20 Tricks to Boost IQ and Build a Mental Exercise Routine
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Why do people go to the gym? We didn’t evolve with treadmills and barbells, so why should experts recommend exercising every day? The answer would probably be because our daily life doesn’t challenge us enough physically.
I’d like to suggest that our daily life doesn’t challenge us enough mentally. Through setting aside time to visit the mental “gym” and organizing my life to work various mental muscles I’ve found it much easier to think logically, create new ideas and focus myself.
Research indicates brainpower is more than just genes
Science shows that intelligence is both environmental and genetic. Lab rats given more toys to interact ended up much smarter than rats left without any. Even more, studies are now showing that, contrary to an earlier belief, you can grow new neurons if given a stimulating environment.
The benefits of mental fitness
The benefits of physical fitness are obvious and visual. In my opinion, the benefits of mental fitness are even more important, although they might be more subtle. Here’s just a few benefits I’ve noticed from structuring my activities and hitting the mental gym:
- Rapid learning. It’s no secret I barely study for exams. My grade point average for my first year of University was a 4.2 out of a 4.5 (my lowest mark was one B+). And this is while taking courses with high failure rates such as Calculus, Asian History and Computer Science.
- Logical thinking. I’ve been told one of the biggest assets to this blog is my ability to discuss problems with a clear line of logic and reasoning. I believe this is an ability I’ve greatly improved over the last few years through mental training.
- Creativity. This month I wrote about 25 articles for this blog, 15 articles as a freelancer and a handful of guest posts. The volume of posting ideas I get is large enough that I now need to put a more strenuous filter for quality.
- Memory. I’ve gone from almost complete absent mindedness to above average memory. Learning memory tools such as linking and pegging have given me new methods to store information.
- Focus. When I started meditating to improve focus over a year ago, I found it hard to control a visual scene or keep out distracting thoughts. I’ve since noticed huge improvements so that I can hold images, ideas or focal points even with a fair degree of distraction. I’m still starting out, but the future looks promising.
Creating a mental fitness routine
There are two major ways to construct a mental fitness routine:
- Balancing projects/activities to ensure all mental “muscles” are being worked intensely.
- Setting aside time to hit the mental gym with activities solely for the purpose of building brainpower.
I use a combination of the two. Unlike physical exercise which is hard to reach a high intensity in routine life, you can structure your day to ensure you are working mental muscles.
You just need to ensure that you are working all mental muscles, not just one or two. If you go to the gym and just work biceps, you’ll have big arms but be completely weak everywhere else. Varied mental exercises will ensure you can handle all problems and ideas.
Here are twenty ideas for starting a mental fitness routine. I don’t suggest trying to implement them all. Instead either set aside fifteen minutes a day for one of these or integrate one of them into your routine.
- Journaling - Writing down your thoughts is a great tool for problem solving. Every journal session I have, I leave amazed with the answers to tough problems I can come up with. Journaling is your Universal Machine of the mental gym, providing good workouts for creativity, logic and focus.
- Meditation - I’ve only recently started to find serious uses for meditation in my mental regimen. Before I saw meditation as a more spiritual than practical activity. Now I’ve come up with several different meditations to work different mental muscles:
- Visualization - One I’ve been working on I call: eating the white apple. Visualize a white apple and hold it in your mind. Then imagine yourself eating it a bite at a time. Experience all the sensations of touch, taste, sound, smell and sight. The hard part is keeping the mental image of your apple consistent with where and how you eat it. I can usually only go about 10 bites before the mental image degrades.
- Focused Breathing - Start by slowing your breathing to about 10-15 seconds per breath. Next focus on one specific part of your body on the inhale. Select a new focus on the exhale. You can then move this to noticing specific sounds or senses. A good exercise in focus.
- Self-Dialog - Meditation makes it easier to talk with yourself. You can invent characters that can dialog with you, helping explore ideas. I believe journaling is an easier form of introspection than meditation, but they both have their strengths.
- Cycle Hobbies - Take up new activities regularly. This will keep your learning curve steep so your mind is always engaged at a high intensity. I’ve dabbled in painting, dancing, speaking, running, music, woodworking, programming, design and many others.
- Peripheral Activities - Don’t just take new hobbies, take ones that are vastly different from each other. Being a mile wide doesn’t just improve mental fitness, it gives you a broad base of metaphors for creativity.
- Read One Book Per Week - I strive to read one book each week. Sometimes this can be difficult with time constraints, but the benefits are impressive. If you want to save time on this one, learn speed reading.
- Engaging Fiction - Engage yourself in movies, books or television that makes you think. Television that makes you think might sound like an oxymoron, but the medium isn’t all bad if you know where to look. Engaging doesn’t just mean entertaining, but that it actively challenges your assumptions.
