This may seem a little strange, but it’s true. There’s even science to back it up – research has suggested that the brain actually starts to deteriorate if it doesn’t get any exercise, and people who stay active mentally tend to maintain their cognitive abilities as they age better than those who don’t –that’s why it’s super important to work out your brain just as much as you do your body, but that doesn’t mean you have to do sudoku puzzles everyday. Sometimes, all the mental stimulation you need is talking out loud!

All sorts of people are worried about losing their memory or finding themselves unable to think clearly at some stage in life. This could come from holding on tightly to thoughts instead of letting them go. We all do things differently when processing information – some people like to talk everything through while others prefer visualizing what they’re saying. This is partly down to your personality, but it’s also very much related to your brain.

The connections between neurons in the brain are constantly changing and strengthening based on the thoughts you have daily. This means that if you’re thinking about something over and over without sharing it with anyone else or trying to act upon it, then those thoughts are just going to be repeated inside of your head instead of being expanded upon (as someone with OCD – I can confirm it’s an awful pattern to get into). It makes sense when you think about it because no one else will ever know what goes on in your mind so there’s never any need to clarify things or expand upon them – they’ll stay locked away in your memory until you decide what happens next.

However, if you were to talk out loud about the thoughts that making up this moment of silence then you could find yourself helping someone else too. They may have had the same idea as you but didn’t bother to mention it, or perhaps they haven’t considered it at all.

In this way, simply talking out loud about your thoughts can help your brain to grow and develop – explaining something to someone who hasn’t grasped the concept yet will mean that you’ll need a deeper level of understanding in order to do so. It’s an entirely different thought process because people often approach things from a different angle – by vocalizing your train of thought then you’re going to be forced to adapt it slightly in order for other people to understand what you’re saying. Think of therapy, it’s exactly that. You take your thoughts and express them in a safe environment where someone who is trained to deal with difficult situations helps you explore different thought processes to things that are bothering you.

The best thing about expanding on your own thoughts is that they can be about absolutely anything – it doesn’t have to be a big thing. It could be as simple as telling someone a joke that happened to you earlier in the day, or it might be a story from your childhood – anything at all. The key is being vocal about those thoughts because this will force you to think more deeply about them and adjust them so that other people understand what they mean.

One of the reasons why people find themselves feeling confused as they get older is because their brain doesn’t work as well when there isn’t any pressure on it – if someone finds themselves surrounded by silence then they’re going to start thinking about everything over and over again without checking whether there’s been a change in the situation. By focusing on how you talk out loud to other people every day, even about the simplest of things, you’ll be doing your brain a huge favor.

If you feel like you’re forgetting important events in your life or finding it harder to answer questions than other people when in large groups then it’s could be down to you trying to keep hold of every thought in your head without sharing anything with anyone else.

Take some time out on a regular basis just to talk out loud about what happens in your day-to-day life and how these experiences made you feel. You may find that this is all it takes for you to easily recall finer details later on.