Saturated fat harms the brain's ability to focus

[eekee]

This is recent research, I just learned about it a couple of days ago. I have severe fatigue issues. These are generally dealt with by "pacing", but it wasn't working consistently for me. Surprisingly, my "mood"—actually my ability to focus at all—could change after eating one meal. When I can't focus, I want easy meals and I want to buy them from the shop across the road. I also want filling meals, which narrows my choice down to pizza, pizza, or pizza. Pizza is high in saturated fat, so after every meal, I couldn't focus. What I ended up with was these phases lasting for weeks or months where I couldn't get anything done!

Anyway, I'm linking it because it seems one or two other users here also have difficulty focusing, and thought they might benefit from it. Healthy people probably won't be affected as much as I am, but if you find yourself stuck on your project, it might be worth looking at your diet.

What the article doesn't mention is the benefits of oily fish on brain function. I like tuna very much. Mackrel is possibly better, but gets tiresome quite quickly and can stink up a whole house if you're not careful. Sardines are cheaper but also very good, and pilchards are cheaper still, depending on location of course.

[alexfru]

[alexfru]

Seems like mental work itself induces excessive cravings or overeating (the interwebs have articles on this).
I wonder if simplifying the problems may help making progress. We often run ourselves into the complexity corner.

[eekee]

Seems like mental work itself induces excessive cravings or overeating (the interwebs have articles on this).
I wonder if simplifying the problems may help making progress. We often run ourselves into the complexity corner.

Interesting! And we do indeed. I had to simplify my intentions before I could even get started coding. The strangest thing is that complexity itself holds a strange sort of appeal. My reasoning mind values simplicity, but to get into a really complex problem and wrestle with the details... Perhaps I just got that way by playing too many puzzle games.

[Thomas]

The Healthy Programmer: Get Fit, Feel Better, and Keep Coding (Pragmatic Programmers)
This likely makes for a worthwhile reading.


--Thomas