- Puzzles - I like to do crosswords and computer game puzzles. Solitary game playing can keep your mind sharp as long as the learning curve is steep and it doesn’t become routine.
- Competitive Games - Games that require strategic thinking are excellent ways to boost your logic and empathizing skills. Chess may be an intellectual favorite, but newer games can hold more promise by being much more diverse, and having a deeper range of strategic options.
- Explore Another’s Perspective - Empathy is a mental, not just an emotional, ability. Exploring another’s perspective hones your ability to think through another’s eyes. Although empathy is often dismissed as being touchy-feely and not logical, the ability to think from another’s perspective is an advanced mental ability that doesn’t develop until we are several years old.
- Create Regularly - I always like to have a project on the go. After finishing my latest e-book, I’ve been itching for a new challenge. I think I’ll be redesigning the entire website in the next month or two.
- Thought Experiments - Einstein was famous for thought experiments. This kind of reasoning ability is a mark of intelligence. Ask yourself, “What if?”
- Break Routines - Try consciously breaking one of your habits, just for a moment. Eat a different breakfast. Take a different route to work. Sleep in the opposite direction.
- New Cultures - Expose yourself to different worldviews. I found going to University and meeting people from vastly different cultures to have a big effect on my own ideas.
- Learn Outside Your Interests - Don’t stick to what you like. As a geek who knows C++ and watches Star Trek, I wasn’t sure whether I’d like dancing. But I took a Latin dancing course and found it to be both fun and interesting. People told me I was an introvert who wouldn’t make a good public speaker. I just finished my Competent Toastmaster and Competent Leader awards from the Toastmasters program.
- Friendly Debate - Discuss, don’t argue. When you are in a debate you should try to persuade, but welcome opposing ideas not as attacks but opportunities. Debating forces you to examine your opinions.
- Teach - When I used to teach First Aid as a lifeguard, I was often surprised at how much better I understood the material through teaching it. Writing articles for this blog organizes those ideas inside my head.
- Practice New Skills - Mastery may be useful, but I don’t think it is as valuable to mental discipline as just getting the basics. Unless a skill is useful to you, I’d suggest trying to learn different skills just to adequacy and then moving to something different. It can take six months to understand 80% of a subject and sixty years to understand 95%.
- Force Constraints - Try washing yourself with your eyes closed. Cooking without sauces. Reading upside down. Extra constraints make problems more challenging, ramping up the mental intensity required.
- Interlink - Holistic learning is about linking ideas together. Spend some time to explore a subject and ask yourself how the pieces fit into other information. This will organize your thinking and improve your understanding.
- Increase Mental Intensity - Force yourself to use your brain more. All these ideas are just specific implementations to increase the mental intensity you face. Focus, strategy, logic and creativity are just a few of the mental muscles you should be exercising more regularly.
Image courtesy of flicrk.
Keep Thy Tool Sharp « Marston’s 365 said,
June 30, 2007 at 8:54 pm
[…] How we keep sharp is as individualized as our DNA. Whatever regime you use, there can always be improvements. In his blog posting 20 Tricks to Boost IQ and Build a Mental Exercise Routine Scott Young shares several (20 to be exact - see, I can deduce that from the title!) tips on how to keep on top of your game. Some of these concepts are quite common sense in that we know to do them. However, the beauty in this posting is that Scott spells it out quickly and simply. A small reminder is always a good thing. The trick to this is to make it a routine. Practice, effort and willingness are all a part of that, but, making it a habit is a lot of work. Scott is very good at helping in that regard as well. […]
Alan Marston said,
June 30, 2007 at 8:57 pm
Scott,
Funny story…I was just blogging about this post, talking about how the brain is a tool that requires preventative maintenance to keep it sharp. Following along your theme. Then, instead of “publish” I hit “Clear Contents.” Sometimes, irony is a wonderfully fun thing. I guess I need more maintenance!
I have become a fast fan of this blog of yours. I am learning more with each posting and look forward to the next!
Boss said,
June 30, 2007 at 9:59 pm
scott,
hey nice article i love getting smarter and challenging my mind. sorry to be blunt; well at first i thought you were a homosexual, but then you said you were a geek so that explains it. unless you’re both? but any ways you write well. but since you told me you are a “geek” i now must take everything you say with a grain of salt. geeeeeeez
much love
Scott Young said,
June 30, 2007 at 10:36 pm
Alan,
Perhaps that’s how I secretly get all my posting ideas. Some cosmic force propels them from the recycling bins of other bloggers and into my head!
Boss,
No I’m definitely straight, although I don’t see how that equates with geek…
Marek said,
July 1, 2007 at 3:30 am
Just one tip from your resident self-improving linguist: read not only books outside your regular interests, read book in other languages. This will not only help you progress in and maintain that language, but also expand you mental horizons culturally.
