Increase Your Brain Power! (Excerpt from 33 Strategies of Board Exam Success)

There are 8 ways of increasing our brain power. These are simple ways that are generally good for our health and improvement of our brain that we sometimes neglect.

1. Food

The brain is greedy and taxes the body in terms of blood sugar. The brain feeds directly on glucose, so if you aren’t nourished, you will lack focus and concentration. For this reason, it is important that you eat “big breakfast” before you start the day.

It is no question that our body’s functions are affected by what we eat. Our brain and thinking function is no exception. Brain foods help improve the functioning of our brain. According to health experts, one good example of brain food is fish. Fish is rich in omega-3 fatty acids which allow blood of the brain to remain healthy and fluid. So it is such a great idea to include fish in your daily diet or at least twice a week. Or if you don’t eat fish then you can have fish oil supplements that will help you complete your needs.

Also, according to experts, foods in the complex carbohydrates family are amongst the best type of brain foods. Food with complex carbohydrates takes longer time to digest and stays extended period in the intestines giving us continuous supply of sugar that our body is able to use and will provide optimal amounts of energy for our brain to access.

Here are some recommended foods that may help us boost our brain power:

1. Cereals and oatmeal

2. Milk and legumes

3. Fruits like apples, blueberries, cherries and grapes

4. Spaghetti and rice

5. Vegetables like kidney-beans, legumes, lentils and chick peas

6. Chicken, lean beef, fish and eggs

Also there are foods you should avoid to make your brain function better. Junk, processed, preserved, highly altered and artificial foods should be avoided. Intoxicating drinks affect not only your lungs and liver but also your brain. It kills brain cells at a very high rate.

2. Exercise

A good and light exercise every morning will give you a very refreshing feeling. It will not only make you good on how you feel but also on how you think. There are many articles and medical journals attesting that exercise can really affect the way we think and the way we perform different tasks. A 30 minute exercise can have a great impact on our performance for the whole day. Getting cardiovascular exercise is one of the most important aspects to having a healthy brain. The main reason is that cardiovascular exercise increases blood flow and oxygen to the brain. There are other benefits to exercise, but it’s of great benefit to the brain in particular.

3. Brain Activities

There are many ways to keep the brain active. Here are just a few of many: Reading, doing arithmetic in your head, memory exercises, learning a musical instrument, learning a foreign language, crossword puzzles, chess, games that require concentration, or any kinds of puzzle games in general. Creative exercises such as painting, poetry, music, writing are also great ways to use the brain.

Luckily for you who are reviewing for the board exams, brain activity is not a problem. You will always find many puzzles and memory exercises guised as problem-solving questions and formulas. You will also learn more and new things from reading and answering practice questions. In this way, you will increase your brain power.

4. Get Outdoors

Many people suffer from poorly ventilated areas such as offices or rooms that lack oxygen. Well, big surprise: The brain needs oxygen to perform at its best. Make sure to get outdoors, get a little sunlight, and keep your homes and study areas well ventilated.

5. Relaxation

You can never concentrate to do your job if there is always something bothering you. Distress and depression are potent combination for brain damage. It is the number one and two enemies of thinking right and thinking better. Your brain will be always pre-occupied and consumed by things you don’t really need. Distress and depression are sickness of the mind and you can get rid of them if you avert your thinking from things that causes them.

6. Brain Supplement

Brain supplement may also help increase your brain power. Fish oil rich in Omega-3 is clinically proven to increase brain functions aside from our regular intake of vitamins A, C and E which also have anti-oxidants that help good circulation of blood on our brain.

7. Avoid Alcohol and Smoking

It is a fact that alcohol directly kills brain cells and smoking is not only bad for your skin but it also limits the blood flow to your organs, which includes the brain. It is wise therefore to avoid alcohol and smoking especially if you want to harness your brain power for the board exams.

8. Rest

There are reviewees who turn night to day and day to night. They sleep during the day and review during the night and stay up very late until dawn. Little they’d realize that their health is already suffering not to mention their brain power.

You need at least 6-8 hours of sleep to keep your mind and body in good shape. Lack of sleep will definitely affect our immune system which will eventually breakdown and will make you susceptible to diseases. Lack of sleep will also make you hard to concentrate on your review making your reading and studying activities useless. Lack of sleep will make you grumpy and irrational most of the time affecting your studies and therefore what you have invested on will all become useless.