Intellectual pleasure, interest and excitement. Distinctive features and history

Your brain, like the rest of your body, needs stimulation and exercise.. If you want to keep your brain in good shape, why not dedicate at least half an hour a day to mental training?

The following simple exercises will help you exercise your brain regularly and prevent it from getting lazy. Some of them can be organically integrated into your daily life, and some are purposefully carried out to keep your brain in working tone.

Make friends with math

Do all the calculations that you feel able to do in your head without using a calculator or computer. Nothing sharpens the brain like simple arithmetic. Mental ability:

• maintain a certain order of numbers;
• operate with two-digit numbers;
• multiply and divide two-digit numbers;

today may well serve as a reason for pride. Our lazy brain does not often encounter such a need.

Do not allow yourself to rush to computing tools for help whenever you need to make calculations. Make it a rule to do mental arithmetic first. Gradually make arithmetic problems more difficult, just like they once did in school lessons.

When driving, do not rely on the navigator

Force your brain to imagine maps of your route when you have to drive a car in an unfamiliar area. Moreover, do not rush to use the help of a navigator if you have to navigate places where you have already been. First, try to recall a previously traveled route in your memory and plot the road from memory.

Reading and tracking the route using old and almost out-of-print road maps is also payload for your brain, which will be forced to construct visual images of the places through which you will travel by car.

Make sure you have a good understanding of the terrain and roads you travel on, expand your knowledge, explore new paths and create new routes.

Relive old memories

You probably have old albums with your photos. If you have some free minutes and want to train your brain, start looking at your old photos. As you look at the images on them, pay attention to the details and try to remember what it looked like in your past. Recreate pictures of your past from photographs.

Pay special attention to details. Try to remember what event preceded the photograph taken, and what followed afterwards.

Remember:

• words from the participants in the shooting,
• the colors of their clothes,
• their voices
• faces,
• and so on.

Try to keep your memories as deep as possible and not just skim the surface.

If you still have old letters, re-read them and try to remember how you felt when you received them and when you read them, in what setting all this happened, what events filled your life at that moment in time.

This exercise trains not only your long-term memory, but also your ability to restore full picture past events using individual images and memories, observing logic and subject connections. You can call this synthesis training - mental capacity restore a holistic picture from disparate elements.

Read in a related language

In this case we're talking about not about that foreign language, such as English, French or Spanish. Although studying them is undoubtedly also very useful for brain development, now the recommendation is aimed at encouraging you to read in languages ​​related to Russian - Belarusian, Polish, Slovak, Slovenian.

Such reading will force your brain to actively search for associations by similarity, compare words with the same root and find in foreign words the same meanings as in the native Russian language.

Here you will need to use logic, guesswork, multiple comparisons, and verbal intuition.

For example, many Slovenian words are remembered due to the fact that they convey a meaning that is understandable to a Russian-speaking person:

• "extinguishers" - firefighters,
• "football" - football,
• “blagaina” – cash register in a store,
• "gotina" - cash,
• etc.

With Vikium you can study effective exercises to charge your brain online

Walk around the house blindfolded

Of course, to complete this exercise you will need the help of an assistant who will insure you against all sorts of surprises and minor dangers.

At first, this kind of brain exercise will probably seem both strange and difficult to you. However, you will soon be surprised to discover that your brain can cope with this task quite well, and with regular repetitions it will do it better and better.

At first glance, this is a fun and interesting exercise, but in fact, it will require you to

• ability to reconstruct terrain from memory,
• logic for reasoning regarding the size of intersecting spaces,
• attentiveness in unusual activity conditions,
• motor coordination.

Use computer brain training

Many successful professionals consider computer training programs for brain development as an effective investment in your personal growth And mental development. As daily exercises for the brain, online exercises not only help keep your intellect in good shape, not only help speed up decision-making, but are also deservedly considered reliable prevention against serious age-related disorders such as Alzheimer's disease.

You can try, for example, doing the “Anagrams” exercise in the Vikium mind training program.. Solving anagrams at speed has a positive effect on the pace of learning, including online learning, since it requires quickly analyzing and restructuring information.

Useful exercises for the brain with games related to mathematics. For example, the Geometry simulator activates spatial thinking, logic and imagination. This task, which is part of the Wikium development program, will help you improve your spatial orientation skills and analytical abilities.

Gradually increasing the complexity of tasks will allow you to develop the skill of processing unfamiliar information of sufficiently high complexity. This is roughly the kind of work the brain does when trying to deal with in writing in an unfamiliar language - analysis of letter combinations and distinguishing familiar signals among them.

To ensure that your workouts remain regular, the program itself will remind you that it’s time for the next workout and invite you to complete next level difficulties.

