Norman Doidge

Normally, when we make a mistake, three things happen. First, we get a “mistake feeling,” that nagging sense that something is wrong. Second, we become anxious, and that anxiety drives us to correct the mistake. Third, when we have corrected the mistake, an automatic gearshift in our brain allows us to move on to the next thought or activity. Then both the “mistake feeling” and the anxiety disappear.

Scans show that the more obsessive a person is, the more activated the orbital frontal cortex is.

more you do it, the more you want to do it; the less you do it, the less you want to do it.

As the scientists randomly changed the light patterns on the computer screen and Belle’s real arm moved the joystick, so did the robotic arms, six hundred miles apart, powered only by her thoughts transmitted by computer.