It doesn’t matter if you’re trying to become more efficient at work, trying to digest more efficient what you just learned or just try to maintain an active lifestyle - keeping your brain in shape is one of the most important things in your life!
Read here about 6 steps how you can improve your memory, physically develop your brain and make yourself smarter.
1)Handwriting
Writing by hand or even reading handwritten notes develop brain areas, which we do not use when we text via smartphone, type via laptops/computers or read printed text. Short-term results can include to remember the things, which were written down. Long-term, writing by hand and reading handwritten notes can result in a better memory. It might also improve your pattern recognition and analytical skills.
2) Brain Exercise
Brain exercise doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to do these brain games on your smartphone. You can challenge your brain by trying to memorise and then recall objects in your house, by guessing music that is running in the radio, by doing mental maths while you do grocery shopping and try to calculate the final price, by taking a cooking class, or even by learning a foreign language.
Important to keep in mind is that you should challenge your brain constantly with new things. Research suggests that, if you do a task over and over again, you will get better automatically, but it doesn’t necessarily still challenge your brain after a while.
3) New Experience
As stated above, it is important to challenge your brain with new things. New experience will also boost your brain health! Why? Because it creates new neuron routes in your brain! As a result, you will improve your ability to learn as well, while making a new experience. It’s never too late to learn that instrument you always wanted to play, or get lost in a small Italian village.
4) Omega-3 Fats
Research has shown that people who consume Omega-3 regularly have a lower risk of an early onset of Alzheimer’s disease, a lower risk of high blood pressure, and might even prevent heart disease. Fish contains a lot of Omega-3 Fats and the American Heart Association (AHA) recommends eating fish at least 2 times per week. Important: especially fatty fish, such as salmon, sardines, mackerel, albacore tuna and herring contain a lot of Omega-3 Fats.
5) Vitamin D
Did you sit in the sun today or plan to do so? Perfect! This is exactly how you can boost your Vitamin D supply. Vitamin D is specifically important to develop and maintain the areas of your brain, which are responsible for information processing, memory formation and planning.
Should you live in a location where it is less sunny, consider taking Vitamin D supplements.
6) Exercise
Exercise is utmost important for a healthy and well-functioning brain! Why? Because physical exercise increase blood flow in the brain and encourages the production of nerve-protecting compounds. This doesn’t mean that you have to run a marathon tomorrow. Just some healthier choices, like taking the stairs instead of the escalator or elevator, taking the bike to work, walking more, or doing just 15 minutes some light exercises per day can already make a difference! In total, you should come to 30 minutes of exercises per day (including walking around).