Arthur Brooks

doing a really great job at what you're doing with your fluid intelligence, you could be killing it in your 50s, absolutely, even beyond.

The key thing is remaining at this really high level of energy and enthusiasm and just love for what you do.

And that's the reason that changing the emphasis, changing the focus earlier is a good thing to do.

Now, every job, every person can actually do that.

So just absolutely maximize your fluid intelligence and be ready to shift from the startup entrepreneur to the venture capitalist.

from the star litigator to the managing partner, from the star researcher to the master teacher.

That's really the kind of thing that's supposed to happen in your 40s and 50s.

It's very natural.

It feels really good.

And you're going to have actually greater happiness because crystallized intelligence maximization leads to greater happiness than fluid intelligence maximization does.

Because you're serving others, which is such a beautiful thing.

Now, that said, back to your question, everybody at every age should be doing what they can to maximize not just their brain health, but their quality of life through lucidity.

Now, the way to think about that is that it's like anything else.

Your brain is part of your body.

You have to take care of your brain the same way that you take care of your body.

Now, there are a bunch of things that you can do, and it really has a lot to do with exercise and with sleep and with proper nutrition and especially being very careful with intoxicants.

A lot of people in their 20s and 30s, they don't want to hear this.

And I'm going to sound like the grumpy old guy.

But let me tell you, this is the big mistake that I made.

I drank way, way, way too much in my 20s.