By Stella van Lane Contributing Author, a passionate Home Designer Her top interests are health, yoga, meditation, and interior design.
The brain is the focal point of our entire body – it is the main processing unit of all of our thoughts, actions, and emotions. But even as such an essential part of human biology, the brain still remains the one that is least understood. While there are still a lot of questions to be answered about the brain and how it operates, listed below are five important facts about brain health that have already been uncovered and that is not generally well-known:
5 Things We Should Know About Brain Health
1. Stressed brains function less efficiently
It is said that the brain is not designed for handling long-term stress, but rather for only being able to handle the stress that is approximately thirty seconds long. Research has shown that stress has the potential to damage nearly every sort of cognition there is. Apart from hurting your motor skills, exposure to stress over a long period of time can also disrupt your immune response, resulting in a higher chance of developing infections and diseases. Therefore, it seems that proper control of the stress you are faced with every day is crucial for both your brain and your overall health.
2. Brain tumors are rare and treatable
One thing most of us fear when it comes to the health of our brains is the sudden discovery of a tumor. However, the truth is that you only have about 1% chance of developing a malignant brain tumor in your lifetime. Apart from this statistic, it is important to note that brain tumors are easier to treat. One reason for this is that they are unique in the sense that they can’t spread to other organs since they don’t have access to the bloodstream. Another reason not to worry is the fact that modern medicine has advanced so much that operations, such as the ones the experienced Timothy Steel performs are done on a regular basis, quickly, painlessly and efficiently.
3. Exercise boosts brain health
Apart from the countless health benefits, research suggests that regular exercise results in an astounding improvement of cognitive functions compared with a sedentary lifestyle. People who exercise every day have outperformed the inactive ones in almost every test imaginable, including long-term memory, problem-solving, reasoning, attention, and even the tests which measure the ability to reason quickly and abstractly, based on previously learned materials, in order to solve a new problem. In conclusion, regular exercise improves many different kinds of brain functions and abilities and boosts your performance.
4. Repeating is the best way to remember
Experience has shown that the most effective way to remember is by being repeatedly exposed to the information in specifically timed intervals. If you want to fix a memory into your brain, purposely expose yourself to a specific piece of information numerous times. If you want that memory to be as vivid as it can be, not only should you re-expose yourself to the information more elaborately, but it should be done in fixed, spaced intervals. Learning occurs best when new information is gradually incorporated into memory rather than being jammed in all at once.
5. Sleeping improves brain functions
Apart from being able to render you incapable of thinking properly, loss of sleep also has the ability to hurt your mood, memory, attention and executive function. Therefore, the better you sleep, the better your brain functions will be. Even taking a nap can significantly boost your brain power. When we feel tired in the afternoon, it is because our brain desperately needs some time to rest – there starts a battle between the two sides of our brain, one trying to keep you awake and the other trying to force you to sleep. Allow yourself to take afternoon naps, let your brain rest and see the improvements in your overall brain functions.
Every brain may be wired differently, as what we do and learn in life physically changes what our brains look like, but all of these facts about brain health remain true for everyone. If you adopt these few simple changes, you can ensure the health and the longevity of your brain and all of its functions.
Stella van Lane is a passionate Home Designer from Sydney. She’s also a writer in love with coffee, chocolate, music, books and good vibes. Her top interests are health, yoga, meditation and interior design.
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