Boost Your Brain Power

Boost Your Brain Power

Ashim Kumar Paul

Mishu, a ten grade student of a renowned school in Dhaka, often gets disheartened when his academic result comes out. It is not only because of his unexpected result, but also because of the reproach produced by his mother at him when he returns home from school. A stream of reprimand leaves him shattered, dismayed and disconsolate. He tries his best to outshine his fellow friends but cannot make his dream and expectation come true. He sinks in the flows of frustration. He cannot find out where the error lies between his expectation and the reality. Is it the only brain power that differentiates him from his other friends?

Studies show that it is your memory and mental performance that greatly contributes to your feat whether you're a student studying for final exams, a working professional interested in doing all you can to stay mentally sharp, or a senior looking to preserve and enhance your grey matter as you age. So, let your brain perform as best as you can if you follow the below tips:

1) Meditate — Meditation has been known to increase IQ, relieve stress, and promotes higher levels of brain functioning. Meditation also activates the “prefrontal cortex” of the brain, an area responsible for advanced thinking ability and performance.

2) Exercise — Long-term exercise has been proven to increase brain power and even create new neurons in the brain. Go out and get a natural high off of your own brain chemistry through exercise!

3) Avoid Junk Food – Junk food has been proven to decrease energy in the body and promotes “brain fog.” Cut some junk food from your diet, and reap the benefits of a more calm, focused brain chemistry.

4) Deep Breathing — Deep breathing actually increases oxygen levels and blood-flow to the brain. 10-15 minutes of daily deep breathing can make a huge difference in the quality of your life and brain’s functioning potential.

5) Learn A New Language — Learning adds more structure to the brain and improves the brain’s speech centers. Hablas espanol? It may be time for you to take a class or program to supplement your job-skills and brain power!

6) Laugh It Up — Laughter causes a natural release of the brain’s endorphins — chemicals that drown out pain and increase overall wellbeing. Laughter is a well known, natural stress reducer. Watch a comedy, crack a joke, and increase those endorphin levels!

7) Engage In Debate — A good, healthy debate strengthens the brain’s ability to think quickly and apply intelligence to verbal situations. Work to build up your brain power by engaging in plenty of healthy debate. Just ask someone who they are voting for in the presidential election and you’ll definitely provoke a debate!

8) Eat Healthy — You know what ‘healthy’ is, so why not eat healthy and improve your brain? The brain requires a certain amount of energy to reach it’s maximum level of functioning. Eating chocolate cake and chips instead of fish and legumes, well maybe that’s why you cannot think clearly.

9) Change Your Environment — To keep your brain properly stimulated, it is important to keep changing your environment. Drive a new route to work, eat at a new restaurant on Friday night. Changing the environment helps change the brain!

10) Listen To Music — Studies have proven that listening to music strengthens the right-hemisphere of the brain and literally changes the structure. Those same studies have found that people who listen to music are generally smarter and have more emotional intelligence than those who don’t.

11) Be Empathetic — Being empathetic and trying to understand the emotions of others is a skill that your brain can learn. Being empathetic is definitely a powerful trait to have and allows your brain to relate to the emotions of others.

12) Avoid Stress — A little bit of stress will never hurt anybody. Too much stress actually causes detrimental increases in the hormone “cortisol” which in high levels, kills brain cells and suppresses brain functioning.

13) Think Positive — If you are currently very good at thinking positively, chances are good that you already have a more powerful brain than those “Negative Nellies.” Take 10 minutes daily to think more positive and start noticing an improvement in thinking abilities and problem solving skills.

14) Brainstorm — A good brainstorming session to think of new, stimulating ideas is a great way to boost your brains ability to think creatively. Brainstorming is actually a different way of thinking that will equip your brain with a quick creative boost.

15) Visualize — Visualization has been associated with focus at a deeper level. Many successful athletes that are able to play “in the zone” actually visualize their game at a deeper level. Visualization has been linked to lowered stress, increased creativity, and peak mind-body performance.

16) Read Books — Reading books teaches your brain to adapt to absorb large amounts of information in shorter periods of time. Books challenge your thinking abilities and memorization skills, as well as boost vocabulary and critical thinking skills. Not only do you learn something from reading a book, but your brain power increases as you build up the book load.

17) Eat Less — Eating too much food has the effect of decreasing blood-flow to the brain and increasing blood-flow to the digestive system. Therefore, if you are able to cut-back on the total amount of food you consume, you will have enhanced brain functioning. In several lab studies, rats on a calorie-restricted diet had increased blood flow to their brains.

18) Eat Breakfast — When kids who hadn’t eating breakfast for awhile, began to eat breakfast, their math grades went up an entire letter grade (on average). Breakfast is probably the most important meal of the day — it provides your body with fuel for the rest of the day. If you don’t have time to eat an entire breakfast in the morning, at least have some sort of snack… It could give your brain a powerful edge!

19) Go For A Walk — Exercise definitely benefits the brain, and walking is a great form of exercise that is easy and very effective for boosting brainpower. Walking puts your mind in a relaxed state of clear thought and brain function. Walking gives your brain a chance to wander and free itself from any troubling thoughts.

