Considering the fact that we have to exist in the same vessels for our entire lives, it’s interesting how little most of us actually know about the human body. Why am I always getting hiccups, and how the heck do I eliminate them? Why does my leg fall asleep every time I lay on my side? Even if you hit the gym every day and are in excellent shape, you can likely still benefit from learning more about that complex body you’re in.

So below, we’ve gathered some of the most useful “human body cheat codes” Redditors have shared to help you pandas get the most out of that mysterious body of yours. Keep reading to also find an interview with the curious Redditor who started this conversation, and be sure to upvote the hacks you plan to utilize in your own life!

#1

I have fairly low blood pressure and I often get dizzy if I get up too abruptly. If it happens, clench your abdominal muscles to force blood back upwards and it goes away immediately.

Image credits: Abraneb

To learn more about what inspired this fascinating thread to start in the first place, we reached out to Alex Clark, the Redditor who posed the question, “What’s the best human body cheat code you know?” And he was kind enough to have a chat with us.

“I started this conversation after following AskReddit for a short while,” Alex told Bored Panda. “I wanted to test different ways of sparking a conversation and luckily for me, there were others who were keen to answer my question!”

#2

Drink enough water – keeping hydrated helps so much.

Image credits: Statscollector

#3

Sick with clogged sinuses?

Put your head between your legs while standing for 10 seconds, and then shoot back to a upright position and blow your nose, you’ll be able to breath for a few minutes.

I call it the “Bend and Snot”

Image credits: drflanigan

We were also curious about the best “human body cheat codes” Alex knows. “This seems like an obvious one, but drinking water when you wake up is a must,” he shared. “It’s such a simple ‘hack’, but is an amazing habit to build into your daily routine.”

“Another one, which is kind of cheating as it’s my own comment, but when people are together in a group, look at the direction of people’s feet to see who they are interested in talking to,” Alex added. “It’s not always the case, but it’s a good way of reading body language.”

#4

When you wake up, drink some water. It will help reduce drowsiness.

Image credits: kukukele

#5

If you have a leg cramp – pull back your big toe and it will alleviate the cramp

Image credits: anon

“One of my other favorite hacks is if you have a sneeze that’s on the edge but needs that extra push to get it to go, look into a bright light, which is called the Photic Sneeze Reflex,” Alex went on to note. “What’s interesting is the trait is genetic, so if you have it – one or both of your parents have it too!”

Finally, we asked Alex if he thinks it’s wise for all of us to have some of these hacks up our sleeves. “I think it’s a great idea to learn some cheat codes – we all have the same human body, and it’s incredible that there’s still so much we don’t know about it!” he told Bored Panda.

#6

Take an espresso right before a power nap. The caffeine will kick in about 20 minutes later and make you feel more energised after waking.

Image credits: wanton_noodles

#7

Hiccupping is largely psychosomatic and it can be cured by betting the person hiccupping a fiver he won’t hiccup again. Works 80-90% of the time

Image credits: anon

#8

Push yourself to do something good for yourself even if you dont want to (something like diet or exercise) and stick to it. Doing it once or twice you wont want to do it again because your body is still adapting. But after a while it will become a habit.

I went on a bike ride every day during my summer break and when winter rolled around I started to realise that I relied on that ride as much as eating. I got really jittery if I didn’t ride that day.

Image credits: anon

#9

Having a good sleep schedule (9-5 or 10-6), and going to sleep when you are tired (you have to make yourself tired throughout the day, preferably with a bit of exercise) makes waking up really easy and your mornings will be full of energy

Image credits: untakenu

#10

Stretch every day.

90% of the problems that people get later in life, whether it is muscle related or not, usually stems from muscles being too tight & pulling where/when they should not.

#11

Lift with your legs, not your back.

Image credits: Xygen8

#12

Take fiber before bedtime.

I used to get really nervous when traveling and it upset my stomach. Getting “regular” calmed my body immensely.

#13

Cold showers are a complete body hack

Image credits: DjAdolfChrist

#14

Wake up with sunlight whenever possible. Your body automatically says “Oh! Sun! I should wake up now! It’s morning!”

Image credits: nythnggs4590

#15

If you’re hungry, drink some water, you might not actually be hungry.

Image credits: SWEnglandAddick

#16

Clench your left fist to subdue your gag reflex. Helps me with brushing my tongue and others with other things.

Image credits: Shangiskhan

#17

If you don’t have your glasses and need to read or see something far away, make an “OK” sign with your hand but with the hole made with your thumb and forefinger as small as possible. If you look through the tiny hole, you’ll be able to see much clearer.

#18

Strength training makes you stronger, look better and significantly decreases your risk of certain diseases like heart disease and diabetes

#19

Resetting your sleep schedule — just fast for a few hours before the time you want to go to sleep. You’ll wake up hungry as if it’s morning.

#20

If you enter a room and forget what you have to do, move your eyes sideways, it helps jog your memory.

