7 Ways to Boost Your Brain Power

Are you doomed to slower reflexes and poor memory as you age?

 Fortunately, science says, “Not necessarily!”

I’ve been fascinated with the brain since I was a child. I’ve spent literally hundreds of hours reading every article I could find on the topic brain health and memory.  And now that I only have one more year where I can say “I’m in my 50’s”, I’m even more keen on learning ways to keep my brain and memory healthy and alert.  Every person’s brain, like their body, is uniquely different. Not everyone is subject to the slowing down of mental faculties that tends to come with aging.

The Benefits of Brain Exercises

 Like every muscle, the brain needs stimulation and exercise to sustain its function. Exercising the brain has as many benefits as exercising the body: You’ll be able to remember things later on in life, you won’t forget as many details about other people, and you won’t have as many “senior moments” as you may fear.

 But brain training isn’t limited to those who are approaching their golden years. Experiments with multiple sclerosis patients with cognitive damage have shown that doing activities specifically tied to brain training can help the brain develop stronger connections. Their brains literally became stronger through the power of exercise. Since I have a few family members with MS, I search out articles on the topic of how they can thrive with their condition. Here’s an interesting article in ScienceDaily on how video games can improve brain connections in multiple sclerosis patients: http://bit.ly/Video_Games_and_MS .  There’s also a suggestion that doing brain exercises early in life can expand your later amount of cognitive reserve (i.e. how much your brain can bounce back as you age).

Some Brain Exercises You Can Complete On Your Own

1. What’s the last full book you read? The more you stimulate your brain by learning, the harder and longer your brain will be able to work.

2. Protecting your head. Wear a helmet, and take proper precautions if you think you may have a risk of a concussion. This endangers your brain health more than anything else.

3. Staying in touch with friends. Maintaining social ties is extremely important. Having people around to talk to and challenge you keeps your brain working in a way that it wouldn’t ever work when you’re by yourself.

4. Talk about problems. Holding on to problems is much more troublesome to your health than just annoying you in the moment. It can lead to serious stress, and can even impair your brain’s abilities later in life. So, if you’re feeling depressed or have a mental problem you want to address, bring it up sooner rather than later. You’ll save yourself a lot of stress and potential harm to your brain.

5. Try new things. Force your brain to be creative, whether by building something in your backyard or playing a game of squash for the first time. It’ll do your brain good!

6. Quit smoking. This decision benefits many different parts of your body, but the fact that your brain will potentially reverse deterioration is a very good benefit!

7. Sleep more. Sleep doesn’t just restore your body. Your mind also benefits from having enough time to rest through the night.

Not all brain exercises need a machine or website to provide benefits to their users.  Here is a nice and tidy summary of some of the other organizations that give out free brain exercise tips that get into more detail:  http://bit.ly/Fit_Brain_Exercise_Resources. But my list of 7 ways to boost your brain power  is a great starting point for habits you can adopt immediately. 

Do you do brain exercises? If so, what have you found benefits you most? Share your story in the comments!

 Another way to enhance your brain health is to master your mindset about health, exercise, stress, and life in general.  I’ll be talking about this very topic as a guest speaker at the January 2019 Mental Health and Mindset Virtual Summit.  You can register for free access to all 3 days of all 15 industry experts here:  http://bit.ly/HealthSummit2019 . You’ll be able to have access to all 15 interviews for 24 hours after each interview is aired.  To see the lineup of speakers, click here for the agenda:  https://healthsummit.club/agenda .

Be sure to join my private (free) “Stop Migraines Now" Facebook group where I like to share tips like this that make life a little more enjoyable (and more productive!)  Or you can reach out to me and schedule a 15 minute call to see if you are a good fit to join my case study group on how to make migraines a thing of the past.  Gwyn's Calendar