Intellectual wellness means striving toward good mental health, continued intellectual growth, and creativity in life. This can include continued learning, practicing problem solving, improving verbal skills, keeping abreast of social and political issues, and reading books, magazines, and newspapers.
Experts widely consider exercise, good nutrition, relaxation and sleep crucial to healthy living. While these help keep your body running, they also do wonders for your intellectual well-being. Studies show that mental decline is not an inevitable part of life especially when ageing. People who lead intellectually stimulating lives are more likely to be free of dementia conditions like Alzheimer’s disease. There’s some truth in the saying ‘use it or lose it’. It’s a question of keeping your mind in trim to retain your mental abilities. Keeping yourself mentally, as well as physically fit, will make you feel better, improve your brain power and also help you to stay independent for longer.
There are three main routes to an agile intellect
Healthy diet: An healthy diet can benefit the brain and nervous system. Foods high in saturated fats, like cakes, biscuits, pastry or sausages, can speed mental decline. Other foods, like oranges and green leafy vegetables, oily fish or soya, are good for the brain.
Aerobic exercise: Exercise is vital for mental agility. It gets the heart pumping and the circulation going, which increases blood flow, carrying more nutrients and oxygen to the brain. Exercise also helps with depression and anxiety and other forms of emotional distress.
Mental stimulation: The more active your brain is, the better your memory is likely to be. The greater the variety of the ways in which you use your brain, the easier you’ll find remembering.
Read also: Exercise and the role it plays in promoting your personal health
There are lots of ways to do a daily mental work-out in order to stay intellectually healthy
Enjoy a daily puzzle or the crossword
Opt for mental arithmetic rather than use the calculator
Read more, perhaps by joining or starting a book club
Play mind- stretching games, like bingo, bridge, chess or computer games
Stay socially active – join a local choir or gardening club
Take up a new interest – learn to knit or embroider, even gardening is good for the brain
Start a course, day or evening class
Go out more with a friend – enjoy the cinema, theatre, galleries
Continue working or do voluntary work -social contact helps your memory and concentration
Exercise for half an hour at least three times a week
Learning a foreign language or Reading for fun. Working on puzzles such as jigsaws, crosswords. Playing a board or card game.
Benefits of maintaining intellectual health
Improve cognition
Helps you experience a more stimulating life
Development of personal values and opinions.
Improve Open-mindedness.
Help you achieve clearer thinking.
Helps you Improved concentration and memory.
Strategies to improving your intellectual wellness
Test your recall: Make a list (whether it is of grocery items, things to do, or anything else that comes to mind) and memorise it. An hour or so later, see how many items you are able to remember. For the greatest mental stimulation, try and make the items more challenging.
Create word pictures: Visualise the spelling of a word in your head, then try and think of other words that begin (or end) with the same two letters.
Take a different route: Because our minds tend to favor patterns, taking the same route to our usual destinations causes our minds to stop paying attention. Try mixing up your routines in order to allow fresh information to stimulate your mind.
Draw a map from memory: After returning home from visiting a new place, try to draw a map of the area and repeat this exercise each time you visit a new location.
Challenge your taste buds: When eating, try to identify individual ingredients in your meal, including those subtle herbs and spices.
Refine your hand-eye abilities: Take up a new hobby that involves fine motor-skills, such as knitting, drawing, video gaming, assembling a puzzle, and so on.
Learn a new skill: Taking up a new sport or learning a musical instrument. Studies show that learning something new and complex over a period of time is ideal for your mind.
