temperament. But you have a lot more power to become the person you want to be than you might think. You are not predetermined by your genes. The secret is neuroplasticity, the ability of the brain to change.

Until a decade or so ago, neuroscientists thought that neuroplasticity was possible only in children’s brains. Indeed, the young brain is highly adaptable and shaped by experience, changing and growing with the nurturance (or lack of it) a child receives from parents and other caregivers. Everything is new to a young child; he or she absorbs it all, and is molded by the world around. (This is the nurture part of nature-and-nurture that makes us who we are.)

In recent years, scientists have made the amazing discovery that the adult brain is also plastic (changeable); we can learn and grow—changing our brains in the process—throughout life. And, it turns out, experience not only changes the connections between neurons, it affects the expression of genes. Genes are turned on or off by experience and environment (this is called epigenetics).

This remarkable new perspective on the adult brain’s capacity for change is heartening to those of us who want to keep growing and learning as we age. It is empowering to know that we can change bad habits and learn new skills throughout life; we don’t have to be victims of our past or of our genes. But it’s much harder for the adult brain to change than the child’s brain. With all of our wired-in habits, we have to work at what comes naturally to the young child.

Neuroplasticity Is a Double-Edged Sword

Neuroplasticity is responsible for both habits and change. Since everything you do changes your brain, you can get trapped in habits by doing them over and over—or you can make a decision to change those habits, choose a new path, and create new habits that are more in keeping with your values. You can live mindlessly, on automatic pilot. Or you can choose a different path and live in a more mindful way. The choice is yours.

We like to think we are in charge of our own life, master of our ship. We do in fact have the ability to choose how to act, what we say, who we are—up to a point. Neuroscience gives us a perspective that is rather humbling. It turns out that we share a great deal with lower creatures in terms of our basic survival instincts, and in terms of how the brain works. Like other animals, a lot of what we do is on automatic pilot. We share 98% of our DNA with chimpanzees. The 2% difference is mostly in the prefrontal cortex, the most advanced part of the brain that is unique to us humans. We are animals, but animals with a difference.

The Amygdala: Threat Detector

Most of the time, our brain is humming along, working on automatic pilot without our awareness. The amygdala, a key part of the emotional brain, is always scanning for danger. When it senses threat, the amygdala kicks into high gear, prompting a cascade of neurological and chemical messages throughout brain and body to deal with the crisis. The fight-or-flight response is triggered. This is very helpful if you’re hiking in the woods and see a snake. Your amygdala gets you to run away before you’re fully aware of what you’ve seen. But perhaps it was just a stick and you overreacted. The amygdala doesn’t dabble in niceties; it is biased toward the negative, and can save your life in a pinch. Its job is to protect you from danger, and a few false alarms are part of the deal.

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The amygdala is a great ally in a dark alley; one whiff of danger and it’s efficiently doing its job. The heart races, the feet make us run, and we (hopefully) escape the bad guy. But the amygdala isn’t very smart; it often sees danger where none exists. Let’s say you’re in your living room with your partner and he or she gives you a look of disapproval. Your amygdala registers danger, and you have two choices: fight or flight. You start defending yourself or you counter-criticize your partner for being so critical (two forms of fight); maybe you storm out of the room, slamming the door for good measure (flight).

Success! Your amygdala has saved you from a threatening moment with your partner. The problem is, he or she is now in the living room stewing over how you abandoned him/her, and more trouble lies ahead. Perhaps it would have been smarter for you to ask about his/her concern and address it calmly. If only you hadn’t reacted so rashly! Now he or she is going to be angry for days, and you’re going to feel guilty. It’s a mess.

Prefrontal Cortex to the Rescue

Your animal instincts are protective, but they also can lead to a lot of heartbreak. Fortunately, we do have a higher brain; the prefrontal cortex (PFC) allows us to pause, think, and choose to act according to our higher values. It also allows us to repair with a partner when we have acted badly.

The prefrontal cortex calms the amygdala, helping us regulate our emotions. You don’t have to be a victim of your own reactivity, anger, or defensiveness. If you have the intention to be your best self, you can stop and make a better choice. I know this from personal experience. When I was a little girl, I had red hair—and a temper to match. My father shared with me some wisdom from an ancient Roman Stoic philosopher, Seneca, who said: “Most powerful is the person who has himself in his own power.” This had a big impact on me, even though I was only 8 years old. I understood that I could be powerful by taming my temper.

