A review by fatherroderick
Habits of a Happy Brain: Retrain Your Brain to Boost Your Serotonin, Dopamine, Oxytocin, & Endorphin Levels by Loretta Graziano Breuning

5.0

What an interesting book! The title suggests that it is a self-help, life-hack type of book, but instead it is a pretty comprehensive explanation of the working of various ‘brain chemicals’ and possible evolutionary causes for their effect on our behavior. The book often broadens the subject to the animal world and explains why we are at once very much like other living beings, but also distinct. Towards the end of the book the reader gets some examples and tips on how to retrain your brain by creating new neural pathways by establishing new habits and by implementing them for at least 45 days in a row. I’ve heard that number before in other books about habits, but the author gives it a convincing scientific underpinning. I feel I should reread the book at one point to fully grasp the extent to which brain chemicals play a role in my own choices, fears or pursuits. I also appreciate how the author doesn’t look at our behavior in a deterministic way, but stresses that if we are aware of the way our brain functions, we can also make deliberate choices to modify our behavior and relearn or unlearn things.