Five Healthful Brain Exercises

1) Get out of your rut. As we age, we tend to make life easier for ourselves by establishing patterns of behavior. While routines make our lives more comfortable, they exercise only a limited number of brain pathways, and lead to mental understimulation. Therefore, try to change your routines by, for example, taking a different route to work in the morning, eating a different lunch, or going to a different church on occasion to meet different people.

 2) Do things the opposite way. From time to time, perform daily tasks with your opposite hand. If you're right-handed, brush your teeth or drink with your left. Or even try moving the computer mouse with your opposite hand. This gets long-dormant circuits activated in your brain.

3) Learn a new word daily. And then practice using it. That requires some real mental work, and can be a significant challenge for people who haven't learned a new word in years. To get a steady stream of one new word coming into your e-mail inbox each day, sign up at www.merriam-webster.com.

4) Learn another language. This really challenges the brain, giving it a good dynamic workout! You don't have to dive into it all at once, either. You can do it by dribs and drabs by signing up, for example, at www.studyspanish.com.

5) Do puzzles and other games. Try crosswords, Sudoku or a variety of board games. A good website is www.prevention.com/braingames.