Simpleology Blog

Elevate your mind. Watch this witty cartoon and learn the words of the "highly cerebral" song so you'll start get to know what makes up your gray matter. You're sure to grow more brain cells while you're at it. (The characters are from Pinky and the Brain, a spin-off from the Animaniacs series.)

Up until last weekend, I thought that I could use age as an excuse for getting badly whipped at Scrabble by my friend David's 12-year-old son. Upon my defeat, the crazy kid started laughing like a hyena. (The word that did me in was "excitement.")

Coming of Age
"Man! Age must be catching up with you, too!" David exclaimed. "I haven't won against him for about a year now." To which I said, "I guess everything really starts to go after twenty-five." This was when he also laughed like a hyena.

Disturbed by my painful Scrabble defeat, I began looking into the effects of aging on the human mind. Sadly, the wonderful information I uncovered made my humiliation at the hands of a 12-year-old boy all the more tragic.

Super-Sized Mind
"We've discovered that humans continue to form new brain cells their entire lives," states Dr. Gene Cohen, author of The Mature Mind: The Positive Power of the Aging Brain.

Cohen--who is also the director of the Center on Aging, Health, and Humanities at George Washington University--further states that various studies in the field of neuroscience reveal that there are simple ways to improve brainpower. As such, here are three of them:

1. Experience the "shock" of the new. Taking up a new hobby--as well as simple activities such as learning the words to a song or trying to figure out who's the culprit in a cop show--prompt your brain to come up with cells to help you process your added knowledge.

3. Play mind games. Crosswords and other brainy activities (Scrabble included) stimulate key parts of the cerebral cortex. Aside from honing your analytical skills, this mechanism also sharpens your mind's ability to organize thoughts and come up with out-of-the-box solutions to problems.

3. Get moving. Being brainy means you have to get physical, too. Exercise reduces plaque formation and enhances the efficiency of blood flow to the brain, which uses 25 percent of the body's blood supply.

Jumpstarting "Dead" Brains
Researchers theorize that if you do these three moves consistently all throughout your life, you'll certainly get smarter as you get older. They also add that if you want to jumpstart a brain that's hasn't been that active lately, you can "still effect positive change" even if your task becomes considerably more demanding.

So, I guess this means I have to start doing crosswords again. Because I'm sure as heck not playing Scrabble until I'm sure I have enough new brain cells.

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