Hot Mind Hacks Posts

How To: Access Someone's Thoughts Using Only Their Eye Movements

Look away from this screen and try to remember the sound of your childhood hero's voice. Did you do it? Do it again, and this time pay attention to your eyes.

How To: Fall in Love by Looking a Stranger in the Eyes

Eye contact is key in conversations, job interviews, and honesty, and it can help you access others' thoughts and spot heavy drinkers. Locking eyes with someone can even help you fall in love, whether you know them or not.

How To: 10 Reasons Why It's Better to Be a Jerk

Nice people finish first—or is it last? Though you may have been told throughout your life that being kind pays off, there are some obvious advantages to getting mean. So whether you're driving towards a goal at work, or need to attack a task in your personal life, acting like a jerk just might help you get what you want.

How To: Eat Like a Martial Arts Master and Increase Your Willpower

Deep in the crevasses of the Songshan mountain range, an Indian dhyana master established the first Shaolin Monastery in 477 AD, seeking to spread the relatively new teachings of Buddha at the time. This monastery then bred the Shaolin monks, who are now popular for their incredible feats with Chinese martial arts, particularly with Shaolin Kung Fu.

How To: Implant False Memories into Other People's Heads (& Why You Should)

Your brain holds a lot of precious information and is capable of great feats. However, there's one quality that doesn't lie among its strengths—memory security. Yes, that's right, your brain can be hacked, and it doesn't take a psychologist to do it. Anyone with the right know-how can change your memories for their own personal benefit, and you can do so to others, too.

How To: 8 Reasons Why You Should Be Playing Even More Video Games

Although your friends might roll their eyes every time you talk about playing Clash of Clans, Call of Duty, or Candy Crush Saga, your excessive gaming habits might actually be making you healthier than everyone else.

How To: 8 Terrible Consequences of Suppressing Your Thoughts & How to Avoid Them

Suppressing your thoughts and feelings might unintentionally be your go-to coping mechanism, but as it turns out, suppressive behavior may have some tragically ironic consequences. Numerous psychological studies have shown the dangers of thought suppression, and in this guide, I'll show you a more healthy alternative for dealing with your demons.

How To: Use Hand Gestures When You Talk to Appear Smarter Than You Really Are

Like most people, you probably use hand gestures when you talk, whether you wave your hands excitedly when discussing the latest episode of Game of Thrones or smack the back of your hand as you rattle off points during an argument. As your speech teacher probably told you, gesturing while talking is a great reinforcement tool—when used appropriately, of course.

How To: Trick Your Brain into Not Feeling Any Pain

Pain is, for the most part, unavoidable when you stub your toe, break your arm, or cut your finger open. It's instantaneous and, in some cases, long-lasting, but it only feels as bad as you want it to. Yes, that's right—that pain is all in your head.

How To: Hate Math? These Mental Tricks Will Have You Multiplying Faster Than Einstein Ever Could!

2 + 2 = 4. That's about as much math as I can handle without a calculator on a daily basis. I literally hate doing math more than anything in life, mostly because I'm not good at it—and I hate doing things I'm not good at.

How To: Turn Your Gag Reflex Off with Pressure Points

The gag reflex: it can interfere while in the dentist's chair, upon seeing another person throw up, or even just getting a whiff of a disgusting, stomach-twisting scent. Every time this reflex kicks in, it stops us immediately, inducing a choking, gagging, coughing fit.

How To: Disarm a Manipulative Sociopath

There are a lot of manipulative people out there, but you don't have to let all of them push you around. It's time for the tables to turn.

Silence Is Golden: Why Keeping Quiet at Work Is Actually a Good Thing

Unless you're someone who's terrified of social situations, chances are you love to talk. But no matter how much you want to share you life story or take over the conversation, you shouldn't. Your socially awkward coworkers that keep their mouth shut might actually have a leg up on you at work, and here's why.

How To: Change Your Sleeping Position to Control the Type of Dreams You Have

If you're someone who frequently awakes in the middle of the night trembling in terror, you might want to consider swapping sides. According to research done at Yüzüncü Yil University, those who sleep on their left side experience more nightmares than those who sleep on their right.