And if you know only your native language, get out there and start learning another. I guarantee you, learning a new language is one of the most demanding, expanding and rewarding mental excercises in the world.
Scott Young said,
July 1, 2007 at 7:44 am
Marek,
I’ve learned a bit of French, but I’ve always been interested in learning languages besides English.
-Scott
ZHereford said,
July 1, 2007 at 10:11 am
Fascinating post!
Scott how is it that at such a young age you are so savy?
Are you related to Peter, David or Anne Young? You look like you could be.
Eric Blue said,
July 1, 2007 at 12:17 pm
Scott,
Fantastic post and some great tips! Have you ever tried out any of the mental fitness games out there (like MyBrainTrainer — formally ThinkFast).
Scott Young said,
July 1, 2007 at 12:29 pm
ZHereford,
I have an uncle and cousin both named David and a cousin named Peter. I’m afraid I’m not at the top of original surnames, so the chances are slim that I’m related to any other Young you happen to know.
It took me months of blogging before I could even claim the top search engine ranking for my own name!
-Scott
Kali said,
July 1, 2007 at 2:56 pm
Scott,
Great idea about engaging all “muscles” in a novel routine… I plan to register for novel classes like dancing and painting during school semesters at the U of M. Hopefully, this will pull me out of the twister that equates coursework with success by keeping me present-focused. In the meantime, I’ll engage my muscles by checking out speedreading, journaling (which I guess will include thought experiments) more regularly, and exploring interlinking.
Thank-you so much for the novel ideas!
Kali
Boss said,
July 1, 2007 at 5:11 pm
well because you never talk about chicks or parties, even though you’re in COLLEGE
Scott Young said,
July 1, 2007 at 8:43 pm
Boss,
You assume that because I don’t mention aspects of my social life on this blog that they don’t exist. I partied a fair bit in my eight months at residence and my best friend and I pretty much talk exclusively about women.
But I’m not a dating expert and I am still sorting out my beliefs on social aspects of my life so I don’t write articles about those topics.
Plus this isn’t a diary. I only do semi-annual posts that are specifically about myself, so I’ll have to apologize if the site makes me appear particularly narrow.
ZHereford said,
July 2, 2007 at 2:01 pm
Scott, you’re right the surname ‘Young’ is not what you’d call obsure. Sorry about that. The Youngs I mentioned are siblings originally from Windsor, Ontario so you’re probably not related to them.
Recommended Reading 03/07/2007 | Personal Development - Brick Blogging said,
July 2, 2007 at 9:50 pm
[…] One of my favorite personal development bloggers, Scott H Young, has an interesting article called 20 Tricks to Boost IQ and Build a Mental Exercise Routine. I’ve been using many of the tricks he writes about and I can definitely recommend them to you. […]
Christian Jonassen said,
September 26, 2007 at 9:39 pm
You mention that you do memory training, but you do not provide any specific hints for this. I would recommend trying to visualise things, learning systems that translate numbers into images, and so on.
20 Tricks to Boost IQ and Build a Mental Exercise Routine « Natural Health Alternatives said,
November 4, 2007 at 12:13 pm
[…] read more | digg story […]
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January 20, 2008 at 3:25 pm
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mathew said,
February 1, 2008 at 1:29 pm
Learn languages the fun way :
If you are interested in learning Arabic, French, Spanish or English the fun way, be sure to visit http://www.speakitall.com.
Max said,
March 16, 2008 at 11:18 pm
I think the suggestion of learning another language is a great one. It is indeed one of the most challenging and engaging tasks you can undertake, but once you are able to speak even at a basic level, interaction with native speakers will expand your abilities at an amazing rate. Since you know French (given that you seem like an ambitious and intelligent guy), you could probably be pretty confident with spanish or Italian in a matter of weeks. I also just started learning Chinese and it’s a very fun challenge. Given that there are 1.3B Chinese and counting, I figure knowing their language can’t be a bad thing. Great post, actually one of the best I’ve found of this kind. We’ve all heard to do one small thing to get better every day, and you summarize very well some of these things in the realm of bettering our mind. Thanks and keep it up.
Scott Young said,
March 17, 2008 at 5:35 am
Max,
Not sure where you got the idea I can speak French. I took basic French in school, but I’m far from fluency.
-Scott
Max said,
March 18, 2008 at 12:36 am
“I’ve learned a bit of French, but I’ve always been interested in learning languages besides English.”
That’s where I got the idea, I guess I just missed the “a bit” part.
Scott Young said,
March 18, 2008 at 3:46 am
Max,
Perhaps I should have emphasized “a bit” more, as my French vocabulary consists of about ten token sentences and thirty or forty words.
-Scott
Scott H Young » 100 Good Ideas said,
May 28, 2008 at 7:00 am
[…] Exercise your mind. […]