This article was originally published on  ARETE schools' web page.

Some fourty years ago, neurologists firmly believed that the brain could not grow in an adult but rather, however slightly, would diminish over the years. they believed that this was a safe conclusion seeing that brain autopsies seemed always to suggest that the brain lost rather than gained in structural diversity and even seemed to shrink to a certain extent.

So when children would overhear their grandparents or even parents quip "I must be getting old" they would take their word for it that old age was coupled with loss of mental faculties - and in fact this would work like a self-fulfilling prophesy, if you firmly believe old age to be synonymous to becoming senile then your body would obey as much as it would if you believed the contrary. But we will leave the subject of autosuggestion and what it can do for you till a later article in this series.

Today we want to show you how working out can increase your intelligence ...