Keep Your Mind Sharp as You Age

As you age, you may start to feel like your brain is aging right along with your body. This is especially true if you find yourself constantly forgetting things. There are several ways you can keep your mind sharp as you age, so keep reading to find out how to keep your brain sharp for years to come. 

 

Don’t Stop Learning

 

A big mistake that people make as they start to age is that they think they don't have to learn anymore. This is never the case. Learning helps to keep the brain fresh, young and building new pathways. If you want to keep your mind sharp, you should try to learn something new every day. The best and easiest way to do this is by downloading a word of the day or language learning app you actively engage with every morning. 

 

Play Brain Teasers

 

You've probably seen a commercial or two about how brain teasers can help keep your mind from aging, and the people who created these games might just know what they are talking about. According to Psychology Today, working your mind every day helps keep it active and keep yourself from forgetting things. So take the time to find a brain teaser game that you enjoy, and aim to spend an hour on it every day. You may just be surprised at the results. 

 

Don't Be Afraid To Use Organization Tools

 

A Harvard Health article points out that people grow more forgetful as they age but refuse to use the tools provided to keep them organized. You probably have a more complex life with more people in it now than you had a decade ago. It's only reasonable that there's no shame in using a planner (or app) to keep track of all the birthdays and important days you need to remember. Take the time to get organized around your house as well. This way, you will waste less time worrying about things that ultimately don't matter (like where your keys are.) This organization allows you to direct your brain power where it counts!

 

If you want to keep your mind sharp as you age, then make it a point never to stop learning. You could also consider working brain teasers into your everyday life. And if you need to use some tools along the way, don't be ashamed. That's what they are there for—to help keep your mind working at its best!

 

How Learning New Things Helps Our Brain

Learning something new isn't easy and facing challenges regularly can really take a lot of your energy. However, learning new things is good because it benefits your brain. Keep reading to learn more about how learning new things help your brain. 

 

Learning Programs the Brain

 

First and foremost, according to Psychology Today, learning is actually the way that your brain gets its programming. Think of it this way, when your computer needs an update, you download new software. This download is the same as learning something new. When you learn new things, your brain updates itself, clears out bugs and becomes better than before. So why wouldn't you want a brain running on the latest program? 

 

Keeps Dementia Away

 

Another major thing that learning accomplishes is it keeps your brain running in tip-top shape. When your brain is in tip-top shape, this means, according to Healthline, that you are less likely to suffer from conditions like Alzheimer's and dementia. Like any muscle in your body, the brain needs to be worked out regularly, and if it isn't worked out, it will begin to atrophy. Don't let your brain atrophy, and commit to learning new things every day!

 

You’ll Be Able to Adjust to Change Better

 

Change is a hard part of life, but it is something that everyone must learn to deal with at some point or another. The more you learn new things, the easier it will be to accept change. This is because learning helps you become familiar with unfamiliar subjects and get used to stepping outside of your comfort zone. If you are one of those people who struggle with change, you should probably start by learning something new!

 

You’ll Learn Faster

 

The coolest thing about your brain is that the more frequently you learn new things, the fasted your brain begins to learn! This means that learning new things in your free time can help other aspects of your life. Say you take a pottery class on the weekends; chances are, it will become easier to learn new things you need to do your job. Who doesn't want to learn faster than they did before?

 

Overall, learning new things can be a challenge, but it is a necessary part of life. Learning new things helps program your brain and keeps dementia away as you age. It makes it easier for you to accept change, and you'll begin to learn even faster, which will benefit all aspects of your life. So embrace new things and start making it your goal to learn something every day!

 

Lifelong Learning Can Help Keep You Sharp

As you age, it's time to start thinking about how you can keep your brain sharp. One of the best ways you can keep your mind fresh is by committing to lifelong learning. 

 

You’ll Enhance Your Brain

 

Just like any other muscle in your body, your brain is a muscle that needs frequent use to stay sharp. You can do this with lifelong learning, which means you aim to learn something new each day. One of the best ways to do this is enrolling in a class you've always wanted to take or studying a new language and practicing each day.

 

You Won’t Be Bored

 

One of the main reasons your brain loses its sharpness is boredom. When you walk a path of lifelong learning, this fights boredom and keeps your mind sharp. And the best part is, you won't have to deal with feelings of boredom which could lead to other emotional issues down the line!

