Five types of exercise that’ll help you study better
First published at Hijacked on 30 October 2015.
If you want to improve your studying prowess, don’t throw money at lattes and energy drinks. Instead, do something that’s free: exercise. Besides the physical benefits, exercise can also improve your mental and emotional wellbeing, thus making you a better studier.
Tai chi chuan: slow and steady
Tai chi chuan (or simply tai chi) is not only a martial arts form, but also a meditative, low-impact exercise that reduces stress in the body and mind. Harvard Medical School shows that it improves physical conditioning, as well as relieving some of medical conditions. As for the mind, a study in 2012 showed that doing tai chi three times a week can increase brain size and improve memory. The core philosophy is to never stop moving using slow but effective motions: this teaches you to view concepts holistically and to connect and flow from one idea to another. Plus, the movements make you look graceful and elegant.
Cycling: best incidental exercise
Walking may be a great way to get free incidental exercise, but if you want to get somewhere faster while improving your health, then cycling is your best bet. Compared to running, cycling doesn’t bugger up your joints and instead improves memory, reasoning and planning if done for only 30 minutes a day. It also reduces stress, anxiety and depression because it’s a transport mode that’s filled with less hassle (for example, road rage or peak hour traffic), as well as natural surroundings boosting these benefits. Its incidental nature not only reduces costs, but it also encourages you to combine tasks and activities to be more efficient. By riding to uni, you’re all set once you reach the lecture halls, while other students are still blurry eyed and sipping lattes.
Read the full article at Hijacked.
