Brain Exercises

Many of us mark a new year with resolutions: eating and drinking less, saving money, reading all the books we own . . . and for most of us -- exercising more.

A fascinating article in yesterday's New York Times revealed that in addition to exercising our bodies, we also ought to exercise our brains.  In her article, "How to Train the Aging Brain," author Barbara Strauch offers compelling evidence that one way to keep a middle-aged mind sharp is by shaking up what you already know.  Here are some of Strauch's key points:

• Brains in middle age (the 40s to late 60s) get more easily distracted.
• Contrary to popular thought, brains continue to develop through and beyond middle age.
• "What is stuffed into your head may not have vanished but has simply been squirreled away in the folds of your neurons."
• The brain in middle age, gets better at recognizing the central idea, the big picture.  "If kept in good shape, the brain can continue to build pathways that help its owner recognize patterns and, as a consequence, see significance and even solutions much faster than a young person can."

But how does one keep brain connections in good condition and grow more of them? The answer will surprise you:  "Educators say that, for adults, one way to nudge neurons in the right direction is to challenge the very assumptions they have worked hard to accumulate while young."  The point is not to learn new facts, but to challenge your perceptions of the old ones; to challenge how you view the world. For example, "get out of the comfort zone to push and nourish your brain.  Do anything from learning a foreign language to taking a different route to work."  Adults learn best with a "disorienting dilemma" or something that "helps you critically reflect on the assumptions you've acquired."

What disorienting dilemma do you need to embrace to exercise your brain?  For example, Flannista may have to read some William F. Buckley or more of Winston Churchill.  Richard Dawkins could really push her out of her comfort zone.  Or perhaps Flann ought to look up beet casserole recipes.

What do you need to do to challenge your perceptions of the world?

Comments

[Flannista]

Carolyn just commented on yesterday's post about her hope that she can "prod" her sister out of her comfort zone to make an effort to meet Carolyn at her parents' home.

On Saturday, Charlissta shared how much of a priority she and her other middle-aged clients (she is a pastoral counselor) place on comfort. It is one of the reasons, for example, Charlissta refuses to face Facebook or other technology. "It makes me uncomfortable," she says.

I get that. Carolyn, however, is referring to breaking out of our comfort zone of not wanting to deal with pain -- particularly someone else's. That's a tougher nut and not something that can be acquired through much reading. Still, I can't help but think that meeting someone else in their pain can only sharpen one's mind . . . and heart. Carolyn donated a kidney to a complete stranger last year -- something that still jolts my comfort zone.

[Jerseysista]

If my Dad were reading this blog I know that he would have a much more conservative challenge for your brain, Flann.

As for me, I am sure there are plenty of ruts I am stuck in mentally but I think, on the whole, I am pretty good at challenging my own assumptions and trying on new thoughts. In the past year I challenged my presumption that a bad relationship is better than risking loneliness. I challenged the fallacy that I am not the only player in the the broken game of intimacy I play with my family. Some of my reading this past year has led me to I challenged an assumption that time exists or that there is no free will. (Those two points still have me thinking hard.) I have tried geocaching for the first time. I have tried to learn how to care for and tend rose bushes. And last night, I tried Ethiopian food for the first time.

Hope this all helps my brain.

[Carolyn]

Hey, dollface. You're right. That comfort thang is what we automatically and viscerally gravitate toward. Even if it's wicked bad for us, it's the known beast that keeps us on the leash. This house, these books, this "stuff" is my self-made womb. Anything that pushes me out is automatically anti-comfort-zone territory. Funny, once out, I seem to go with the flow quite well. It's the gettin' out that goes against the grain. Giving that kidney was the best thing that I ever did in a selfless sense, and stretched the boundaries of my comfort zone something considerable. If that helped my brain, then all the better.

[Flannista]

I know, Jersey -- the conservative challenge would be to watch Fox News, right? Glenn Beck, specifically? I'd rather bone up on conservatism with more thoughtful conservatives. That Glenn Beck (in a recent poll) ranked higher than the Pope says much about how many of us are unwilling to get out of our comfort zones. We prefer our regular diet to Ethiopian food to continue the metaphor.

