3 Brain Games for Lifelong Health and Learning

Do you remember the pure joy and the curiosity you felt as a kid when you dumped out a bucket of Lego bricks or puzzled over jigsaw pieces and revealed the final picture? What if I told you that tapping into your inner child and engaging in those classic activities isn't just a nostalgic trip down memory lane? It could actually help to Welcome back, Kwik Brains. I am your host and your brain coach, Jim Kwik. Keeping our brains active and engaged as we age is crucial for maintaining cognitive health and mental performance. Finding mentally stimulating activities that you enjoy It could help you boost your memory, your reasoning, your problem-solving abilities. In this episode, we'll explore how activities many of us associate with childhood, like Lego or jigsaw puzzles, can support brain performance across our lifespan. And we'll also look at how engaging in word games, like crosswords, can delay memory loss. So join me as we explore these classic pastimes They aren't just fun, they can also be exercise for your mind. So let's dive in and build some new connections in our brains. Let's start with Legos. This is something that I recently started engaging with more. We have a 1-year-old son, and so I have these Lego blocks here that we are using to help us Stimulate. Remember, your brain grows through novelty and nutrition. So we're playing a lot of Legos. And recently I was gifted the Avengers headquarters. And for those of you who know me, know that I, I love comic books and superheroes. With my traumatic brain injury, I couldn't read as a child, and I taught myself how to read by reading comic books. So I get to play and build this. It's over 5,000 pieces. So it's quite a brain teaser, if you will, or a brain builder, as we're going to talk about. But playing with Legos could actually bring many benefits to our brain health and performance. Developing spatial awareness, right? Visual spatial intelligence. If you're working with others, teamwork, language skills, teaching us also things that can be very important nowadays, like patience, exercising our focus muscles, our creativity. And I'll share with you how this game has evolved into a form of therapy, if you will. And we'll have a closer look at how it can particularly help with developing communication and social skills. There's something called Lego therapy, and I was doing some online research with that and autism. Now, Lego has evolved past simple entertainment and is now also used as a form of therapy for autism. Lego therapy was originally developed by a US psychologist, Daniel Lagoff. After observing 2 of his clients who had shown poor motivation to interact but were playing with Lego in his waiting area, Therapy has grown into a development program for children with communication difficulties and helps to teach social skills like sharing, turn-taking, and making eye contact. LEGO therapy also provides opportunities to practice and improve executive functions like our attention, like our working memory, and self-regulation. The cognitive skills developed through LEGO therapy has the potential to materialize beyond the therapy sessions As individuals practice problem solving, planning, social interaction, they can transfer these skills to other real-life situations and support the development of flexible thinking and adaptive behaviors. And so problem solving, mathematics, we're gonna talk about spatial awareness. On the practical side, building structures with Lego bricks can help to refine your visual spatial skills. We've done whole programs on multiple intelligence theory the different forms of intelligence, not just logical and language and math, but visual-spatial intelligence is something that's very important also as well. Spatial awareness is our ability to understand your body's position in relation to your surroundings. It can help to impact everything from picking up a book to literally navigating your surroundings. Sometimes we're not building that visual-spatial awareness as much because we have an app on our phone to tell us how to get from here to there. But understanding and building Building spatial awareness is needed to understand sentence structure, grammar, geometry, and it can help us arrange numbers in our mind. Mathematical intelligence, which is one of the forms of IQ, if you will, focuses on numerical reasoning, logical thinking, problem-solving skills. And this skill encourages rational thinking and enables us to take a step-by-step approach to what? To solve problems, a very useful skill set to have today. It allows us to interpret information critically, more analytically, to decipher everyday details, and has also been linked to learning new languages. So the ability to follow instructions, to decipher the order, understanding quantity, symmetry, patterns, location— we're talking about Legos, like the location of the Lego bricks— helps people to develop Potentially their mathematical skills and their spatial awareness, teaches how to problem solve, to see what fits together and come up even with new ideas. Now, speaking of making things fit together, something that our family has been more engaged with more recently are jigsaw puzzles. Now, I happen to have a jigsaw puzzle here. This is a A gift from a client. If you're listening to us, like many people are on Spotify or iTunes, I'm holding up a box of— for a puzzle, jigsaw puzzle, and it has Spider-Man on it. And the theme of superheroes. And there's a quote on this jigsaw puzzle that says responsibility in big letters. And it says, with great power comes great responsibility. And many of you know the story that I tell. The quick of it is Kwik, quote unquote. The quick of it is I remember when I got to take Stan Lee, the co-creator of many of my favorite superheroes, out for dinner, and we're in the car, and he helped me on my learning journey without even knowing it. It's interesting that if you, you know, write a book, which he has his name on, what, a billion comic books or more, you never know whose lives you're, you're affecting. So to you— I'm Aspiring writers out there, if you feel like there's a book inside of you that hasn't been done before, please, please write it. I will enjoy reading it. I'm an avid reader, as many of you know.

