Hot Mind Hacks Posts
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: 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: 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: 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: 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: 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: 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: 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: 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.
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: 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: 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: 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.
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: 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: 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: 4 Reasons Why Talking to Yourself Is Anything but Crazy
Admit it: you've been caught muttering to yourself under your breath in very public places. Maybe you've gotten stares while wandering the grocery store talking to yourself out loud. If you're like me, you might even talk yourself through various tasks, giving the atmosphere a little background noise.
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: Reprogram Your Brain to Stop Phantom Phone Vibrations
Phantom phone vibrations. You might feel them in the pocket of your jeans, or when your handbag is on your shoulder—even when you're holding your phone in your hand. When you do, you immediately wake it up to see who texted or what app just had an update—but there are no alerts.
How To: Attention All Neat Freaks—A Messy Desk Can Actually Make You More Productive at Work
When it's time to get down to work, a clean, organized workstation is key to accomplishing tasks and being more productive. Or, so we thought.
How To: Put Down Your Smartphone at Home to Increase Productivity at Work
We all know that opening our work emails at home is a bad habit. Yet reading and responding to emails every time your iPhone dings is worse than you might realize. Not only are you extending the workday, but you are also sacrificing your ability to perform on a daily basis.
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: Spot an Undercover Narcissist
Humans in general are great at keeping things about themselves private, from feelings to personality traits. While smartphones and social networks are making these secrets more open, narcissists have and always will love being out in the open with everyone's attention on them.
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.
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: 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: Pet Peeves Have Benefits? 5 Annoying Things That Are Actually Good to Hate
What's your top pet peeve? Open-mouthed chewing? Nail biting and knuckle cracking? The sound of silverware scraping? Or perhaps it's a bigger behavior, like leaving the toilet seat up?
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: 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 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.
DIY Pain Relief: 7 Weird Ways to Reduce Aches & Soothe Burns
No one ever wants to experience pain, whether it's as small as a stubbed toe or as great as recovering from surgery. Yet so much of our lives causes pain, lasting or brief in its form. With a few mental tricks and unusual home remedies, you can relieve some of the most common aches and ailments that arise painlessly.
How To: Calm Your Fear of Public Speaking for Better Presentations
Sweaty palms, stuttered speech, and terror blackouts: if you're someone who absolutely despises speaking before audiences, you've probably experienced side effects like these. No matter how well prepared we are, or how familiar our audience is, giving a presentation can be an experience more terrifying than death, according to psychologists. Unfortunately, it's impossible to avoid public speeches, but you can make these events less frightening with a few simple hacks.
How To: 10 Ways to Manipulate Irrational People & Get Your Way
It may seem impossible to win an argument against an irrational person, but it turns out the tried-and-true techniques that hostage negotiators use against hostage-takers work surprisingly well in everyday situations. You may not ever deal with a real hostage situation personally, but life is full of negotiations with unreasonable people, and those conversations don't always have to end in rage or disappointment. The mental techniques that professional hostage negotiators use can help both pa...
How To: The 15-Minute Trick to Boosting Your Memory & Being More Productive
From day to day, it can be difficult to remember everything that's required of you. I tend to forget exactly where it is I'm supposed to be during my busiest moments, and it's even easier to delete each day's events out of your brain when there's so much else that dominates your mind. Yet taking the time to remember exactly what it is that happens during each of our days can be a vital part of our memory—and with nothing more than 15 minutes, we can strengthen our brains and remember more tha...
How To: A Sports Psychologist's Guide to the Perfect Workout Playlist
The right music can spur you to pick up the pace during an intense workout, pep you up before you hit the treadmill or walking path, and even encourage you to lift for just a few extra reps. Although we all have our favorite workout playlists, scientists have discovered what it is, exactly, that makes you workout harder when certain songs begin.
How To: Science Says You're Taking Too Many Showers (Are You?)
My morning just doesn't start without a cup of coffee and an incredibly hot shower. There's nothing better than sloughing off sleep with a dose of warm, cleansing water. Except, as scientists are pointing out, our habit of showering daily isn't exactly the healthiest choice. Though it feels great, if you have a shower-a-day habit like I do, you're showering all wrong.
How To: The Scientific Methods for Boosting Your Willpower
Willpower is a pretty significant word. It's the difference between sticking with a clean eating diet and diving face-first into a plate of brownies. It's what drags you out of bed on Monday mornings and into work rather than letting you stay snuggled under the covers asleep. And, most importantly, it's the kick in the butt we all require to both accomplish goals and make changes.
How To: Succeed in Group Settings by Shutting Your Mouth
What type of person are you in group settings? Are you the social butterfly, eager to get to know everyone and interested in the people more than the setting? Or are you a wallflower, afraid to catch anyone's eye out of fear?
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