Brain Fitness

I’m always into anything that talks about brain fitness. In this day and age where it is so easy to just sit in front of the television and do mindless activities, I think brain fitness is SORELY overlooked by most Americans. I know I want my brain to stay as sharp as possible for as long as possible. I’m a big purveyor of the Flow theory brought forth by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi which basically states that most people are at the happiest when they are completely immersed in an activity that requires their brain to be working at its peak. We can get so used to letting our brains idly go through life, but I think that is the wrong way to go through life. Yes, we all get tired and need to rest, but that does not mean we need to deprive our brains from the “fitness” it needs. So, with that in mind, here are some tips from Pick the Brain:

What can we do to maintain our brain? Focus on four pillars of brain health: ensure frequent physical exercise, eat a balanced diet, learn effective stress management techniques, and get a constant flow of brain exercise. Stress management is important since stress has been shown to actually kill neurons and reduce the rate of creation of new ones. Brain exercises range from low-tech (i.e. meditation, mastering new complex skills…) to high-tech (i.e. using the growing number of brain games)

Back to my brain fitness…

Illini…Football…Basketball…

Even though I am a much bigger Illini basketball fan than football fan, I’d be remiss if I did not mention somewhere here about the Illini football team. For the first time in many years, Illini football is relevant again. Yes, we have been relevant all year long, but our win over Ohio State this past weekend was our biggest win in a long time. I’m just glad to see some excitement in Champaign at Memorial Stadium. It is too bad we had too many mind-boggling losses this year, but we could have easily put together a BCS team this year if we played the way we played in Columbus. I’m hoping we take care of Northwestern this weekend and get a nice New Year’s Day bowl…then we can look forward to next year.

And basketball…yes, this looks to be a down year for Illini basketball, but it could also be very interesting and exciting depending on how well Weber gets this team ready to play. It sounds like we are going to have a lot of players in the mix. I’ve heard as many as 12 players could play every game. Either Weber does not know who the best players are or this is going to provide a lot of competition down the road. I think we are going to have a lot of ups and downs this year, but I’m looking forward to the new blood. This really feels like Weber’s “first” year. These are his recruits (I think) and it his solely his program. Though I expect us to miss the tournament this year, anything is possible. And, Weber has generated a lot of excitement for the program with the big in-state commitments and I think the Jeffrey Jordan thing will bring a lot of attention to our program. We are at point where we can surprise other teams…which certainly wasn’t true just a couple years ago. We will see what happens…

No Impact Man

I’ve enjoyed this blog No Impact Man since I have become more interested in “living green”. Now, I have not taken to the limit that this man has, so I can’t say I’m completely green, but he does make me think. Here is something that he posted recently about getting the message across to people that being green is important to all of us and it IS possible:

So, we can change the message.

For many years, in this country, smoking was trendy. Now it’s not. The message changed. When I was young, people threw their wrappers on the New York streets without a thought. Now people sneer if you drop your trash. The message changed.

Why wouldn’t the same be true of our use of planetary resources? For many years, as a culture, we thought it was great to get more and use more, and that was the message.

People argue that changing course is impossible. You can’t, they say, change human nature. But we don’t have to change human nature.

All we have to do is change the message.