Gaslighting 101: How to Turn People's Own Thoughts Against Them

This is evil and it destroys people. Let's just get that out of the way. Nonetheless, suppose you need to make someone distrust their own memory and perception of reality. Suppose you want someone to believe in you more than they believe in themselves.

How To: Woke Up Before Your Alarm? Stay Awake, Don't Go Back to Sleep

There's nothing more jarring than the sound of your morning alarm. Even hearing it on others' phones, hours after your own abrupt wakeup, can cause you to flinch in fear. Though we depend on that shrill sound to get up each morning, it's actually better to wake up naturally—so don't even think about hitting that snooze button.

Sleep Hacks: 10 Ways to Take Back Control Over Your Sleeping Habits

Climbing into bed and shutting your eyes each night is heavenly—but waking up the next morning isn't. We all hate dragging ourselves out of the comfort of sleep and into the groggy, exhausting work day. Yet starting your day doesn't have to be awful if you know how to hack your sleep cycles and get the most out of your shut-eye.

How To: 5 Things Cold Baths & Showers Can Do for You That Hot Ones Can’t

If you're anything like me, your day doesn't start until you've sloughed away your grogginess with a scalding hot shower. That perfectly-heated water can clear stuffed sinuses, relax the muscles, and make pretty much anyone feel squeaky clean. However, a cold shower can do even more for you if you can stand the low temperatures.

How To: Fake Smiles Are Bad for You & Here’s Why

Can you tell when someone is shooting you a fake smile? Even though fake smiles are easy enough to see through, we all still do it, attempting to show others just how happy we are when we're really feeling less than fantastic. Unfortunately, every smile we fake makes us a tiny bit more miserable.

How To: 10 Surefire Ways to Spot a Liar (And Tell Better Lies Yourself)

Seeing that you probably can't go ten minutes without lying (according to this study), you're probably interested in becoming a better liar. The best way to do so is to learn what makes a bad liar, and then do the opposite.

How To: Speed Read Your Way Through Anything with the Right Font

Hate slogging through pages and pages of weighty books and lengthy work documents? You may not be able to depend on speed-reading apps, but with the right font, you can increase the number of words you scan each second, speeding up your reading pace exponentially.

How To: Blowing on Your Thumb Can Calm Down Stress on the Spot

If you're feeling stressed, there are many home remedies you could use for relief. Meditation, yoga, acupressure, an ear massage, more sleep, shower soothers, playing video games… the list is endless. But a lot of these methods require a significant amount of time, so what do you do when you need immediate stress relief?

How To: Why Keeping Good News to Yourself Is a Good Thing

Can't stand seeing your Facebook news feed full of peoples' good news and awesome accomplishments? Those oversharing friends are, in a sense, hampering their great news simply by sharing it. If you hold back and keep your accomplishments from friends, you might find even more success than if you'd shared with your support network.

How to Beat a Telemarketer: 8 Surefire Ways to Keep Them from Calling You Back

Telemarketers can be as terrifying as a villain from a horror film. Your phone rings with an unknown 800 number, and you immediately fill with a sense of dread. There's no way to get them to stop calling; you imagine the number appearing on your phone at all hours of the day and night, haunting you.

Expert Advice: Four Ways Doctors Keep Themselves Healthy

Staying healthy is a progressive challenge we all face throughout our lives, and figuring out just how to do that can be a challenge when it's not your job. For doctors, however, it is. Here's how they keep themselves healthy day to day.

How To: Get Along with Coworkers Without Saying a Word

Sooner or later, you're going to come across a person at work that you don't like—or someone that doesn't like you. This can result in uncomfortable tension, insulting gossip, and a disrespectful attitude, to name just a few of the negatives. But it doesn't have to be that way. The next time you're having a workplace conflict with a particularly challenging coworker, the best thing you can do is keep your mouth shut, and here's how to do it.

