Your brain is no different than the rest of the muscles in your body − you can either use it or you lose it! The good news is that brain health and growth can be stimulated by challenging brain exercises.
Brain reserve is a term used to describe the brain’s ability to withstand damage due to ageing and other factors without showing visible signs of slowing down or memory loss. Researchers now believe that following a brain-healthy lifestyle and performing brain exercises can increase the brain’s cognitive reserve.
Try the following exercises to sharpen your mental skills:
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- Do math in your head. Figure out mathematical problems without the aid of pencil, paper or calculator.
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- Take a cooking class. Cooking uses senses such as sight, smell, touch and taste which involve different parts of the brain.
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- Refine your eye-hand coordination. Start a new hobby that requires fine motor skills, such as knitting, painting or drawing.
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- Test your recall ability. Memorise your grocery list (or any other list) and test your recall.
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- Take part in a new sport that utilises both mind and body, such as yoga or golf.
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- Create word pictures. Visualise the spelling of a word in your head, then try and think of any other words that begin (or end) with the same two letters.
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- Let the music play. Learn to play a musical instrument or join a choir. Learning something new and complex over a longer period of time is ideal for the ageing mind.
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- Learn a foreign language. The listening and hearing involved stimulate the brain.
In addition to mental brain exercises, you can actually get a brain boost by hitting the gym. The benefits of physical exercise, especially aerobic exercise, have positive effects on brain function. Exercise affects the brain on multiple fronts. It increases heart rate, which pumps more oxygen to the brain. It also aids the bodily release of hormones, all of which participate in providing a nourishing environment for the growth of brain cells. Even briefly exercising for 20 minutes facilitates information processing and memory functions.
Sources
http://www.everydayhealth.com
http://www.fitbrains.com