The Power of Blue, and You
You’ve probably heard that blueberries are good for you. But there's more to that purplish-blue color than meets the eye, particularly where you brain is concerned. And we're not just talking high antioxidant levels!
Would you believe that eating this tasty, low-glycemic superfood every day was found by the USDA and Tufts University to slow and even REVERSE age-related brain decline, as well as improve short-term memory loss and help reverse age-related loss of balance?! Blueberries are a truly a Superfood for your brain because they are a top source of antioxidant phytonutrients such as anthocyanins, which support healthy brain function, in addition to providing the anti-aging, anti-cancer & disease-fighting benefits we all could use more of in today's world.
Make it work for you: add 1 to 2 cups of blueberries to your diet each day, and if that's simply not possible for you, drink unsweetened blueberry juice or extract, which you can find in either fresh juices, blends or from concentrate.
Red Apples - keep the brain doctor away?
An apple a day keeps the doctor away, so says conventional wisdom. But could it be that all this time, this common staple known for its iconic place in American history and folklore could do much more for you than just ward off the doctor and make the teacher happy? Amazing recent research in 2005 and 2006 at Cornell University and Agri-Food Canada in Ontario showed that a group of chemicals called phenolics, particularly high in Red Delicious and Northern Spy apples as well as their juices, helps protect the brain from the type of damage that triggers such degenerative brain diseases as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, in addition to reducing the risk of prostate, colon and lung cancer. Wow! Bet you didn't think red apples packed that kind of power...
Make it work for you: what could be easier? Add a couple red apples (we think the Red Delicious variety is a good safe choice) to your diet each day, or how about some high-quality apple juice in the morning, and a red apple in the afternoon? Remember the incredible health benefits, and this one's a NO-BRAINER.
Is Your Brain on Vacation?
It feels good to have a routine, to make your daily ritual...well, just that: a ritual that doesn't require much thinking to get through. Why makes things more challenging when they don't have to be, our convenience and pain-averting selves tell us when it comes to anything we do regularly, right? Here's the problem: just like it's easier to sit on a couch watching tv instead of lifting weights or solving complex math problems, your brain goes into vacation mode...it gets soft. Dangerously soft. What if you could re-awaken those dormant brain cells again in an incredibly easy, fun way, while you're doing what you're already doing, but in new and different ways? Countless studies have shown that our brains are forced to re-awaken those dormant, little-used (but so important!) areas of our brains when we do things that we either haven't done before or don't do often, routinely, as you might expect. It's just like a path in the woods that either gets walked on every day, making the path clear and well-worn, or slowly vanishing due to lack of use. Think of all of the routine tasks you do each day, from brushing your teeth to reaching for something in a dark bathroom because you "know where it is" to driving the same way home each day to even eating the same foods and meals over and over again. Want to get your brain back into shape? Come back from Brain Vacation and start tossing it up! Listen to our BrainCasts to hear some simple, easy and fun ways to do this daily...the results are worth it.