Whether we have good or bad memory, training it will make what we study stick to us faster and we will take less time to learn the subjects.
And you, do you go to the gym?
The brain is capable of changing and learning throughout our entire life. This is a capacity known as
neuroplasticity and it is related to what we learn and also to what we forget. The fact that the brain is plastic means that we can change, learn, integrate new habits, and expand our abilities, and that is achieved in the same way as when we want to grow our muscles or learn a sports discipline: by training. Just as we go to the gym or go for a run, the brain also needs our attention. A well-trained brain will have better communication between neurons (synapses) and those essential abilities to easily obtain our
eTítulo university degree (remembering, learning, deducing, etc.) will be greater and more efficient.
Daily Neuróbica
Brain gymnastics or neuróbica is too new for enough scientific studies to guarantee its success conclusively, but most specialists recommend it and firmly believe in its effectiveness. They recommend doing several minutes a day of various exercises or puzzles ranging from doing a puzzle with one eye closed to trying to perform everyday tasks with the opposite hand to the one we normally use or changing the routes we usually take to get to class or work. In reality, it is like a game where you compete against yourself, so it is much more fun than lifting weights at the gym and takes less time. With a simple search on the Internet, we will find many exercises that we can try.
Memory has its own routine
Having a well-trained brain is great for memory, but in addition, we can give it an extra training. There are several
apps with memory games that can help us, such as those that consist of making pairs of images. It is also a good exercise to memorize poems, tongue twisters, or songs. Number series are somewhat more boring but essential if we want to improve our numerical memory. Learning some phone numbers (before there were mobile phones, everyone did it) is not only a good exercise but also useful because you never know when we may be left without a phone and we will need to make a call.
Rest is good for memory
Sleeping well is necessary for anything. To begin with, to keep us alive, but it is also essential if we want to have a healthy brain and train our memory because during sleep, the brain is dedicated to processing, discarding, and archiving what we have experienced and studied, so that information is better retained if, after studying, we sleep for the necessary hours (minimum 7).
Reading: one of the best workouts
Reading really puts the brain to work. There are areas that are simply there to fulfill that function and others that are activated when reading and, therefore, are also exercised. Reading also expands our potential and fills our brain with new images and knowledge that will later be transformed into new neural connections. But it is not just about reading without more if what we want is to improve our abilities and memory, but we must strive to exercise speed and comprehension. When we have read a number of lines (which we will gradually increase), we must stop and ask ourselves: "What have I read?" When we make a mental summary in our own words, it will stick more in our memory and we can exercise it by also asking ourselves "What did I read yesterday? What was the book of the previous month about and which part did I like the most?" This training with reading is going to help us a lot when we are in the exam season and we have to cover a lot of material. After a few months of practicing the exercises and reading regularly, we will notice a big difference in our abilities.
Do you like languages?
If we want to test our abilities, nothing better than learning a language. It is like presenting our neurons with an Olympiad. Not only is it going to make us "step out of our comfort zone" in all aspects, but it is also going to force us to go full speed in our memory. New words, new pronunciation, new ways of writing, and even new gestures. Studying a new language is undoubtedly useful for our brain, but also for our future. Especially if we choose a rare language that helps us stand out from the competition because maybe there are many people who have chosen the same career as us, but how many of them speak Spanish, English, and Finnish (for example)? Training our brain and improving our memory is in our hands and it is fun. What if we try it?