You're right, Jersey -- you DO challenge more presumptions more than most folks I know. Further, you continue to challenge me to challenge mine.

[PEACEsista]

I find that driving to new places, to different states and cities than the one I live in, challenges my brain. I use Map Quest, usually still get lost, but am confident of finding my destination and always have, so far, even if it's taken an extra phone call for clarification ... like, "which townhouse is it in this giant complex?"

Something about the multi-tasking of it: driving, navigating and looking for the road signs, etc., is just brain strengthening, but most of all it forces me out of my comfort zone of letting someone else drive, or going with someone else, and causes me to face squarely over & over again my fear of "getting lost." I get lost and find my way, again & again ... and that seems to make me stronger for facing the mysteries in the rest of my life.

[Flannista]

I love this line: "it's the known beast that keeps us on the leash." Ain't it the truth? Unlike you, Carolyn, I don't always fare so well out of my comfort zone; say, at a party where I have to mingle. I want to hide in a corner with one other person and talk about how stupid parties are. So pretentious.

I wonder what the equivalent of donating a kidney would be to jar me out of my comfort zone? Any ideas? I'll ponder this a while.

[Flannista]

Well, that didn't take much pondering: TECHNOLOGY. Embracing THAT.

Now THAT is something that continues to drive me from my comfort zone. Learning movie editing software. Trying to figure out how to add another back-up drive. Wondering how to install more memory so I can download the latest update to Final Cut Studio. This stuff makes me want to tear my hair out. I'd rather be watching Fox News. Actually, I often run away from learning how to upload and download, etc. BY watching Fox News.

Maybe I should donate a kidney.

[Flannista]

PEACE -- just read your comment. Fascinating.

As anyone who has ever been in a car with me will attest, I hate to be in a car. Hate to be "on the road." Maybe I ought to go on a road trip with you, though I fear you'd be a drooling idiot in about 15 minutes.

This is a perfect description of life for me: "I get lost and find my way, again & again ... and that seems to make me stronger for facing the mysteries in the rest of my life." Thanks for that, PEACE.

[Jerseysista]

One of the best paradigm challenges is to visit another country. Of the ones I have been to, would say Nicaragua, Israel, Jordan and Thailand have done it most for me.

[Flannista]

Oh dear.

Matissta so wants to travel overseas, but runs smack dab into my stubborn comfort zone that doesn't even like traveling to Orlando. Or Baltimore, for that matter.

Jersey, I never knew you were in Nicaragua. You join up with the Sandinistas for a while?

[Jerseysista]

I was in Nicaragua while the Sandinistas were agitating but before they overthrew the government. That trip exposed me to the realities of insurrection and of poverty and of natural disaster (I was there following the 1972 earth quake that killed 10,000 people and more or less leveled almost all homes and businesses.) Definitely a challenge to my world view. Think of a city like Pittsburgh, say, being leveled.

[Flannista]

Wow, Jersey . . . shame on me for making a smart-alecky comment about a serious experience for you. I can't imagine a city like Pittsburgh being leveled, let alone actually witnessing that kind of leveling. Just reading your comment challenges my world view.

[Flannista]

Okay -- here's something honest: living with someone else would completely challenge my comfort zone. How about YOUR comfort zone, Matiss?

[Chrysosistah]

Fascinating post & feed today. I am in awe again of all of you, your lovely way with words.

My challenge this past year was in becoming more comfortable with uncertainty of all sorts. That's been a very difficult and unsettling experience. Also (although perhaps not evident), has been the exercise of keeping my thoughts to myself - of listening to others, trying to understand where they are without interjecting. Also "muy dificil".

Love playing with languages. Perhaps I might do that again this year. And I've resolved to take some creative classes this spring, and yoga as well. Need to get out into the world!