I think reading—

talk about brain exercise— is one of the most important things. Reading is to your mind what exercise is to your body. But when we're— I'm in the car with Stan Lee, I asked him this question. I was like, Stan, you've created so many superheroes, so many of my favorites. Who's your favorite? And he looks at me and he says, Jim, my favorite is Iron Man. And he says, Jim, who's your favorite? And he had this Spider-Man tie. If you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, I posted this, a tie with Spider-Man on it. So I say Spider-Man, and without a pause, in his iconic voice, he goes, with great power comes great responsibility, right? The quote that's on this jigsaw puzzle. And maybe because I hit my head one too many times, I sometimes reverse things when I read it or when I hear it. And I heard something different. I was like, You're right, Stan. With great power comes great responsibility. And the opposite is also true. With great responsibility comes great power. With great responsibility comes great power. When we take responsibility for something, we have great power to what? To make things better. And I think it's so important, tying it into brain exercise, to take responsibility for your brain. Your brain is like a muscle. It's use it or what? It's use it or lose it. But if you put your arm in a sling or a cast for a year, would it grow stronger?

No.

Would even stay the same? No, it would atrophy. That's why it's so important to exercise our mind so we don't lose that strength, that mental endurance, the power that you have between your ears. And so exercise it continuously. So whether it's Legos or it's reading, in this case, I'm talking about puzzles, right? And so doing puzzles potentially has a protective factor to cognitive aging. As we age, maintaining a healthy and active lifestyle becomes increasingly important. Engaging in activities that stimulate the mind and promote mental well-being is especially crucial for older individuals. You know, this is something I'm thinking about being in, in my 50s. One activity that has gained recognition for its cognitive and its emotional benefits is the humble jigsaw puzzle.

Are you a high achiever constantly seeking that next level of success? Welcome to the Kwik Success program. It's a deep dive and support system to master your life and scale to new heights in personal and professional achievement. Included is our exclusive monthly book club where we process transformative ideas from amazing books to level up your learning and your life. We also bring the author to the club to answer your burning questions. You could also participate in monthly live coaching calls with me where your questions meet my decades of expertise. Simply go to kwiksuccess.com. That's kwiksuccess.com and choose the plan that works best for you.

