For my inaugural blog post, I thought it would be most appropriate to tackle the issue of brain fitness. The goal of brain fitness is to optimize your mental functionality. It is similar to physical fitness, but instead of exercising your body, you are strengthening your mind.
There is so much information out there about how to battle the aging brain. What is surprising to me is how vague and repetitive this information is: stay active (mentally, physically, socially), be mindful of what you consume (food, alcohol, tobacco), and seek novelty. First, let me say, these tips are accurate. The issue that I have with these often cited tips is that they are too ambiguous and leave people with little direction on the actionable steps they can take to exercise their minds on a more regular basis. It is easy to keep living the life that you have always lived, but making changes – even if you know they will help protect your brain as you age – can be very difficult even for those who are motivated to do so.
My mom (aged 70+) has often asked me – “Am I mentally doomed, because I don’t like doing crossword puzzles?”. The simple answer is “No, of course not”. The longer answer is what I am going to tackle in this series of blog posts: keeping your brain active and engaged throughout your life is an ever changing and unique endeavor. There is no “one size fits all”, cookie-cutter solution to achieve brain fitness. When working to enhance your brain fitness, I urge you to start by thinking about who you are and what makes you unique. What are your natural interests and inclinations? What hobbies to you enjoy? What do you do for fun? The answers to these questions can be used as a backdrop on which to design your life in a way that is mentally challenging and highly enjoyable.
This is the purpose of the Brain Shape® brand: to help you do a dip-dive into the various avenues you can use to keep your mind sharp and engaged. Our goal is to help you accomplish this task in two key ways: by talking about how it is that a certain activity or behaviour affects brain plasticity (your brain’s incredible ability to change itself), and then offering actionable steps to make that behaviour happen.
Brain Shape® is geared to help residents of the Toronto (Canada) and help everyone find engaging and stimulating activities by exploring unique ways to modify your daily habits all while staying true to your authentic self.
In this inaugural post, we will explore the three most common tips on mental fitness:
1: Stay active
2: Stay social (Part 2)
3: Seek novelty (Part 3)
The above are considered the three pillars of a healthy brain. You have most likely heard these “tricks” before, but may have wondered how the heck these pillars apply to you?
I want to propose a new way of personalizing these tips to make them achievable in your everyday life. For brain health strategies to be effective, they need to be specific, personally meaningful and attached to an already existing habit. Without these keys pieces, any attempt at enhancing brain fitness will fall flat.
Quick side note - The inherent power of various approaches to achieve mental vigor are amplified many times over when they are combined together.
While I will be talking about staying physically active, social and seeking novelty as individual and separate strategies below, it will be useful for you to think about some engaging activities that you can do your own life that combine all three of these approaches.
Part 1: Stay active (physically)
There are lots of different ways to “stay active”; but, today, let’s focus on the one most powerfully related to brain health – physical activity. We have all heard it before; but, it is worth mentioning again, because staying physically active is immensely important for keeping your brain healthy, especially as we age.
Did you know that physical exercise can create a more effective space for learning and brain performance? It has been shown to enhance communication between brain cells. So don’t skip your walk today.
Below are three steps to enhance brain health through exercise: be specific, make it personal, and attach it to an already existing habit. Under each step is an example that you can use to form your own unique approach to physical activity.
Be specific:
Be clear about the goal you want to achieve - e.g., walk at least 10,000 steps a day. To accomplish this ambition, strap a cheap pedometer to your hip and start moving (I recently bought a relatively cheap and easy to use step counter here). You would be surprised at how easy it is to get to 10,000 steps, if you just put your mind to it.
Make it personal:
You want to spend more time with your grandson and get more exercise; so, work to make your activities together more physical. Take him to the park/zoo/island (in the summer) or aquarium/indoor amusement park at Woodbine Mall/Science Centre (in the winter) - all activities that require you two to get moving.
Attach it to an already existing habit:
The little stuff adds up here. For example, every time you park your car in a parking lot, park a fair distance from the entrance, so that you need to walk more to get to you destination. Or, opt for the stairs instead of the escalator when you ride the TTC.
It is important to choose physical exercises that fit within your ability level. If the above examples are too much for you, think about what you can do - e.g., walk up and down the hallway in your apartment building once an afternoon, just to get moving.
Life gets busy and getting physically activity every day can be difficult – especially if it is not part of your daily routine. Remember that even small steps are a step in the right direction.
Examples of ways to stay active in Toronto:
Visit the Allan Gardens (click here for more information)
Take an architectural or historical walk with ROMWalks (click here for more information)
Go bird watching with Birds Studies Canada (click here for more information)
What do you do to stay physically active? COMMENT BELOW.