How To: Ace Every Essay Assignment with Less Substance, More Fluff

Essay writing is the bane of most students' educational existence. Whether you're a college student tired of slaving away over 30-plus page research papers or a high school student just trying to get through AP Language, chances are you'd love to find a way to cut down on all the writing. Before you spend hours googling facts and figures to cram into your next paper, work smarter by cutting down on content.

How To: Spot a Liar Through Text Messages

While text messaging has become one of the most frequent ways we communicate with our friends, the missing body language, tone of voice, and eye contact can make it difficult to tell when someone is being dishonest. That said, it's not impossible. There are a number of subtle hints you can train yourself to recognize that will to help you detect written lies hiding in your SMS and iMessages. Here's what you should look out for.

How To: Earn Someone's Trust Without Ever Saying a Word

There's more to earning someone's trust than simply shaking their hand, especially if you're not particularly trustworthy. Your body language doesn't reveal your thoughts, it reveals your intentions, and sometimes intentions are better left unrevealed. Psychopaths, take note...

Body Language 101: How to Hold Your Beer & Body to Look & Feel More Confident

Walking into a bar or crowded dinner party can be intimidating. Being surrounded by a bunch of people you're unfamiliar with or trying to impress the smokeshow at the bar is no easy task...for most of us.

How To: Cheering Sad Friends Up Might Not Be the Best Way to Help

Contrary to popular belief, taking someone's mind off their sadness and telling them to "cheer up" doesn't do much good. Misery loves company, and while it may be a tiresome cliché, there's actually some science behind it.

How To: Get People to Trust You with Their Secrets

Prying into people's lives without them putting up their guard can be difficult, unless you can convince them that you already know them very well. Most people don't have many friends they can be honest with, and this can be exploited. Once they're convinced you already know their secrets, they'll start to fill you in on the little details.

How To: Prevent the Harmful Effects of Working in a Windowless Cubicle

Sitting in a cubicle and never seeing sunlight during the workday is unpleasant to even think about—and sitting in a flourescent-light cube can have terrible effects on both our work performance and overall attitude. Yet there are ways to counteract the effects of cubicle sitting, even if you can't sit in a sunny office or work from home.

How To: Fall Asleep in Less Than 1 Minute

It can be pretty tough to fall asleep when your brain is thinking nonstop or anxiety has gotten the best of you, and it seems to only get harder when you're lying in bed listening to yourself breathe. Yet paying attention to that breathing may be exactly what you need in order to find a calm, easy entry into a good night's rest.

How To: Spot a Heavy Drinker with Eye Contact

Did you know that your face shows others how much alcohol you drink? Whether you've never had a sip of booze with those around you or you're known as the party animal of the group, the genes that shape your appearance also show others just how much you enjoy liquor. Pinpointing the big drinker in any setting is easy to determine: you just need to make eye contact.

How To: 8 Reasons Why Getting Off Your Ass at Work Is So Important

If you've read any health news in the past year or so, you've probably been bombarded with headlines announcing that frequent sitters face certain death, even when you're just relaxing and watching TV at home.

How To: Win Over Your Coworkers During Meetings with These Mind Hacks

Instead of suffering through long, dull meetings with your supervisors and coworkers, you can turn those office table sessions into your very own psychological experiment.

How To: 5 Reasons You Should Stop Sleeping In

Are you someone who always struggles to wake up in the morning, no matter how much you've slept? For most, the thought of getting out of bed any earlier sounds horrific. Yet dragging yourself out of bed and towards the coffee maker a few hours earlier each day can have benefits you've never realized. Here are six reasons that make a compelling case for ending our bad habit of sleeping a little too long.

How To: Make People Like You (Even if They Hate You)

Someone does't really like you. I don't know who or where they are, but they exist. If you want to change that, simply ask them to do you a favor.

How To: Why You Shouldn't Stretch to Warm Up for Exercise or Sports

If you're like most people, you've stretched before a workout or playing sports. Doing so should help you get your muscles ready to work. While stretching is good for your muscles, you're wasting your time if it's the first thing you do. I talked to Dr. Brian Parr, professor at the Dept. of Exercise and Sports Science at the University of South Carolina Aiken, who explained this misconception and what you can do about it: