How To Exercise Your Brain?

[simple girl]

Brain HQ, specificially the Double Decision program, has some good evidence behind it showing it can improve cognitive functioning in older adults. This specific type of training has shown improvements in more ways than other kinds of cognitive training. It works on the brain's processing speed. More information can be found here:

https://www.brainhq.com/world-class...zeJMYy-nlLLKTwziajQcQ7-ua85mLTOEaAsFgEALw_wcB

I tried the Double Decision program as part of a different research study. It's challenging! It definitely changed how fast I could think/process - interesting stuff!

 

[Out-to-Lunch]

What platform are people playing Sudoko on? I am using sudoku.com, mostly because I like their interface for the most part.

Gumby, I find that (on sudoku.com, anyway) the "Evil" level is often quite a bit easier than the "Expert" level. What I usually do is repeatedly click on "Expert" until I get a game that less than say, 45%, of players are able to finish. It seems to me that I can often complete "Evil" using only elementary techniques, but I have to pull out the bigger guns for "Expert."

But 7 or 8 minutes is impressive! I just cranked through an Evil level in 13 minutes; it was not difficult, but it felt like a real rush.

 

[Mr._Graybeard]

(1) Sudoku
(2) Trying to understand some of the posts here.
(3) Fixing my DW's PC. <----- I have no idea how she can get it so messed up so quickly.

I love Sudoku. I like crosswords too but Sudoku is more abstract.

 

[GoodWishes]

I read an article about the best ways to exercise the brain a few years ago. According to this article:
- Learning/playing a musical instrument.
- Learning/playing a racket/paddle type of sport (i.e. pickleball, tennis, badminton).
- Learning a new language.

All these activities:
- Require lots of brain work to do.
- Have new challenges as you progress and get better.

 

[georgemoe]

Great post. I do Wordle and Word Hurdle (Solitared) with my daughter daily. Started back up learning guitar. Never learned as a youth so building finger memory/dexterity has been a challenge. Having fun with it though. While my running has tailed off, I'm the membership director of my local club. I'm involved in many of our club events and volunteer at The Boston Marathon. I lost my copy of Excel when I left the workplace. Using Google Sheets now with no problem for our financials and trip planning. One of my first spreadsheets was called 20/20. An oldie.

 

[Car-Guy]

What platform are people playing Sudoko on? I am using sudoku.com, mostly because I like their interface for the most part.

Gumby, I find that (on sudoku.com, anyway) the "Evil" level is often quite a bit easier than the "Expert" level. What I usually do is repeatedly click on "Expert" until I get a game that less than say, 45%, of players are able to finish. It seems to me that I can often complete "Evil" using only elementary techniques, but I have to pull out the bigger guns for "Expert."

But 7 or 8 minutes is impressive! I just cranked through an Evil level in 13 minutes; it was not difficult, but it felt like a real rush.

I actually like to play Sudoku in the paper back books. Sometimes I'll play on-line @ websudoku.com. I often have a dozen or more hard+ puzzles going simultaneously in the "books". If I can't finish a puzzle in one session, I'll move on to another and come back to it later. Almost always find a way to finish them. I'm not sure I have ever completed an Evil one but I still try.

 

[DayDreaming]

Anyone here any good at solving Rubik's cube? I never have been able to solve one. Unless I took it apart and put it back together or peeled off and moved the stickers.

I was once in line at the checkout of a department store and the family ahead of me had a kid with them who was maybe 10 or 11 years old. There was a Rubik's cube display next to the checkout. Yep, he picked up one and solved it in just a few minutes while we were standing there. I know there are tricks to solving it but gee-whiz. Dang kids!

Slightly off topic, but the a new world record was recently set and this guy solved Rubik's cube in under 4 seconds. Actually, he spends about 12 seconds looking at the cube first, then 3.134 seconds to solve it. Utterly amazing:
https://youtu.be/LL8pN96MHZs

 

[Car-Guy]

Slightly off topic, but the a new world record was recently set and this guy solved Rubik's cube in under 4 seconds. Actually, he spends about 12 seconds looking at the cube first, then 3.134 seconds to solve it. Utterly amazing:
https://youtu.be/LL8pN96MHZs

I saw that on the news the other day... Impressive... However, the skeptic in me says "No Way".

 

[FREE866]

Brain HQ, specificially the Double Decision program, has some good evidence behind it showing it can improve cognitive functioning in older adults. This specific type of training has shown improvements in more ways than other kinds of cognitive training. It works on the brain's processing speed. More information can be found here:

https://www.brainhq.com/world-class...zeJMYy-nlLLKTwziajQcQ7-ua85mLTOEaAsFgEALw_wcB

I tried the Double Decision program as part of a different research study. It's challenging! It definitely changed how fast I could think/process - interesting stuff!

Signed up for this last night
thank you for posting!

 

[Out-to-Lunch]

I actually like to play Sudoku in the paper back books. Sometimes I'll play on-line @ websudoku.com. I often have a dozen or more hard+ puzzles going simultaneously in the "books". If I can't finish a puzzle in one session, I'll move on to another and come back to it later. Almost always find a way to finish them. I'm not sure I have ever completed an Evil one but I still try.

I must admit that it appears that I have been spoiled by the ability to make notes. I just tried websudoku.com, and am frustrated that I cannot differentiate between a number I am sure of a note.

 

[Lisa99]

I play survival themed video games. I have friends in Europe that I play with so it has a social complement as well.

 

[JoeWras]

Build and repair stuff, especially broken stuff.

It exercises your body and mind.

I do a lot of my own repairs on home and cars. Always an interesting challenge. My volunteer activities involve maintaining old structures, repairing disaster impacted homes, and a little Habitat for Humanity.

Habitat is mostly plug-and-chug. I prefer disaster houses. Always a lot of problems to solve.

 

[mystang52]

I've been addicted to Bridge since college, and play it almost every day (online as well as in person). Bridge definitely requires brain usage.

 

[ER Eddie]

I like watching philosophical discussions on Youtube. And reading, of course.

 

[sengsational]

I have noted that in some of my sources the extreme/challenger puzzles are unsolvable by logic and you have to "pick" one of two routes and see which one is a "bust" to actually solve the puzzle.

There are actually some very complicated schemes to get through the evil/insane level puzzles, but I only know about those, not how to use them.

What platform are people playing Sudoko on? I am using sudoku.com, mostly because I like their interface for the most part.

Gumby, I find that (on sudoku.com, anyway) the "Evil" level is often quite a bit easier than the "Expert" level. What I usually do is repeatedly click on "Expert" until I get a game that less than say, 45%, of players are able to finish. It seems to me that I can often complete "Evil" using only elementary techniques, but I have to pull out the bigger guns for "Expert."

But 7 or 8 minutes is impressive! I just cranked through an Evil level in 13 minutes; it was not difficult, but it felt like a real rush.

I don't know about that site, but the most difficult puzzles handed out on a recent cruise I was on certainly couldn't be solved with elementary techniques!


This cruise that I just got off was my first foray into sudoku. It was exclusively paper. My wife had an app on her phone and it would tell you when you blew it! Totally cheating! I remembered one rule someone told me: only pencil in candidates if there are two, and I could solve all except "insane" level.

When I got back home, I found a site where you could type in a puzzle and it tells you what techniques are required to solve it. Some of those techniques are completely unintuitive... I'd never legit solve one of those. Sure, I could stumble into a solution, but only at the risk of going down an incorrect path.

So I think I'm done with sudoku. That's a pattern I've noticed in myself (getting back on topic): once I get a handle on something, know the ins and outs of it, even if I haven't mastered it, I move on to something else. And I think that's actually better than doing the same thing "forever".

My puzzle today is trying to parse a PDF. More accurately, see why my earlier design is crashing. If anyone wants to help me with this puzzle and knows how to code in Java, let me know

 

[Sanbenito1]

My mother had Ataxia, a neurological disorder. We once listened to a specialist who asked our group, “what is the best way to preserve your mental function: playing cards, learning a new language or exercising?”. His answer was ‘exercise’, and he said it was even better if you occasionally did it in unusual ways, such as dribbling a basketball on your weak side, or mixing in something like tai chi instead of only walking.

