A Brain Workout Plan for Better Mental Fitness

Looking for a new brain workout? Well, there are a lot of brain training exercises to choose from. Primarily because of the baby boomers, programs to improve cognitive performance and mental clarity are becoming increasingly popular. Some day, the mental fitness industry may become as popular as the physical fitness industry. Analysts expect the market to exceed the billion dollar range by 2015.

The experts say that you should actually combine physical and mental exercises. A number of experiments have shown that 30 to 60 minutes of aerobic exercise, just three days per week, improves cognitive performance and mental clarity.

Strenuous activity is not necessary, although some researchers argue that some physical exercises are better than others, there have been positive results with regular walking. It may simply be a matter of improving circulation. The brain needs blood and fluids, after all.

But, of course, physical activity is not the only thing that we need to remain "clear-headed". The experts suggest that we need to maintain "lifelong intellectual engagement". You don't necessarily have to buy one of the brain workout software programs though.

Effective brain training for you, might simply be taking a walk with friends to discuss a book that you have all read. Take your book club "on the road", so to speak. We should try to include social interaction, intellectual stimulation and physical activity in our weekly routines.

Not only will this improve our cognitive functions and decrease the risk of Alzheimer's, it will also reduce our risks of falling into a deep depression as we age. Depression among the elderly is becoming an increasingly serious problem.

But, with the proper brain training, a few good friends and a little "movement", we will reduce the threat of many health problems. Physical activity, alone, reduces the risk of heart disease. You can see how the health of the whole body is interrelated.

We cannot effectively treat separate areas of the body, without focusing on the "whole" body. So, do your brain workout, but remember to work out the rest of your body, as well.

When it comes to brain training, alone, there is lots of new exciting research. For example, Professor Arthur Kramer and his group at the University of Illinois showed that playing a strategy based video game for 23 hours improved the volunteers' memory, ability to multi-task and other higher cognitive functions.

The volunteers for the brain workout were all around 69 years of age and they had not played any video games in the previous two years. So, if you don't play video games, you might want to start.

The researchers plan to eventually compare the results from different video games to see if some are better for brain training than others. They aren't sure if the benefits had to do with the game, itself, or simply learning a new skill.

Overall, most experts agree that a good brain workout requires "novelty, variety and challenge". So, why don't you pick something new, different and challenging to do today and see what happens.