New Year’s resolutions aren’t really my Thing. I’m not good at keeping them, especially if they involve exercise or dieting or learning new skills like musical instruments or languages. I’m not disciplined enough to stick with Things I know I should do, but don’t really want to. That’s why I’m trying a new approach this year: my resolution is to improve my brain power.

It’s my kind of resolution because it doesn’t require agonizing morning jogs against my will, giving up my favorite foods in favor of greens and bean curds (seriously, ewww!) or hours of grudging practice just because I spent too much money on a guitar. And boosting my brain power is someThing I really want to do. I tried Lumosity for a while and I really like their games, but I’m not crazy about being tied to a glowing screen for my cranial calisthenics, so I found some real-world, 3-D Things to help out.

Working puzzles are a great way to exercise your gray matter. The classic 15 Puzzle, which I had as a kid, still confounds my mind and gives a great brain workout. Plus, it’s portable so I can play it while I have a few minutes in a waiting room instead of picking up my phone and scrolling through Facebook. Jigsaw puzzles help with visual acuity, pattern recognition and problem-solving. For a little extra pressure, choose a jigsaw of Albert Einstein.

My favorite new puzzle is the Collide-O-Cube. Not only do you have to figure out geometric relationships, you have to figure out which way the magnets in each piece fit together. It’s at least as confounding as its precursor, the Rubik’s cube, if not more so.

So if you feel like giving up all those unrealistic New Year’s resolutions this year, that’s not a bad Thing. Just pick someThing small that you can stick with and make that happen. You can do it!

See you next week,
Bobby