UNEXPECTED BRAIN BOOSTERS

(Women's Health) Any athlete will tell you that what you do outside your training is as important as the workout itself. Same goes for memory. Make these tweaks to your daily habits to further fuel your recalls:

Eat
The mind diet, which emphasizes vegetables, berries, nuts, beans whole grains, fish, poultry, olive oil, and wine. It limits red meat, butter, cheese, sweets, and fried foods. Noshing this way may lower your risk for cognitive impairment by up to 35 percent. The lean protein, omega-3s, antioxidants, and fiber can reduce inflammation to help cut your risk of dementia. Berries in particular stimulate blood flow to the brain, aim for two weekly servings.

Smell
Rosemary oil, recent British research discovered the scent of the aromatic herb can help improve long-term memory, possibly by enhancing the activity of chemical messengers in the brain linked to recollection. Place four drops of rosemary essential oil in a diffuser and run it for five minutes every hour throughout the day.

Move
Several hours after learning something new. Vigorous cardio such as biking or running, four hours after learning information heightens recall and activates areas of the brain needed for memory retrieval, according to research. This specific time frame is key: In the study, working out didn't improve memory if it was done right after learning. So if you need to crank out a major work presentation, do it in the morning, then carve out a half-hour to sweat that afternoon.

Read
Hard-copy, old fashioned books. Studies show that users of e-readers are worse at recalling the order in which events occurred in a story compared with paperback fans. Researchers theorize that the physical motion of flicking through the pages with your fingers and sensing the growing pile of pages on the left may support the ability to mentally reconstruct the details of a plot.

Sleep
Shortly after memorizing a new fact. Sleep triggers changes in the brain that make memories more solid, robust, and longer lasting, says Jessica Payne, Ph.D., director of University of Notre Dame's Sleep , Stress, and Memory Lab. Again, timing matters; you want whatever you just learned to be in your mind relatively soon before sleep. For example, if you work on the big presentation at 3 p.m., review your notes just before hitting the sack.

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