Principles of Effective Brain Training

All of the exercises listed above will be even more useful if you follow a few simple, but very useful principles. Namely:

1) Intellectual pleasure, interest and excitement

Brain exercise should be fun. Any business at the stage of its development requires more effort from us than we would like to put into it. But, if this is how you can train muscles and, for example, the eye, then the effectiveness general training brain directly depends on your attitude towards training tasks.

If they seem boring and monotonous, your brain is unlikely to learn the lesson. That’s why training and computer problems should be captivating and exciting, and their solution should awaken real passion in you, motivating you to do more and more. complex tasks.

2) Regularity and systematicity

It hardly needs a reminder that main principle any workout - do it regularly. One random workout or workout based on your mood is not the best useful practice for the development of mental activity. It is important to develop your own training system. For example, one or two weekly classes.

To avoid missing out on scheduled brain exercises, coordinate your exercise times with your schedule. This could be the time before bed or, conversely, in the morning before you decide on your professional tasks. And it will be absolutely wonderful if such training becomes a habit and becomes an integral part of your work week.

3) Prevention of mental fatigue

The brain gets tired from work. Therefore, it is wrong to distribute your tasks in such a way that you first devote your time to completing simple tasks and then move on to more complex ones that require significant effort. By that time my brain was already tired.

Therefore, start your working day by solving complex problems that require creativity, intellectual courage, and intense attention from you. And only after that, load your brain with familiar and relatively uncomplicated types of mental activity.

1. Get up early

Early to bed and early to rise is the first rule. The brain works best in the morning, according to research University of Sussex. If you have to take a test, for example, the results will be 5% better before noon.

2. Chew

Chewing gum not only freshens your breath, but also improves brain function. Chewing increases your heart rate, which helps better supply oxygen and glucose to your brain.

Saliva helps trigger memory by releasing insulin, which stimulates memory receptors in brain cells.

3. Hit Vitamin B

B vitamins are great for the brain. Vitamin B6 improves long-term memory, and B1, 2 and B12 restore and help produce brain tissue. You can get B vitamins by adding chicken, fatty fish and bananas to your diet. And if that's not enough, buy vitamin complex at the pharmacy.

4. Learn from women

Women are great at multitasking, and we can learn from them. When you do several things at once, the brain works at full capacity. Try practicing by watching TV and listening to the radio at the same time.

Focus on both streams of information and then isolate one. This will improve your ability to concentrate and you will be able to watch TV shows and listen to sports news simultaneously. Do you think it won't work? Julius Caesar did it!

5. Eat right

Your brain also suffers from poor nutrition. " Eat little and often - this helps your body constantly maintain required level energy, says the author of the book, You are what you eat: How to plan meals“ Karina Norris. “Larger meals provide significant blood flow to the stomach to aid the digestion process, which means blood flows away from the brain.”

6. Learn another language

This will not only help you during your next trip to another country, but will also keep your brain in shape. According to the study University College London, second language changes Gray matter- the part of the brain that helps you process information.

It's like going to the gym - the more and better you pump, the more muscles you have, and here the more languages ​​you know, the better the situation with your gray matter.

7. Don't forget the herbs

Add rosemary sprigs to your breakfast. This will improve blood flow to the brain and have a beneficial effect on working together brain and body. Rosemary is not the only herb that enhances cognitive function- sage, for example, will help you concentrate better.

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There is a fairly difficult to translate psychological term called Fluid Intelligence (FI). If translated literally, it sounds like “fluid intelligence” or “flexible intelligence.” This area of ​​our abilities allows us to cope with complex, complex problems, to build original logical chains, find solutions to situations that are new to us. It is known that the level of FI is proportional to the educational level of a person, because when difficult learning this area much more thinking is involved.

There are special tests and tasks to assess Fluid Intelligence, and until recently it was believed that this dark area of ​​​​our consciousness cannot be improved. But spent Scientific research and their further publication in 2008 in the specialized journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA) claim that there are techniques that allow you to train mobile intelligence, improving performance by as much as 40%! This is huge!

By training on the results of a specific test, you can improve the results of this test, but if the subject is given another task....then.... The conclusion is that simple training and cramming information does not affect the level of FI and that it is almost impossible to train it. For forty years they thought this way, but a solution was found!

It turned out that humans have special shape memory, which makes it possible to overcome complex tasks. It allows us to hold many factors in memory and evaluate their interaction, build associations between objects - it is called “working memory”. We often use it to transfer information from one place to another, for example, when dictating a phone number, we ask for several numbers and write them down in a notepad.

