5 Ways Puzzles Improve Your Mind

Puzzles and brain games can be fun to do, but can they actually enhance the way your brain functions? The answer is — emphatically — yes. Doing puzzles can improve your memory, reasoning, motor skills and ability to visualize things in three-dimensional space. Moreover, in addition to sharpening the way your mind works now, puzzles can help ward off the mental decline that can come with age.

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Over the course of your life, your brain never ceases to change, both structurally and in the way it operates. These changes are spurred by life experiences. Brain scientists use the term plasticity to describe this process. By learning more, and experiencing more, we form greater numbers of circuits within the brain. With this increase in functional power, we become smarter, faster and more astute.

Having fun with puzzles can help you to hone these 5 areas.

1. Enhance Motor Skills

Improving and learning motor skills is a great way to enhance eye-brain-hand coordination. As you age, you may lose flexibility and muscle strength, which can make you more susceptible to injuries from falling. In addition to protecting against falls, improving motor skills and maintaining coordination may increase longevity.

Next: It's time to get coordinated. >>