Interesting, the discussion about getting lost. Both Planta and I are fairly relaxed about driving, and not worried about getting lost, as we've never yet gotten so turned around we couldn't get back out. Kiddo, for some reason, gets almost panicky as soon as Planta and I start discussed the best way to get from point a to b, to the point we tend to tease him about it (we've never gotten lost yet). But after reading this, perhaps we need to ease up on him. His sense of direction is awful, no doubt about it.

Jersey, I cannot imagine being in a 3rd world country after an event like you describe - that would truly be challenging. Mind-altering, more like. Completely outside any comfort zone I know about!

[Chrysosistah]

By the way, LOVE the graphic with this post ;-)

[Flannista]

Thank you, Chryso . . . for your kind comments about the words and the graphic. It was not the first image that popped up when I googled "brain exercises," but it was the one I liked best. I work out a lot on a tread mill, so maybe I was picturing myself . . .

"Becoming more comfortable with uncertainty of all sorts." That's a brave admission, Chryso. Most folks understandably find uncertainty unbearable, and it is difficult to live with palms open. Unsettling is an understatement. Whenever I'm outside my comfort zone, I want to hang on as tightly as I can to what is familiar to me.

I'd like to hear more about your exercise of keeping your thoughts to yourself as I think this is completely necessary in order to produce art in any form. How are you training yourself to do this? I tend to blurt out details about a piece I'm working on and then lose all momentum; that somehow by virtue of TALKING about a piece, I've actually COMPLETED it.

[Chrysosistah]

Well, because so much of what has been on my mind has been centered around the uncertainty, or the pain of it, I'm aware that's not easy for other people to hear or deal with. It's rather like holding something as fragile and as beautiful as a soap bubble - its very difficult to pass it along unless the other person's hands are soapy as well. So, I have to look to make sure that person has soapy hands, or else keep that bubble to myself. Not sure if that helps in your quest?

[Chrysosistah]

Holding that bubble can be very painful in a lonely kind of way, or an isolating experience. But it's been a very good exercise to force myself to really listen to others, to hear where they are. Just listening, without sharing, unless they specifically invite it and are prepared. It's a challenge.

[Matissta]

Well, this job definitely keeps my mind sharp. I'm forever learning something new and building on past knowledge. I also do Suduko puzzles to keep the wheels churning.

But as Flann mentions in the post, expanding on what you know and viewing it from a different perspective is very interesting. I think we all probably experience and do it much more than we realize. Even seeing something new from a visual perspective, like attending a museum show, broadens your viewpoint as well.

[Flannista]

Deft way to avoid my question to you at 12:15 pm, Matissta. You gonna answer it?

Until you do, wanted to comment that you have helped me to appreciate art that is out of my comfort zone. And, while I was walking the dawg at lunchtime, I realized that caring for a dog was once out of my comfort zone as well. So thanks for challenging me in that area. But back to that 12:15 pm question . . .

[Flannista]

Chryso -- you tell me that I have a lovely way with words . . . lemme tell ya that your bubble metaphor keeps floating in and out of my head (and heart). It's spot on. Thanks.

[Chrysosistah]

Glad you liked it. Hope it helps?

[Flannista]

Yes, it does, but I'm trying to take in the truth of it gradually; holding the bubble gently, so to speak, so I don't burst my bubble -- which is what I tend to do when I blabber about writing projects rather than completing them. Talking about them and sounding oh-do-artistic about them is my comfort zone. Actually FINISHING something? Lots and lots of bubbles to hold there. But the metaphor works for me because working on a project often feels like holding my breath. As William Blake says, one must stand still and be attentive so one can "kiss the joy" as it flies by. Now THAT'S brain exercise.

[Flannista]

One more observation: a couple of your shared how moving out (however quickly or gradually) challenged your comfort zones. The comfort zones of Matiss and I are challenged by moving IN . . . which obviously will continue gradually!

[Matissta]

Flann, I think that living with someone is out of everyone's comfort zone but doesn't mean it can't be done successfully.

For you, the bad part of living with me would be the "paper piling issue."

The bad part for me, would be trying to get you out of the house.

The good part, we'd laugh even more. Yes, imagine that. My sides are already hurting.