It’s that time of year when you feel like you need all the brains you can get and are feeling the pinch. We’ve got some ideas that’ll help you get into prep mode and whip your brain into shape. You can overclock your brain with some small adjustments to your routine and diet. Here’s a quick little primer on how to get your brain working double time.
1. Practice deep breathing
Breathe in. Breathe out. That might sound obvious, but active breathing is a whole other thing: involuntary, i.e. normal, breathing causes a lot of stale air to get trapped in our lungs. Make a conscious effort to inhale deeply every 15 minutes and really oxygenate those insides. The increased flow of oxygen to your brain will immediately and noticeably affects its performance.
2. Drink lots of water
Flush out all the toxins that’re doing you harm and mucking things up, freeing your brain to function better.
3. Do puzzles
Do a crossword or sudoku puzzle, or play a game of chess (all of which you don’t even need a partner for, so there’s nothing to keep you from doing it). These games will train your brain to work harder and produce instant results. The more you use your brain, the more adept it’ll become.
4. Eat brain food
Your diet has enormous influence on your brain function. Keep your brain well-nourished by making foods like salmon, tuna, tomatoes, nuts, berries, oatmeal, coffee, pomegranate, chocolate (without overdoing it!), olive oil, garlic, and leafy green vegetables a part of your regular diet.
5. Avoid binge eating
Your digestive system needs regularity, and if you eat too much more or less than your body’s used to, it’ll upset your workings. While your body’s trying to right itself, it’ll reroute important resources from going to your brain to returning your body function to normal, and you need that energy! So when you’re preparing for a big day, make sure not to over-indulge—a food coma’s the last thing you need on test day.
6. Exercise
Regular exercise keeps everything—mind and body—in good shape. It keeps your metabolism running smoothly and a steady supply of nutrients. Your body assimilates and uses resources more efficiently, and lots of fresh oxygen increases brain function and boosts neurogenesis. So whenever you work up a sweat, you’re causing new brain cells to form, and that’s one population that needs no controlling! So get up and get moving.
7. Don’t let your brain idle
Technology has been good and bad for our brains: some research shows that it’s made us better able to process lots of different kinds of information from multiple sources making us more efficient thinkers, but we can’t deny that it’s also made us lazy in some areas. Do you know how to read a map? Could you find north if you didn’t have Google Maps? Can you calculate the tip for lunch in your head? Take full advantage of the ease that comes with technology but don’t let your mental faculties atrophy.
It’s never too late to start working out your brain. Contact us and try a tutoring session—the first hour is free! We’ll set your brain to work!
I would like to add sleep here. You have to sleep atleast 8 hours a day to relax your brain. A sleepy brain will not function properly and will not be able to keep the clock going. Instead the crankiness will hinder productivity and slower the brain’s clock.
That’s a great observation Anam! It’s not just crankiness but if you don’t sleep, you can’t retain new information and it only exists temporarily in the short term! Isn’t that scary!