I’ve been working on my temper ever since, and these days I am often able to catch myself before I blow up at my husband. I pause (activating my PFC) and think before I yell or get reactive. Then I raise my concerns with him in a more loving and respectful manner—getting much better results than if I blast him with anger. In these moments, I am acting according to my higher values. When I can pull this off (not always!), I am choosing who I want to be in my marriage.

Emotion Regulation

The goal is not to stamp out our emotions. Emotions give color and vibrancy to our lives. They inform our decisions, allow us to love, and orient our moral compasses. But we do need to learn how to deal with our feelings, identifying and regulating them so we are not victims of our own reactivity.

Some people never learn to read their emotions. Men especially are socialized early in life to tune out or become numb to their vulnerable feelings: “Big boys don’t cry.” But if you can’t name your emotions, how are you going to regulate them? It’s not that the emotions go away—they’re just not available to consciousness. Let’s say Ted feels vulnerable when his wife, Amy, turns her attention away from him and he feels unimportant. But he’s never learned to recognize or understand his vulnerability. He may blow up at her if he’s felt ignored too often; neither he nor she has any idea where his tantrum comes from.

Neuroscientists point out that emotions start in our body; the information travels from the gut or heart up the spinal cord to the brain, where we become aware of our feelings. Ted needs to learn to identify his body cues when he is feeling left out or ignored by his wife, name the feeling, and take more constructive steps to address this issue with her.

Step one is identifying the emotion; step two is regulating it. When Ted feels upset with Amy, it’s not OK to just lash out. He needs to work with his feelings so he can raise his concerns respectfully. There are many ways to regulate emotions when we are upset. Deep belly breathing is particularly helpful; the out breath activates the parasympathetic nervous system, which calms down the sympathetic nervous system (part of the fight-or-flight response). Mindfulness meditation likewise calms the emotional brain. Counting to 10 or taking a break for a few minutes are other ways to settle down when upset. Cognitive reappraisal or reframing is also helpful (“my husband didn’t leave his shoes by the back door to trip me up on purpose; he just forgot to put them in the closet”).

Living and Loving Intentionally

Rather than living with knee-jerk reactivity, driven by our animal instincts for self-preservation, we can choose to live intentionally, thanks to the prefrontal cortex that differentiates us from other animals. I encourage couples to who come to me for therapy to identify their own higher goals and values; I then help them operationalize these values into concrete skills to improve their relationships.

Identifying your values and intentions helps you maximize the power of your prefrontal cortex. It allows you to develop relational virtues and reach for your best self—even when you start to get reactive. Instead of lashing out at my husband in a fit of temper, I can take a deep breath and say to myself, “This is the man I love. I want to act in a caring manner, not fly off the handle. I want a relationship of mutual respect.” In these best-self moments, I am relationally empowered, as my father and Seneca taught me so many years ago. It takes work to be able to calm yourself down and act in accordance with your higher values. The payoff is well worth it.

Editor’s note: Mona Fishbane, PhD is a clinical psychologist and the author of Loving with the Brain in Mind: Neurobiology & Couple Therapy. Her continuing education presentation for GoodTherapy.org, titled Neurobiology and Couple Therapy, is scheduled for 9 a.m. PDT on December 12, 2014. This event is available at no additional cost to GoodTherapy.org members and is good for two CE credits. For details, or to register, please click here.

Falling in love is easy, and delicious. I remember the moment I fell in love with my husband—what I was wearing, how beautiful his eyes looked, the bright, cold February day. I saw the two of us in Technicolor and the rest of the world in black-and-white. It was a heady time; I was crazy in love.

Now I understand the science behind what was going on in my brain back then. Neuroscientists have studied madly-in-love folks, putting them in the fMRI machine while they look at a photo of their beloved. The parts of the brain that “light up” while looking at the lover are the same brain areas activated by cocaine—the reward centers. These researchers concluded that love is like a drug. I’ve never tried cocaine, but I’ve certainly tried love, and it is indeed a high.

