How to Improve Brain Function

how to improve brain function

Boost Your Brain Function

Your wellbeing depends on, both physical and mental health. Therefore, apart from taking care of your body, you should take care of your brain. Brain function affects your focus, concentration, attention, memory, and other vital cognitive functions. That’s why you need to improve and maintain a healthy brain.

Ways to boost your brain function

A healthy brain is responsive, oriented, and has a clear understanding of many things in the world. As you study academics and learn from life’s experiences, the brain learns to adapt, creating memories and intertwining events with logical reasoning. 

Have you tried taking any of the best IQ tests yet? The result may show you how your brain functions, giving you an idea of your cognitive, memory, problem-solving, and other skills involving the brain.

You can do that by taking brain function supplements, meditating, quality sleep, and other methods proven to be beneficial for achieving optimal brain function.

In this article, we will look at a few ways to boost your brain function.

Meditate

The first of the natural methods that can boost your brain function is meditation. Regardless of whether you are practicing mindfulness meditation or the basic one, it will help you relax, calm, and clear your mind.

In that way, it will prepare your brain for the things that await, improve your focus, concentration, and other cognitive functions.

Have Enough Sleep

It’s widely known that sleep is one of the most important factors when it comes to mental health. It not only helps your body distress and heal itself but also allows your brain to refresh.

In that way, it improves memory, maintains the volume of the gray matter in the brain, and prepares it for the new day and the activities that follow.

Challenge Your Brain

A great way to boost your brain function and maintain your brain fit is by challenging it with different activities. These brainy activities stimulate the creation of new connections between the nerve cells.

It is believed that they may even help the brain to create new cells, thus preventing future cell loss. Some of these activities include playing chess, word puzzles, math problems, painting, drawing, and similar.

Playing board games and doing other activities to improve brain functioning can improve your analytical skills or how you interpret scenarios or processes. These games can also enhance your problem-solving skills or how you resolve issues in your professional or personal life. 

Challenging yourself with active games, such as tug-of-war, racing, and obstacle games, can also boost your brain function. Being active increases happy hormones in your body, including epinephrine and serotonin, as well as melatonin in the latter part to improve your sleep. As a result, your body can have better sleep to repair brain cells at their maximum levels.

Build Social Connections

The Scottish poet, John Donne, once wrote that “No man is an island”. That means that we need other people in order to live a happy and fulfilled life. In fact, we need others in order to survive because solitude can kill us.

It’s because being alone, isolated from others, affects your brain function negatively, resulting in cognitive and psychological decline. Therefore, in order to improve your brain function and support your mental health, you need to build social connections and make friends.

By building social connections, you’ll also strengthen your support system, which can positively affect your brain functioning and mental health. So, don’t hesitate to become more approachable and friendly, and welcome more people into your social circle.

Take Brain Function Supplements

How to Boost Your Brain Function Starting TodayOne of the reasons for lack of concentration and a foggy brain is vitamin and mineral deficiency. So, if you feel like your brain isn’t working well, you should see a doctor. They will check your condition and tell you whether or not you lack a nutrient.

If that’s the case, you will need to take certain brain function supplements, as well as vitamins B, C, or E, magnesium, and beta-carotene.

Improve Your Blood and Circulation

Believe it or not, heart health is related to your brain health. To be more specific, your blood affects the function of your brain. There are several reasons for that, including:

  • Your blood pressure – High blood pressure, which is very common in midlife, increases the risk of cognitive function decline in older age.
  • Your blood sugar levels – Diabetes is one of the factors for dementia.
  • Your cholesterol levels – High LDL (bad) cholesterol levels are related to many health conditions and diseases. One of them is also the risk of dementia.

Drink Coffee

Rejoice, coffee addicts, because here’s great news for you! Coffee, due to containing caffeine, helps you improve your focus, concentration, attention, and thinking. Actually, it boosts all your cognitive functions.

Although its effects aren’t permanent, it sure helps when you work on certain tasks that require your full attention.

Eat Brain-boosting Foods

Eating healthy food helps improve your overall health. However, apart from supporting your health, certain foods boost your brain function. According to an article published in Medical NewsToday, brain-boosting foods are:

  • Oily fish – rich in omega-3 fatty acids that improve your brain health.
  • Dark chocolate – rich in flavonoids, antioxidants help prevent oxidative stress.
  • Berries – rich in antioxidants that reduce oxidative stress, reduce inflammation, improve the communication between brain cells, promote the creation of new connections, and reduce or delay age-related brain diseases and cognitive decline.
  • Nuts and seeds – rich in healthy fats and proteins, including omega-3 fatty acids and antioxidants.
  • Whole grains – rich in vitamin e, which is a powerful antioxidant that protects the brain from diseases.
  • Avocados – rich in healthy fats.
  • Peanuts – rich in unsaturated fats, protein, vitamin e, and resveratrol (antioxidant).
  • Eggs – rich in b vitamins and folic acid.
  • Cruciferous vegetables – rich in glucosinolates that produce isothiocyanates which may reduce oxidative stress and reduce the risk of brain diseases. They also contain antioxidants, vitamins, ad minerals.
  • Soy products – rich in antioxidants.

Wrap-Up

Finally, don’t forget to exercise. Exercise can help your brain function. As research shows, it helps your cognition and improves your memory.

It also supports the development of new nerve cells and increases the synapses. That results in a more efficient and better-performing brain.

How to Improve Brain Function