From meditation to nutrition, these science-backed strategies keep your brain healthy as you age.
There’s a reason the brain is nicknamed the “three-pound universe.” From producing dreams to store memoriesthere is so much this fascinating and infinitely complex organ can do, and humans are discovering new information about it every year.
Fortunately, we are living in a time when leaps and bounds are taking place in the fields of neurobiology and medicine, specifically, with scientists racing against the clock (literally) to better understand, treat, and hopefully one day prevent neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s Parkinson’s, and THE A. And with all that academic study, and our newly discovered knowledge about what the brain needs to function, from sleep quality to the connection between physical exercise and cognitive health, those researchers have uncovered a ton of invaluable insights that we can put to use. testing. practical, daily use.
Put another way, it’s never been easier to know how to take care of your brain and stay cognitively sharp as you age.
In fact, recent studies have suggested a startling idea: By committing to radically healthy lifestyles, people could not only live long and healthy lives, but even reverse harmful health conditions that we previously thought irreversible.
That got us thinking… Which lifestyle habits are the most important when it comes to brain health? We’re not talking about snake oil fixes (hello, Alex Jones’ $600 Vitamins), but proven strategies to stay cognitively sharp for as long as possible. We reached out to some of the top experts in the field of brain health to find out what they recommend to keep your mind sharp for decades. Here’s what they had to say about how to protect and improve your brain function as you age.
Prioritize hobbies that allow your brain to learn and create strategies
“A great way to keep your brain healthy is to regularly create new learning experiences and cognitive challenges,” explains Jessica ZK Caldwell, director of the Women’s Alzheimer’s Disease Stroke Prevention Center at the Cleveland Clinic. In particular, Dr. Caldwell suggests “hobbies and games that involve memory, problem solving, and strategizing, such as chess.”
Here’s why these games are so good for you: Continuing to learn and taking on new mental challenges actually trains your brain to function at its optimal capacity.
“When you learn, your brain creates new connections between brain cells,” says Dr. Caldwell. “We don’t ‘store’ or remember everything we learn, but the more you commit to a practice, the more your brain will cement those new connections and the more permanently it will hold onto those memories.”
If chess or sudoku aren’t your game, don’t worry: board games and math equations aren’t the only way to keep your brain busy.
“Two great examples of mental activities to keep your brain sharp during challenges are learning a language and learning to play an instrument,” suggests Dr. Caldwell. “Exercise is also great for keeping the brain in shape. It directly supports the regions of the brain that create new memories. Interestingly, if you can think and exercise at the same time, like practicing a speech while walking, you might get an even bigger brain boost.”
Another way to approach this is to take an activity you already do (like your Sunday crossword or your daily Wordle) and time yourself. Better yet, don’t just time yourself, but what’s more try to have a conversation with your partner or a friend while you do it.
“Fast-paced tasks that require multitasking have been associated with a higher probability of maintaining activities of daily living,” he explains. marilyn albertoPh.D., professor of neurology at Johns Hopkins and director of the Division of Cognitive Neuroscience.
That said, you shouldn’t feel pressured to strength anything. This kind of process only works if you do it often, Albert says, so “the most important thing is to find an activity that you love to do, to keep doing it.”
Embrace a holistic lifestyle with the SHIELD method
A great way to consider improving your lifestyle from a bird’s eye view is to use the SHIELD methodcreated by Rodolfo Tanzi, Ph.D., author, Harvard professor of neurology, and director of the Alzheimer’s Genome Project. Tanzi tells us that the strategy encapsulates much of the work he shared in his three best-selling books on the brain. This is what the acronym stands for:
Ssleep
hchild stress
meinteraction with others
meexercise
Learning new things
D.iet (Specifically, Dr. Tanzi suggests a focus on plant-rich foods.)
By keeping an acronym like SHIELD in your back pocket, you can ensure you’re taking a holistic approach to your lifestyle, checking in on all angles from time to time, rather than just doubling down on just one of six relevant factors. and ignoring the rest.
“These lifestyle changes can help at any time,” notes Dr. Tanzi, “but they are much more for prevention than treatment.”
In other words: you should aim to make consistent and healthy lifestyle choices as soon as possible. As for what these strategies have in common, he explains, “they’re all geared toward reducing inflammation in the brain.”
Get into a daily meditation practice
The benefits of meditation are celebrated in both the Western and Eastern medical fields, and it turns out that this age-old practice could be the key to preventing memory loss. in his book super brainDr. Tanzi points out that meditation may be a foundational practice in anti-aging strategies, thanks to a little thing called telomeres.
Telomeres are chemical structures that exist at the end of each chromosome. Dr. Tanzi describes them acting “like the period at the end of a sentence: [they] close the DNA of the chromosome and help keep it intact. As you age, your telomeres tend to fray and shorten, preventing your cells from dividing properly. If telomeres get too short, you can start to lose parts of your genetic code that keep your mind and body functioning properly.
This is where meditation comes into play. A recent study from the University of California at Davis and UC San Francisco showed that meditation can lead to an increase in the enzyme which keeps telomeres strong and replenished over time.
The study authors were quick to point out that meditation only it might not be able to keep telomeres safe from atrophy permanently, but “the sum total” of the effects on a given meditation retreat also contributed to the effect. This includes (you guessed it) proper sleeping conditions, a decrease in stress for participants, and a strong nutritional regimen.
When in doubt, treat your brain the same way you treat your heart.
The brain and the heart may be two wildly different organs, but scientists increasingly believe that their health is closely related. Studies show that many of the same risk factors for heart disease (such as diabetes and high blood pressure) are also risk factors for brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s.
The connection between brain and heart health can be amazing from some angles. For example: An estimate 80 percent of people with Alzheimer’s what’s more have cardiovascular disease.
When it comes to diet in particular, you should take comfort in knowing this one truth: There’s nothing you can do for your brain that isn’t good for your other vital organs, too. Your heart, your brain, and other essential components of our bodies benefit from the same types of diets, and while the most recommended diet will alternate, depending on which doctor you speak with, they all seem to share the same recommendations for minimizing fat and carbs. of carbon and prioritizing foods rich in plants.
“The general conclusion is that diets that are good for heart health are good for brain health,” says Dr. Albert. “Any diet that keeps blood pressure down, cholesterol down, and weight loss is good for you. everybody of blood vessels throughout the body, including the brain.
Of course, everyone’s nutritional needs are different, so it might be productive to meet with a doctor or nutritionist to determine which specific diet is best for you.
In the years to come, scientists will continue to study the connections between the brain and the heart, but in the meantime, we can all benefit from the simple rule of thumb that what’s good for one is good for the other. In short, all those great lifestyle choices you make (regular exercise, stimulating your mind, eating healthy, avoiding tobacco) will benefit both of these vital organs.
So the next time you go for a long walk or a chess set with a friend, take a moment to congratulate yourself and remember that the main machinery of your body will thank you.
Our Inside Your Mind series will return on Saturday, November 19 with a fascinating report on how your sex life affects your brain health. If you missed our first installment of how the brain changes as we agenow is the perfect time to catch up.