We were awash in the chemicals of early love: testosterone (the hormone fueling the sex drive in both men and women), dopamine (focusing on “that special someone”), and oxytocin (the bonding hormone/neurotransmitter). I didn’t notice my lover’s flaws, nor he mine. It turns out that in early love, the critical part of the brain goes quiet. This is the science behind “love is blind;” we see our lovers through rose-colored glasses. Perhaps this is nature’s way of helping us bond with the beloved, oblivious to the problems that lie ahead.

Waking from the Spell

Crazy in love is a temporary state; the brain can’t stand the intensity forever. At some point the critical parts of the brain come back online, and we see our partners, warts and all. The jazzed-up chemicals settle down, and our drug high gives way to a calmer brain state. Romantic love, researchers find, yields to a tamer version, called companionate love. This happens somewhere between a year and three years into a relationship. Many couples are deeply disappointed when their romance fades into a more sedate version. They crave the high of early love, dopamine and all. Some have affairs, or divorce and remarry, seeking another hit of the drug. But eventually the new relationship will become old. The challenge: How to nurture love over the long haul? 

From Crazy in Love to Lazy in Love

When the newness and the magic fade, many of us become lazy in our relationship habits. Instead of dressing up for our beloved, we wear sweats to dinner. We become lazy in our interactions, blaming our partners when upset, not giving them the benefit of the doubt.  We become reactive to the negative, and overlook the positive in our relationships. We expect unconditional love, no matter what we dish out. But adult love is not unconditional; our partners may leave us if we behave badly.

Proactive Loving vs. Passive Loving

“I still love my wife, but I’ve fallen out of love with her,” a man said to me recently. He’s missing the hit of the drug, and is thinking of looking elsewhere for that love high again. To my mind, “falling out of love” sounds so passive—like falling into a pothole! I propose a more proactive view of long-term love, in which both partners work to create a great relationship. Once the initial glow wears off, the real work of loving begins. The stakes are high; while happy relationships are associated with health and longevity, the stress of an unhappy marriage can result in illness and earlier death. [fat_widget_relationships_left]

Researchers such as John Gottman have identified the secrets to successful relationships. In longitudinal studies, he compared happy couples (he calls them the “masters”) and unhappy couples (the “disasters”). Happy long-term lovers are emotionally and socially intelligent. They nurture positivity and don’t get lost in negative reactivity with each other. They are generous, fair, and kind, practicing what I call “relational virtues.” When they hurt each other, these successful partners apologize. It turns out that love means having to say you’re sorry—a lot!

Nurturing the Positive in Your Relationship

So how can couples develop these skills of emotional and social intelligence? One of the most important skills is the ability to regulate your own emotions when you get upset. It’s so easy to “let it rip” and have a temper tantrum when your partner does something you don’t like. But staying calm in the face of stress is vital if you want to be a good lover. You also need to take responsibility for your own reaction rather than blaming your partner. As the wise Roman stoic philosopher, Seneca, said long ago, “Most powerful is the person who has himself in his own power.” Rather than getting into power struggles, each person can try to be his or her best self in interactions with one another. And partners can make room for mutual empowerment; research shows that happy relationships are more equal and respectful.

Happy couples do a lot to cultivate a positive tone in their relationship. This can be challenging, though, because our brains are biased toward the negative—better safe than sorry, so we notice an attack or danger more readily than we see the lovely things our partners may offer us. To counteract this negativity bias, many psychologists now encourage actively focusing on, noticing, and savoring the positive. One couple I know has a “Blessings Jar;” each time they notice something positive the other one does, they jot a note and put it in the jar.

For couples caught up in cycles of negativity, unable to notice the positive and having difficulty regulating their own emotions, couple therapy can be enormously helpful. Most people don’t act in nasty ways intentionally; they get triggered in interactions with their partners, and have a meltdown. And then they may blame their partners for the whole mess. Therapy can help partners take responsibility for their behavior, learn skills of emotional and social intelligence, and cultivate positivity. This is empowering, as they share the responsibility for building a relationship in which they can flourish. Rather than feeling like victims who blame each other, these couples become co-authors of their relationship.

The bottom line: To be a good long-term lover, there’s no free lunch, and there’s no free love. Love that lasts takes work. Happy couples do this work gladly, reaping the benefits in body and mind.