I think there is probably something evolutionary in that we are drawn to the easiest option. But in our age of convenience, cars, ready meals and off the peg mean that we are in danger of being mentally under stretched.

As we get older it is our short term memory that fades rather than our long term memory. Perhaps we have evolved like this so that we are able to tell the younger generation about the stories and experiences that have formed us which may be important to subsequent generations if they are to thrive.I worry though, about what might happen to our minds if most of the stories we hear are about greed, war, and atrocity

If we are not using our brains' capacity for challenge it feels to me as though it atrophies like an unused muscle.

Sometimes an artist's vision may get blurred when subjected to a committee because an artwork is usually an expression of something unconscious that is better left in the realm of one person's unconscious if it is to speak to another person's unconscious.

In order to stretch ourselves we do need to experience the vulnerability of not knowing the outcome.

People tend to slip up and go along the old road before they realise what they've done and climb out of it again.

Plasticity is an intrinsic property of the human brain and represents evolution's invention to enable the nervous system to escape the restrictions of its own genome and thus adapt to environmental pressures, physiologic changes, and experiences.