20) Solve Puzzles — Solving puzzles is a great way to stimulate your brains ability to critically think and process information. Puzzles are thought provoking, challenging, and a fun activity. The great thing about puzzles is that they require activity in the left-hemisphere of the brain to work with, and transfer information to, the right hemisphere’s visual center of the brain. Want a more integrated brain? Solve a puzzle!

21) Drink Fruit Juice — Drinking fruit juice revitalizes the brain and provides cells with a refreshing jolt of nutrients. Great juices to drink include: grape juice, orange juice, cranberry juice, and apple juice. Most juices provide your brain with vital nutrients which in turn, provide you with more mental energy and focus.

22) Be Self-Aware — When you learn to let go of ego-driven and emotional aspects of life, rational thinking kicks in. Rational thinking will allow you to become self-aware, which in turn allows you to make better future decisions to achieve optimal brain health. Activities like meditation, self-hypnosis, and introspection allow us to increase our self-awareness.

23) Ask Questions — Asking questions is a phenomenal way to keep your brain in shape. Get in the habit of questioning others and their thoughts. Questions can provoke new thoughts and ideas and asking them is a great way to build up brain power.

24) Play video games— While this may seem a dubious inclusion in this list, research says that playing video games exercises your mind, improves memory, alertness and the ability to switch between tasks more quickly.
25) Look at nice pictures— Find babies or animals cute? Look at their pictures! Experts say even looking at pictures that make you feel good and bring a smile to your face, can do wonders for your alertness levels. So, the next time you want to focus on that task at hand, take a quick break and allow your eyes to feast on some nice visual imagery.

However, whether you're having trouble concentrating at work or you just need an extra mental kick to make it through your finals, there are many foods, herbs and supplements that can improve your memory, concentration and focus. If you combine these "brain foods" with regular exercise and a good night's sleep, you'll have boosted your brainpower in no time.

But keep in mind that while some foods can be beneficial for your brain, others can have quite the opposite effect. Processed foods that are high in simple carbs, sugar, salt, and preservatives -- such as pies, cakes, and some breads and cereals -- can actually inhibit the release of chemicals needed for the brain to function properly.

If you're looking to boost your brainpower, here are some whole foods, herbs and supplements that can help.

1)      Eggs

Since the solid (non-water) part of the brain is primarily composed of fat, we must provide it with "good fats" -- essential fatty acids or EFAs -- through our diet because the body does not produce them. In fact, fat is essential in the formation of synapses in the brain that are involved in the creation and maintenance of memories. Eggs are an excellent source of EFAs.

2) Oily fish

If your mother told you that eating fish would make you smart, she was right. Oily varieties of fish -- such as salmon, sardines, mackerel, and herring -- are high in the EFAs known as omega-3 fatty acids. These good fats are crucial components of our brain cells and improve learning powers and memory.

Sardines also have the added benefit of containing the nutrient choline, a brain chemical that is fundamental for memory.

3) Green and black tea
According to recent studies, green and black teas appear to have the same effect on Alzheimer's disease -- a neurodegenerative disease resulting in the loss of mental functions and memory -- as drugs specifically designed to combat the illness.

Both types of tea fight the illness in many ways, but the most significant seems to be that they prevent the breakdown of acetylcholine, a key chemical involved in memory that is lacking in Alzheimer's patients. Green tea was one step ahead, as its effects lasted a full week, whereas those of black tea -- which comes from the same plant as green tea but is fermented -- only lasted a day.

4) B vitamins

While a healthy, balanced diet generally provides you with all your essential vitamins and nutrients, a vitamin B complex supplement can be beneficial for your memory, particularly in periods of stress. When you are under mental or physical stress, your body is depleted of B vitamins. This deficiency prevents acetylcholine -- a key chemical involved in memory -- from functioning in the brain.

B vitamins also carry oxygen to the brain and do away with damaging free radicals; this helps to enhance memory and sharpen the senses. You can either take a supplement or increase your consumption of vitamin B-rich foods, including liver, eggs, lentils, soybeans, and green beans.

5) Iron
Iron deficiency -- the most common nutrient deficiency in the United States -- is linked to many adverse effects, including difficulty concentrating, diminished intelligence, and a shortened attention span. Iron helps carry oxygen to the brain, and the lack of oxygen associated with iron deficiency can cause brain cell activity to slow down significantly.

A simple blood test can determine whether or not you suffer from this deficiency. If so, you can either take an iron supplement or consume iron-rich foods such as lean meats, beans, and iron-fortified cereals. Vitamin C also helps your body absorb iron, so try to combine the two with supplements or with whole foods during meals.

6) Water
Since the brain is 70% water, this essential fluid is vital for your memory. In fact, water accelerates the functioning of the brain as a whole, and when it is dehydrated, it works at a slower pace. This is particularly true when it comes to memory; a dehydrated brain releases the hormone cortisol, which adversely affects the brain's capacity to store information and create memory. In addition, cortisol causes adrenalin to be released, which prompts the brain to function in a more primary, instinctive way; this also affects our mental functions and memory.