Illusions Improve Our Health
What would we be without illusions? Illusions are desires associated with a hope of materialization. In this sense, recent research has shown how illusions markedly improve our health.
Alvaro Pascual-Leone, professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School, having considered the results of its study, expressed the following: ” Having a vital project , a goal that transcends and brings satisfaction when looking at the realizing is good for the brain and for health in general. ”
It seems that having illusions or a life plan increases cognitive reserve, namely the brain’s ability to cope with challenges to a level where our abilities are really tested. It is closely related to tolerance for change, novelty or uncertainty.
But what kind of illusions are we talking about?
These are aspirations that motivate us to move forward. For one person, the reason for getting up in the morning may be their children or grandchildren, for another the work they do or maybe their faith in a religion …
Illusions are therefore diverse, individual or collective, and can change over time. What is common to all of them is the state of satisfaction that they produce once we have completed them, once we reach them at the cost of our efforts.
People with a clear life plan have greater cognitive reserve and take better care of themselves.
Keys to a Healthy Brain
People with a well-defined life plan who are full of hope seem to have a clearer and healthier mind. So the illusion seems to be this oil that lubricates all of our cognitive processes. They also have fewer cognitive problems in their daily lives and take better care of themselves.
To take advantage of healthy neurons, we need to nurture seven areas of our life:
- Health: how many times we are sick and how we cope with the disease
- Nutrition: a complete and balanced diet helps us to stop the deterioration of the brain
- Sleep: good sleep hygiene, the quality of which is directly linked, for example, to the formation of memories
- Exercises: combination of aerobic and anaerobic exercises. An hour and a half of exercise improves brain function
- Cognitive functions: the way we deal with our problems, whether or not there are attention or memory difficulties, all of this prevents or slows down brain deterioration
- Social relations: the type of social network, the number of friends or any support received are factors that condition cognitive reserve
- Vital project: cherish illusions or goals, find satisfaction in them, look straight ahead and bet on the future.
The magic of illusions
The illusion is the essential dimension of the future. Perhaps not so much its content, as its cover. Thus, we can open our eyes and dream, but knowing that most of our illusions will require, in return, an effort.
Injecting illusion into your project is to revitalize it, it energy, polish it, clean it, have it vaccinated against the enemy of monotony. These are the efforts to be made to achieve the desired objective.
Finally, note that illusions take care of our mental processes (memory, attention, intelligence…).