Assembling a puzzle, it feels like a mental workout, right? That stimulates both sides of your brain, the left, and I'm kind of grossly simplifying this more, logical side and the right, more whole-picture creative side. And at the same time, it allows us to manage our stress. It helps to relax our minds and enter a state similar to almost meditation. Working on a puzzle reinforces connections between brain cells, increases the generation of new relationships, and improves mental speed and thought processes. It is especially good for improving short-term memory. So here are some of the brain functions that get activated during puzzle assembly, let's call it. You have visual perception, recognizing objects and patterns, which is so important. A lot of genius is pattern recognition and seeing those patterns and how things fit together. Mental rotation. Think about it, mentally rotating pieces. Like their orientation to fit them to other pieces. Also cognitive speed, and who doesn't want that? Visual scanning, sorting puzzle pieces. You're sorting through all of these random pieces and you're kind of scanning it, right? And information processing in our minds. You have cognitive flexibility, the process of switching attention between different strategies and between different puzzle pieces You have perceptual reasoning, developing strategies and plans on how to solve a problem, long and episodic memory, keeping the association between spatial location and visual patterns of puzzle pieces. And again, there's a social intelligence for this, just like there are with Legos, if you're doing it with somebody. So you have that social interaction, you're, you're doing some team building, maybe some exercising some management or leadership. Kind of processes also as well. And then the third activity I'll just offer you are something that I enjoy, crossword puzzles. And there's a study done at Columbia University where researchers found that almost 1 in 10 older adults ages 65 and older have memory decline, while another 22% have mild cognitive Now, this is something I'm very passionate about. Many of you know that I lost my grandmother when I was 7 years old to Alzheimer's, and, you know, it may put me on a track and informed what I do today, because sometimes, you know, what you go through kind of touches not only your head but your heart. So your mind is central to your identity. The sharpness of your thinking, your ability to communicate and connect with others, And the memories you've collected throughout your life, they all have value. And as you get older, you may notice changes in some of your thinking skills and experience gradual loss in abilities such as learning or remembering, our ability to pay attention, reasoning. And for some people, a small amount of cognitive decline occurs with age, and this is a normal occurrence. But keep in mind that typical forgetfulness is not the same as cognitive decline. So you want to be able to just Look and observe yourself. I don't want you to get stressed over this. Obviously, talk to your healthcare practitioner. There are institutions that do full brain scans, like our friends at the Amen Clinics. We've had Dr. Daniel Amen on our stages. We do an annual Brainpower Conference. I hope you'll join us later this year for, for it. And he's been on our podcast. But participation in cognitively stimulating leisure activities is what really the through line is. Something like Legos or puzzles or crossword, they have been found to delay onset of memory decline, possibly due to its effect on improving cognitive reserve. It is the process of learning new information that is most important for the brain. And when we do something like a crossword puzzle, it's a test of memory. You're retrieving information.

Right?

That's retrieval practice, as we do, as we teach in our study program for our students. So it's a test of memory, knowledge, language, verbal ability. So here are some of the ways that crosswords can help you activate your brain. First, doing crossword puzzles is difficult, right, for many of us, and performing moderately difficult cognitive tasks is helpful in cognitive performance and your overall, your brain health. You always want to challenge your brain. Your brain's like a muscle. It's use it or what? It's use it or lose it. Secondly, crossword puzzles will engage multiple brain regions in the search for the right word, and the clues often force you to link concepts maybe you haven't connected or pictured together before. This means that large areas of your cortex will be active and stimulate new connections in your brain. Part of your brain that we talk about a lot in this podcast called the hippocampus, whereas really function is memory, will then remember those new connections, strengthening both your hippocampus and your cortex. Lastly, I'll say that crossword puzzles can potentially also, because they're a social activity, gives you connection, which is so very important. Remember, it's not just your biological network, or your neurological networks, it's your social networks. And just like doing this with Legos or making puzzles, the person with the pen in their hand can read out clues for other people to get involved and everyone to guess. So you can, you know, focus on emotional learning and social learning. And so the quick summary of this is this: activities like Lego, jigsaw puzzles, and crosswords are just the beginning, and they could stimulate your brain And your cognitive abilities, they can have tremendous benefits as we age, as we grow older, at every age and stage, not just for children. And not only can they help delay the onset potentially of memory decline, but they can also promote cognitive flexibility. It could promote problem-solving skills, improve your focus, your concentration. They also give us much-needed social connections with others that can boost our overall mental well-being. It can reduce stress where you're detaching, you're disconnecting from the world to reconnect with yourself. Simple ways like working on a puzzle together improve your mood and decrease loneliness and isolation and give more purpose and more meaning to our days. You don't have to spend 8 hours doing these things, but it's a nice little, little break from your work, from your school, from the areas that are creating more frustration and stress. So the next time you're looking for a fun activity to do, either alone or with others, consider picking up some Lego, doing a jigsaw puzzle, or cracking open the crossword section in your newspaper. Or tell me, what's your favorite way of activating your brain? Put that in the comments, post it on social media, take a screenshot wherever you are consuming this right now. Tag me and share the thing, the hobby that you have, because I think we all need a hobby to rest and relax. We also need a hobby to challenge ourselves and challenge our brain and the overall being that makes your brain want to thank you. So thank you so much for joining us for this episode. I'm your brain coach, Jim Kwik. Make sure you like and subscribe. Leave a review because your stories matter. They can inspire somebody else to do something. To truly be more limitless.