Train Your Brain: Ways to Strengthen Your Mental Health

Given its importance in living a healthy life, it is crucial that the brain should be exercised often and well. Your nervous system, thoughts, memories, movements, emotions, and much more are controlled to a high degree by the brain. However, with time being a scarce resource for many, mental exercises may often take a back seat. While people may focus on physical workouts and financially insure their health with health insurance policies, mental health exercises are often not given high importance in one’s fitness routine. This is quite unfortunate, considering the fact that some brain exercises can help boost your creativity, cognitive function, memory, concentration, and even creativity. The good news is that the ways in which you can train your brain are quite easy, but they require consistency. With that in mind, let’s take a look at some interesting ways you can strengthen your mental health.

1. Practice meditation 

Meditation is an act of focus and attention on a particular object, thought, or activity. As with other skills, meditation, too, is something you can get better at with time and daily practice. One can and should practice meditation to increase mental awareness and flexibility, improve observational skills, and create a healthy, focused perspective toward things. Meditation has also been found to alleviate mental health issues, such as stress, anxiety, and depression.

2. Learn a new musical instrument

Learning a new musical instrument is a challenging task for most. It requires focus, dedication, concentration, and memorising new elements of the instrument on a regular basis. By learning a new instrument consistently, you exercise these aspects and help alleviate your brain health and boost them in other areas as well. Learning a new musical instrument has been linked to reduced chances of cognitive and mental impairment in older adults, as per the International Journal of Alzheimer’s. It may even protect one against neurodegenerative diseases, as well as improve decision-making skills, information-processing and retaining skills, and enhance memory and focus. Did you know? Mental health coverage* is provided by several medical insurance companies in India these days. However, one must know what kind of coverage is available under their plan in regard to mental health treatment, before signing up for a policy proposal form.  

3. Improve your vocabulary 

Gaining knowledge of new words helps in more ways than just allowing you to expand your vocabulary. Research has shown that the areas involved in visual and auditory processing are used and impact positively when one notes down a new word. Adding a new language to your knowledge kitty can also help improve your mental health since it allows you to learn new words, their writing systems, and their pronunciation on a daily basis. Knowing more than one language has also been linked to better cognitive function.

4. Practice mathematics

Whether you like mathematics or hate it, there is no denying that practising mathematics sincerely can help improve multiple brain functions. It enhances your creative and analytical skills, problem-solving skills, visual attention competencies, and so on. A quick tip: You do not have to exercise your mathematical abilities when buying a health insurance plan or estimating its premium! A useful tool called the health insurance premium calculator  can help you get an idea of the premium easily once you enter the information required.

5. Read a book

Reading can be more than just a leisure activity. When you read, your brain is processing symbols into words and those words into meaning. Once your brain has understood the meaning, it then creates visualisations based on the words portrayed in the book. Reading allows your brain to imagine the various elements of the book, such as characters, settings, plot, action, and even how the dialogues may sound in real. Thus, reading helps fortify your brain, reduces stress, slows down mental decline that may occur due to ageing, and so on.

Other aspects that can improve mental health 

A balanced diet and regular physical exercise can have a positive impact not just on one’s physical health but also on mental improvement. Financial health is also something that can affect your mental health. Securing your finances in the right manner is vital to having peace of mind. Investing in health insurance plans for family and not just for oneself can put one’s heart and mind at ease. However, some people may hesitate from opting for financial products such as health insurance due to the cost involved. Some even believe that they would never need a medical insurance plan. The unfortunate reality is that health woes can strike anytime. In the absence of adequate financial backup during such a situation, one may experience stress. Thus, a medical insurance plan may help improve your mental health in more ways than one. What’s more, following a healthy lifestyle such as exercising regularly can lead to better health results. This may help you reap wellness rewards from your individual health insurance plan  as per the features provided under your plan. ^* *Standard T & C Apply. ^#All savings are provided by the insurer as per the IRDAI-approved insurance plan Insurance is the subject matter of solicitation. For more details on benefits, exclusions, limitations, terms, and conditions, please read the sales brochure/policy wording carefully before concluding a sale.