 

You Will Sleep Better

 

When you spend too much of your life inactive and bored, this can lead to issues sleeping. Instead, when you aim to maintain lifelong learning, this will help your mind to stay engaged during the day, then better disengage at night, which means you will sleep better as a result. And who doesn’t want to sleep better at night?

 

You Will Connect Better With Others

 

A major factor in aging is the importance of maintaining your social circle, as this can help keep you happy and healthy. This can be hard to do if you don't have common interests or things to discuss. Lifelong learning can help with this as it can help you connect with new people who share your interests and maintain old friendships you may have already created. Learning helps expand your mind to connect with others better, and it gives you more to talk about to keep them around!

 

Overall, no matter how you look at it, lifelong learning is an important part of keeping your mind sharp. This is because lifelong learning enhances your brain, keeps you from boredom, and helps you sleep better. Not only that, but it will help you to connect better with others, making it a winning situation for everyone involved. Therefore, it's time to take the leap and make lifelong learning part of your routine today!

 

Useful Resources for Becoming Influential

There are several resources that can help you become influential. Use them as a guide to learn and as resources to keep your influence intact.

 

Google.com

 

Although obvious, you should always start your search using this ubiquitous search engine. One trick that many overlook is to search beyond the first page of the results. You can often find some gems as these webmasters are trying to fight their way to the top of the search engine results. These gems are often resources that are less about selling and more about offering great value.

 

Book: How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

 

This book needs to be singled out as it is essentially the bible on the subject. This belongs in everyone’s library and needs to be read multiple times to reinforce the lessons. It is available as a Kindle book and if you are a member of Kindle Unlimited, you can get a version of it as part of that subscription. There are even several summarized versions of the book for those that don’t want to take the time to read the entire book. The book is really easy to read, though.

 

Udemy.com

 

Udemy has several courses related to influence, charisma, etc. Some of them may seem expensive but Udemy runs sales on its courses often. You can also search online for “Udemy Coupon Codes” as instructors like to use these to lure learners to their courses.

 

Amazon.com

 

Amazon has several books on how to influence. What’s great about Amazon is you can usually tell which books are good by reading the reviews and choosing the higher rated ones. Another great way to use Amazon is to scan through the table of contents of the bestselling books in that category and then searching on those topics to see what you can find.

 

YouTube.com

 

It’s amazing how many people overlook YouTube when they are trying to learn something. YouTube has videos on just about any subject. You will have to do some digging and weed through the videos that disguise themselves as courses but are really just sales pitches for a product. But there are definitely some great videos that can help when learning how to become influential. Another advantage is YouTube is free for most videos. One tip when evaluating videos: read through the comments and stay away from videos that have high thumbs down rankings.

How to Speed Read

Looking to save yourself time and get more done in the small amounts of time you do have in the day? 

 

Then how about trying to speed read? 

 

Speed read is the process of scanning through text while at the same time still taking in all the information. This is something some people are very good at and other people struggle with, so let’s look at some methods you can use to learn it.

 

Use a Tool

 

One easy way to learn to speed read is to try using a tool such as ‘spreader’. Spreader is a program that lets you paste a large amount of text into a website and then quickly runs through all the words, showing you one word at a time for a set duration. You can choose that duration and then by looking at the word count, the program can tell you precisely how long it will take to read that content. You can this way read a very big novel in a couple of hours!

 

Use ‘Jumps’

 

Normally we read by letting our eyes scan left to right across the page. You can speed this up though by letting your eyes ‘jump’ from one block of text to the next and by taking mental snapshots as you go.

 

When you do this, you may notice you are no longer sounding the words out to yourself but instead just trying to take the meaning in. This is a good thing – as you remove the need to mentally verbalize you can start reading with ‘unsymbolized thought’ which is much faster.

 

Time Yourself

 

Timing yourself at any task is an easy way to get quicker. Likewise, if you’re giving yourself 30 minutes to read in the evening, why not challenge yourself to see how many pages you can get through and then try to better that next time? The old saying goes: ‘that which is measured, improves’.

 

Eventually, try going just a little faster than you can comfortably understand.

 

Have a Goal

 

Often, we don’t need to read a lot of the text in an article or even a book. If you’re trying to get a specific piece of information from the text then set out with the goal of retrieving that and then look only for relevant content in the page. This is a good way to make sure that you aren’t wasting time by reading long introductions etc.

 

Becoming an Avid Reader (Infographic)