We don’t only lose muscle over time. Our brains also atrophy or waste away. This can adversely affect your brain’s cognitive reserve, or its ability to tolerate neurological damage associated with aging and other factors without increased evidence of memory loss or slowing can diminish over the years too. This can make it harder to work through mental tasks. The good news is researchers have found that following a lifestyle that is brain-healthy and by performing brain exercises on a regular basis, you can increase your cognitive reserve in your brain.
A Note about Smartphone-Based Brain Games
Many people buy into smartphone-based brain games because they tout brain-boosting benefits. But do the effects of using these programs actually measure up to their claims? The truth is, the majority of those brain apps teach your brain to get good at working through tasks in the apps and only those apps. Mental fitness fails to apply to any other areas of our lives.
Why You Need Concrete Brain Exercises
It is important that you do brain fitness exercises that improve your ability to focus and/or to associate so that you are better able to focus, such as a brain fitness routine that enables you to exercise your brain on both an abstract level as well as to direct the fitness routine at goals that will help to improve your life. These specific goals should help you to attain specific goals and to avoid cognitive decline.
4 Brain Exercises for Improving Memory
If you want to improve your memory while giving yourself a fantastic mental workout, try any of these brain exercises, as shared by Magnetic Memory Method:
Number Brain Exercises that Improve Concentration
When it comes to improving your cognitive abilities, numeracy is essential, helping to boost logical thinking.
Try this brain activity: “Add 3 minus 7.” What you do is choose any 3-digit number then add 3 to that digit three different times. Then subtract 7 from that new number 7 times.
Repeat this process at least 5 times, picking a new 3-digit number each time. You can also use a different number of variables, such as starting with a 4-digit number.
The 4-Details Observation Exercise
Find four details about people you encounter in public. For example, a person is wearing a blue hat, has brown hair, is wearing a red shirt, and has brown shoes.
The goal of this exercise is to first observe the details then later recall them.
This type of exercise is often referred to by scientists as “passive memory training.”
These exercises are considered to be passive because you don’t use any special memory techniques, such as mnemonics. Instead, you simply ask your brain to do exactly what it was created to do, which is to remember.
Try observing just one person per day, to begin with. Once you feel like you have gotten better at recalling four details at a time, add more information or people!
Repeat and Recall What People Say
Train your brain to focus on what people around you say and remember everything they have said.
Start by creating a presence in a moment by following the words a person says to you by repeating them in your mind. Repeat everything they are saying silently in your mind. This is a brain exercise that helps to boost your cognitive function while enabling your brain to remember more.
Metronome Clapping Exercise
Turn a metronome on at a slow speed and practice “covering the click.” This is a neurobic exercise that can help you to focus on something your brain has been automated to do. This increase in focus helps you to focus more on your surroundings while boosting your memory skills.
For more tips on how to improve your memory with brain exercises, please check out our brain fitness program at NeuroGrow.
