5 Important Ways To Exercise Your Brain!!!!

1.  Walk briskly several times a week to boost blood flow and oxygen to the brain.








2.  Eat green leafy vegetables and nuts to help support memory function.










3  Socialize with friends and family to maintain verbal fluency and emotional control. 












4.  Read anything and everything you find interesting.

5.  Play Brain Games to help form new neural pathways and improve cognitive skills.







- Team Shirsa

"Puzzles for you brain!"

Children love to play. It’s how they learn.  Creating block towers teaches spatial reasoning and motor skills.  Playing Crazy Eights and Monopoly help develop logical reasoning abilities.  Adults need to play too but don’t seem to get enough of it.  Our brains are stimulated by the unique challenges and problems that games and brain teasers offer.

Research is finally demonstrating that our brains do better in the long term if they are exposed to novel activities including brain teasers, brain games and logic puzzles.  Publishers seem to get that point too, that it’s always a good time for a puzzle.

So what are the benefits of brain teasers? 

•    Boosts brain activity
•    Provides emotional satisfaction and sense of accomplishment
•    Enhances memory and processing speed
•    Helps slow the decline and reduce the risk for dementia
•    Improves concentration
•    Reduces boredom

Remember that variety is important to maximize the benefit you get from working logic puzzles. Just don't focus on crosswords or Sudoku.  Instead change up your brain workout by trying a variety of brain teasers.  Even if you can’t solve a puzzle your brain will still receive an excellent and much-needed workout.

- Team Shirsa

Drive safe!!

'Talking on phone'..'texting while driving'... is dangerous and irresponsible behavior and it should be banned.  However, there are a significant number of accidents that occur where there is no device being used behind the wheel. 

Research about how the brain works and its impact in situations such as driving make it clear that brain performance is the biggest factor in driving safely. Whether it be responding to visual cues such as tracking multiple objects, widening peripheral view or maintaining a clear sight of what is straight ahead, it is the brain’s job to process and respond to the thousands of stimuli and information taken in every second. And according to our research on brain plasticity, the brain has the ability to rewire and therefore improve the cognitive functions that are essential for safe driving.

So many lives can be saved on the roads today if people would only pay attention to their real reason for being behind the wheel  to operate a motor vehicle while we help drivers deal with the multitude of distractions that get in their way of doing it safely.

- Team Shirsa

Brain Training with Crossword Puzzles?

There has been a lot of debate over the years about whether or not working crossword puzzles can prevent Alzheimer’s Disease. 

It’s all a little confusing. Here’s the scoop: Crossword puzzles are great as a cognitive workout, but they cannot prevent Alzheimer’s Disease. Unfortunately, nothing can prevent a person from developing AD. However, doing brain stimulating activities that incorporate novelty, variety and complexity can help build your cognitive reserve and reduce the effects of dementia and AD. Anyways, crossword puzzles are still a great way to sharpen your cognitive skills.

Four Ways Crossword Puzzles Benefit Your Brain

1.     Enhance vocabulary  

2.     Strengthen word recall and memory

3.     Stimulate problem solving skills

4.     Improve focus and attention

If solving crossword puzzles is part of your routine, try changing it up a little. Variety and novelty are crucial components of cognitive reserve. Look for other word puzzles like acrostics or try a book with multiple kinds of word challenges.

If you get stuck, look up the information. Use the internet or reference guides to get info on a clue rather than looking at the answers. You are more likely to remember the information for future puzzles if you search for that information rather than just looking at the answer key.

- Team Shirsa