It is easy to conclude that working memory is quite small, since it allows you to retain a couple of digits in your consciousness, or, if you try, five or six digits. She handles visual information somewhat better. What if you combine auditory and visual perception? Will your head explode? Like that. However, in reality, all this leads to a gradual increase in working memory resources, the ability to remember more and more, to think faster - i.e. its training takes place and the more trained and “bigger” it becomes, the easier it becomes to build associations.

This is what the researchers did: they wrote a game where each time you need to use more and more working memory, increasing the amount of information. The name of the game is Brain Workshop, available to everyone who wants to increase their intellectual abilities– at this address, it can be downloaded for free - http://brainworkshop.sourceforge.net

What is the game like? In the process you see a 3x3 field, like in tic-tac-toe. A square appears and a letter is pronounced at the same time English alphabet. If the position of the square is the same as the previous time, press “A” on the keyboard, if the sound is the same, press “L”. That's all :) When the correctness of the choice increases above 80%, you will need to guess the previous position of the squares and sounds. It’s interesting that the program itself builds performance graphs and also allows you to change settings.

Information on the topic

It is difficult for you to gather your thoughts, you cannot perceive new information, is it difficult for children to study? Review your diet urgently! Scientists have found that if a person has memory lapses, he feels constant fatigue, then this is not always associated with serious health problems. It is quite possible that you have hypovitaminosis, and poor nutrition. Need to charge your brain!

We present to your attention a set of foods, vitamins and minerals that improve brain function and memory.

Group vitaminsB are important element nutrition of brain cells. To improve memory and assimilate information, thiamine (vitamin B 1) And folic acid. Use sufficient quantity B vitamins in old age prevent Alzheimer's disease. Vitamin B is found in foods that should be included in your diet daily, these are liver, kidneys, egg yolk, tuna, cereals. For brain nutrition for breakfast for both children and adults perfect option – buckwheat, oat or wheat porridge.

VitaminE – the most important element for the brain, contained in pine and walnuts. According to research, it has been proven that the contents of nuts fatty acid, essential oils, amino acids, zinc, magnesium, vitamins A, E, B, stimulate brain cells and prevent their destruction, develop thinking and long-term memory, strengthen nervous system.

VitaminA– extremely important for the brain. Contained in products: carrots, melon, apricots, mangoes, milk.

VitaminC. The foods that contain the most vitamin C are those that are essential for the brain: citrus fruits, black currants, cauliflower, bell pepper.

Vitamin and mineral composition: folic acid, vitaminsE,C,K, iron. It is contained in leaf lettuce, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, spinach. The carotenoids found in these products speed up metabolism in the brain, improve memory and the ability to concentrate. Folic acid also contain green vegetables, beets, bananas, raspberries.

Calcium- V dairy products,phosphorus- V fish and celery, selenium– in vegetables and garlic necessary for the brain to think quickly and be active.

Antioxidants anthocyanins help the brain perceive, process and remember information. Dark purple berries contain the most antioxidants: red grapes, blueberries, blackberries, black currant, which improve the nutrition of brain cells and protect them from destruction. And for those who complain of forgetfulness and absent-mindedness, as well as for the prevention of Alzheimer's disease, it is recommended to use freshly squeezed blueberry juice. This antioxidant is also found in eggplant peel, thanks to which it is preserved required amount fat in the membranes of brain cells and protects them from damage.

Antioxidant lycopene protects against free radicals leading to dementia. Found in tomatoes.

Carbohydrates necessary for the brain to normal functioning. Chocolate, which children and adults love, nourishes the brain. Healthy foods for the brain containing carbohydrates: oatmeal, legumes, bran, brown rice, vegetables, fruits. Special attention you need to pay attention to dried apricots, it should always be on your table, as it stimulates the left hemisphere of the brain.

Protein– the main building material of brain cells. Therefore, it is necessary to include in the diet protein products: meat, fish, shrimp, milk, cottage cheese, curdled milk, yogurt, cheese, nuts.

Fats necessary for efficient work brain: they provide control over emotions, influence the formation of thinking, blood circulation processes and the state immune system. The most healthy fats found in walnuts

almonds, cashews, in sunflower and olive oil. And also in noble breeds of fish: trout, salmon, mackerel, tuna.

Caffeine – stimulates brain function when making important decisions, protects the nervous system from harmful microorganisms, toxins and cholesterol. An excellent alternative to coffee is green tea, containing the amino acid thiamine, which improves brain function, increases efficiency, and relieves fatigue. Antioxidants in green tea protect brain cells from destruction and improve their function.

Water– for the brain to work productively, you need 1.5-2 liters of fluid per day. Best fit still mineral water. Since the brain is 70% water, its deficiency impairs the nutrition of the brain. During thirst, the stress hormone cortisol begins to be intensively produced, which reduces the brain’s ability to remember information.

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