 

[indiajust]

I have read several recommendations for exposure to language, 2 is much better than one and each additional is less beneficial, but still positive. Asymptotic approach to best case.

 

[Katsmeow]

I exercise my brain by ....using it. That is, I have hobbies and interests that require me to reason and use logic and learn new things and then use those things. I do feel that learning to do new things and then doing them I exercise my brain. I do have hobbies that are more passive such as reading but I do the more mentally active hobbies regularly.

 

[cyclegirl]

Something I’ve been thinking about lately, we can all benefit from exercising body and mind, both “use it or lose it.” I do Wordle and a couple crossword puzzles every day, but I read Outlive recently and he said doing crosswords every day just makes you good at crosswords - so I’m not sure that’s useful. I do exercise almost daily and I also spend a lots of time problem solving and learning every day in the hopes it helps exercise my brain. Other suggestions?

Take Care of Your Body
Draw a Map of Your Town From Memory (then what?)
Learn Something New
Try Using Your Non Dominant Hand
Socialize
Meditate

https://www.verywellmind.com/brain-exercises-to-strengthen-your-mind-2795039

I do several crossword puzzles every day and heard the same thing, so now I do them with my left hand, I also try to do other things with my left hand. I read that this is similar to learning new things.

 

[Mark1]

DW and I exercise a lot, which is suppose to be good for the brain. We also hike >1000 miles per year. Lately we have been hiking a steeper hiking trail to Independence Rock from our house. Beside the great work out, it provides a lot of brain processing around foot placement as we go up the climb pretty fast.

Another new one we plan on trying is timed multiplication flash cards (e.g. how many correct answers in 2 minutes). Somewhere I read processing speed is also helpful for the brain.

 

[JoeWras]

Every step in a hike exercises the brain in different ways. It is great all around exercise for both the mind and body.

 

[rkser]

What is good for the heart is also good for the brain, ie... exercise & get your heart up regularly, engage with(talk with) as many people(friends & acquaintances) as you can for a longer & a happier life, keeping dementia away.

Look up a 75 yr ageing study out of Boston. Different puzzles & quizzes are all good and interesting, but no evidence if one is particularly better than other.

I did not read many posts above, so sorry, this may have been covered already up thread & is a repeat.

 

[Koolau]

Every step in a hike exercises the brain in different ways. It is great all around exercise for both the mind and body.

Especially when you revert to the primitive mind set - because you might be attacked by a mountain lion.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cougar-utah-mountain-lion-man-chased/

That'll sharpen your brain!

 

[NoiseBoy]

I'd love to learn a language, but I'm not sure what the best way is. Course at he community college? Babbel? Duolingo?

My library offers two different foreign language programs on their online portal so you might check to see if you have something similar. The apps do not cost extra. One of the apps is called Mango which I tried to use to learn Russian. I liked the structure of the app, but I didn't stick with it and any Russian that I picked up, has leaked back out of my head.

Duolingo's lessons have always seemed like they are randomly generated to me. Too many nonsense phrases. But, I have a friend who's stuck with her daily dose of French for something like two years and now she has fair reading comprehension. I do think that learning something new, such as a foreign language, is good for our mental health so I may give it another go.

I also just finished reading Outlive and recall his comment about how solving crosswords just makes you good at that particular thing. I liked the book and would recommend it to the members of this forum. Topical, recent data, and very readable in my opinion.

 

[gauss]

My mother had Ataxia, a neurological disorder. We once listened to a specialist who asked our group, “what is the best way to preserve your mental function: playing cards, learning a new language or exercising?”. His answer was ‘exercise’, and he said it was even better if you occasionally did it in unusual ways, such as dribbling a basketball on your weak side, or mixing in something like tai chi instead of only walking.

Agreed that I have also heard medical professionals say the things that are good for you cardiac health are the same things that are good for defenses of dementia in general.

Mom did lots of crossword puzzles daily for years, but still died with some pretty serious dementia (ie she could not remember what she did that morning or figure out any task of modest complexity).

-gauss