What are the 12 habits that damage your brain? That you should avoid...
Stephen Hawking...one of the greatest physicists of all time. His whole body was paralyzed except his brain and some cheek muscles, and with the help of his brain only he wrote many books, published many papers, and contributed a lot in the field of science. In short, the brain is the most important part of our body and we should care about it the most. We should invest the most in our brain, the rest parts don't need much investment. So friends, today we will discuss those 12 habits, which damages your brain, and you must try to avoid them. Here we go...
1. High volume can damage your brain
Most people like to listen to music in a high base and especially in the today's world where we are treasured with the different equipments like 'Noise Cancelling earphones', it has become even easier to damage our ears. Most people wear headphones to lower the volume of the outer world, and start hearing music in a high volume, which not only leads to a hearing problem, it also leads our body to 'Alzheimer's Disease' and loss of 'brain tissue'. So the question comes 'should we say no to music'?????.The answer is 'obviously no'.We can listen to music but at an optimum volume. Now the next question comes 'What is that optimum volume'??? HEADPHONESTY... which is a very famous digital magazine. They say that to find the right volume, put the headphones on your shoulders, and listen to music. If you can identify the song, decrease the volume ... Repeat the task again and again until you can't identify the song. Once you are done with it you will get that optimum volume.
2. Inactivity
'Journal of Comparative Neurology' published a study in which it was told that inactivity means 'lazy lifestyle' has a direct relation to 'mental decline', that means those people who don't even do basic activities like walking, cycling, stretching etc are getting more closer to diseases like heart problems, obesity, depression, cancer and memory loss. A lot of books have been published describing the direct relationship between exercise and the brain like 'SPARK' by John Ratey and 'BRAIN RULES' by John Medina, which you can read. We should do physical activities regularly so that our brain releases those hormones which increase our memory and learning capacity. I know you are not lazy...... right?
3. Multitasking
'Earn Miller' who is a neuroscientist in Massachusetts Institutes of Technology and world expert in divided attention says that we can't do multitasking at all. We just shift from one task to another and whenever we do multitasking, our brain is affected. Multitasking increase 'stress hormone CORTISOL', which leads to the creation of 'mental fog' and we find ourself unable to think clearly. So, it's better to perform a single activity at a time, on which Cal Newport had written a very amazing book named 'DEEP WORK' in which he suggests amazing concepts to avoid multitasking. I suggest the same...
4. Over Stimulation
'Glenn Wilson' visiting professor of psychology in Gresham College of London has proved that if we are focusing on a task and we see E-mails and WhatsApp messages in the inbox than our IQ decreases up to 10 points. Overload of information is the main reason for irritation, that's why it is better to organise the information in a better way and pre-decide the content that we are consuming. It increases the chances of improvement of efficiency of our brain. There are a lot of books to overstimulation like 'EAT THAT FROG' by Brian Tracy and 'THE ONE THING' by Gary Keller.
5. Sitting for too long
A paper was published in UCLA in which the author described that if we sit for too long then our brain structure starts changing specially Medial Temporal Lobe, even if we are exercising for too long in sitting position. To avoid this, you can adopt many solutions like to stand up for 10 min after every small duration of time, if your meetings are for a shorter time then prefer to have standing meetings or to walk a little after every 40-50min.
6. Avoid Increased screen time
'Tom Kersting' a psychotherapist and expert in the field of Mental health and Parenting in the digital age says that any activity with a screen like a television, phone, computer, laptop, tablet, video games are included in screen time, affects our brain. Prefer face-to-face meetings in place of video calling. In the study of The University of Michigan, it was found that even after a small face to face conversation of 10 min, our memory and co-operation abilities increases.
7. Sleeping poorly
It has been proved by one after one studies that lack sleeping has a lot of short-term and long term disadvantages like your reaction time get slower, glucose level, mood, headache, hormone inbalances and memory problems. Recent studies have shown that sleep deprivation shrinks our brain. Elon Musk also says that if he doesn't get enough sleep then he feels grumpy. Shawn Stevenson says in his book 'SLEEP SMARTER' that sleep is more important than exercise and diet combined, which means the benefits that we get after a good and sound sleep can't be obtained by hard exercise and heavy diet together. In this book, the author tells 21 methods to get the best sleep which is all research based. So, if you are interested in a good sleep then must read this book. Remember I am not saying to sleep more and more, it is also harmful, I am just saying that have a sound sleep.
8. Covering head while sleep
This point says that when we sleep by covering our face, we breathe a lesser amount of oxygen because we are already taking the recycled air inside the blanket in which the amount of carbon dioxide is more than oxygen. So by doing this, a lesser amount of oxygen reaches our brain. Start sleeping beneficially from today and tell your family members and friends too, share the page, at least for their benefit.
9. Dehydration
Do you know that 70-80% of our brain is made of water only because necessary substances reach our brain with the help of water? So our brain can give its best and the most efficient performance when our water intake is efficient.
10. Smoking
A lot of researches have proved that smoking not only causes cancer, it also lowers the thickness of our cerebral cortex which results in a huge decrease in our thinking ability. If you smoke then on this new year day take a resolution to leave it, to get the best performance of your brain.
11. Avoid too much salt
A study was published in Jama Neurology in which it was proved that in-taking too much salt results in High blood pressure which increases the chances of stroke.
12. Avoid too much food
In 2012 an experiment was performed in neurology in which 6000 participants were taken. Some tests were taken of them. The average age of all the participants was 50 years. After 10 years, they all were re-examined. The results showed that the participants with increased weight had a decrease in their cognitive function means thinking capacity by 22%. So eat as per your requirements.
Here we are done with all the points, if you found them beneficial share the page with your friends and family, and do subscribe the blog you will get more knowledgeable pages. Here is a quick recap of all the points...
1. High volume can damage your brain
2. Inactivity
3. Multitasking
4. Over Stimulation
5. Sitting for too long
6. Avoid Increased screen time
7. Sleeping poorly
8. Covering head while sleep
9. Dehydration
10. Smoking
11. Avoid too much salt
12. Avoid too much food
THANK YOU!!
by Dhruv Mishra
