Additional information
by Alex Southmayd (Author)
What are Brain Snacks? Well, there's an old adage, "Successleaves tracks, and failure does, too." In other words, if someone is particularly successful in an area of his orher life, then there are things that person is doing day inand day out to produce that success. Likewise, if someoneis particularly unsuccessful at something, there areprobably things he or she has done that have becomeobstructions.So, in essence, Brain Snacksare effective ideas and strategies, with detailed tactics, to help you turbo-charge your life. They're delicious andnutritious pieces of information that can help you becomehappier, healthier, and more successful in your lifeand, ultimately, make the world a better place.So, before reading a book whose origin and purpose areso centered on ideas, tactics, and strategies, it's importantto understand how we define those three words inour language. Merriam Webster Dictionary defines anidea as "a formulated thought or opinion;" a tactic as"a device for accomplishing an end;" and a strategy as"a careful plan or method." In this way, it's pretty clearhow those three words are related: an idea can engendera solution to a certain problem, and that solutionwould require a strategy, which would in turn compriseof various implementable tactics. In sum, the idea is theprime mover, the strategy is the plan, and the tactics arethe ideological tools.The ideas, tactics, and strategies in this book have beenhelpful to me throughout my life, and my hope is thatthey will be just as helpful to you. The book is broken upinto four parts: Your Brain, Your Body, Your Life, andxYour World. There's a good reason for this order. Everythingwe do begins with our brain. Life for us might aswell not exist without our brain, since everything weperceive takes place inside of it. All our thoughts, actions, habits, reflections, emotions-everything thatconstitutes existing-originates from our brain. Therefore, on the road to changing ourselves and thosearound us for the better, the brain is the first destination.Once we have achieved a level of mastery over ourbrain, we can begin to control our body. We can gearour habits toward improving our health, fitness, andwell-being, and we can maintain those habits overtime-but only if we have disciplined our brain to doso. Once we have control over our brain and our body, we are well on our way to controlling all the other, lesstangible aspects of our life, from building confidence todeveloping a stronger character. And as you will readon the next page, we cannot expect to change our worldfor the better if we cannot change ourselves for the better first.
Author Biography
Alex Southmayd was born in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and raised in the suburbs of Boston, Massachusetts. He graduated from Groton School, a prep school in Groton, Massachusetts, with honors. At Groton, he was Vice President of the Debate Team, President of the French Club, a head board member of the Groton Community Service Board, a writer for the school newspaper, the lead trumpeter in the Jazz Band, a member of the varsity squash team, and an All-League squash player. He scored 800, 800, and 770 on the Critical Reading, Writing, and Mathematics sections of the SAT, respectively, and he is an AP Scholar with Distinction. Alex also qualified to sit for the American Invitational Mathematics Examination. His favorite area of study is foreign languages, and he is fluent in French. Alex is a lifeguard, he lives in Boston, and he is the class of 2015 at Amherst College.