Image credits: Barack-YoMama

#21

If you wake up with your arm asleep because you were laying on it, the fastest way to make it “wake up” is to stick your arm straight up in the air and let the blood drain back down. Then lay your arm flat and allow blood flow to resume normally.

For people that get stuffy noses- pick a nostril you want to have clear. I tend to prefer my right nostril but it works both ways. Pick the side you want clear and lay on your side so that nostril is on top. Prop your head up on your hand so your head is resting at around a 45 degree angle relative to the surface you are laying on. This should clear the nostril on top pretty quickly. If not, try tilting your head at different angles until it does. This doesn’t always work, but for me it usually does.

Image credits: jonnycrush87

#22

Your legs will move as fast as your arms. If you’re walking and want to speed up, start swinging your arms just a little faster. Your legs will start moving faster without you telling them to. If you’re tired and feel like you can’t go faster, try the arm trick and be amazed.

#23

When people are together in a group, look at the direction of people’s feet to see who they are interested in talking to.

Image credits: Lexxclark

#24

If you have a sneeze that’s on the edge but needs that extra push to get it to go, look into a bright light.

Image credits: mrking944

#25

To beat a hangover – before you goto bed and are still drunk, drink as much water, a B12 Vitamen, and Strawberries.

#26

To quickly stop a nose bleed put something cold at the point where your neck meets your back. Haven’t had a nose bleed last more than 5 minutes since learning that.

#27

Make a habit of always doing some exercise while you’re at something casual. Sorry about my english, but to make an example: You go in through a specific door or hallway, and then you just start doing random jumper jacks in a specific amount. After some time, your brain will turn that into a habit, so that it becomes routine, and it’ll keep you exercised.

#28

Water. Drink water and drink a lot of it.

Thirsty? Drink water.

Hungry? Drink water.

Headache? Drink water.

Tired for no good reason? Drink water.

Trying to lose weight over more than a few hours? Drink water.

#29

If you’re anxious, about the have a panic attack and you feel your heart rate go up splash some ice cold water on your neck, face, and wrists. This will slow your heart rate down a little.

#30

Eating veggies and fruits, and getting a good night’s sleep will give you more energy than you get from caffeine, everyday.

Also, caffeine gives you a boost but if you use it everyday it just gets you back to “normal”, so save the coffee for days you really need a boost.

#31

Don’t use foundations. Use bb and cc creams with high levels of spf and your skin will always look better with and without makeup.

#32

When you are very tired and you feel you could sleep for 10 hours, taking a short nap ( like 20 minutes) might actually help, instead of sleeping for longer. You feel energized enough to keep going if you have something important and immediate to do.

#33

Basically the Keto diet feels like a cheat code to losing weight while eating good food and never feeling hungry.

There’s some sort of anti-cheat measures in the “Keto flu” for the first few days and relatives always shoving cake and ice cream in your face, though.

#34

You can increase the rate at which you learn by having shorter study sessions of the same about of time as before that are broken up by doing something that is stress reliving. Like a 20 minute walk in a park or a coffee break after every 1 hour long study session.

#35

If you work out and maintain a healthy diet, your body will look and feel amazing.

Image credits: cmc

#36

There are two conflicting facts and one thing that most people don’t talk about directly that lead to unsuccessful diets:

1) As many people say, calories in < calories out will make you lose weight, however:

2) Most people don’t feel “full” (aka: lose the food-craving of hunger) because they’ve eaten enough calories, but because they’ve eaten enough volume to fill their stomachs (there’s a bit more to it, but this is basically true).

Some really simple things help to fix this:

1) Eat beans and lentils as a main portion of your diet. They are really filling, really high-protein, and have other good things in them. They are also relatively low-calorie; I’ve eaten so many beans over a week, and still lost weight.

2) Eat slowly and talk during your meal, as in, between bites of food; it takes some time for food to hit your stomach, and everyone knows that feeling of “I shouldn’t have had that much” from time to time. Give your stomach some time to send the “I’m not hungry anymore, please stop sending in food, kthx” signal to the brain.

3) Forget everything you’ve ever been told about “clearing your plate”. No matter what you do, the extra half a meal on your plate is never going to be able to get to the starving kids around the world. Donate to some charities if that’s a thing that you actually want to help solve, but shoving down food that you aren’t hungry for is just going to contribute to weight gain. If there’s enough left for another potential meal when you’re hungry, just wrap it up and save it for leftovers. If there isn’t, just trash it.

4) If you’re over 30, try eating foods you didn’t like again. I have a newfound love for raw spinach since I’ve turned 30, when I hated it as a teen and even into my 20s. Your taste buds change as you age, and you might enjoy healthy foods more than you think.

5) Cut out sodas. This gets said a lot, but it’s true. If your lunch is a turkey club sandwich, a 20 oz bottle of soda is adding 33-50% more calories to that meal. They are a relative *ton* of calories that don’t make you feel more full or quench your thirst at all.

#37

Drink more water. Always.

If you feel at all off, emotionally, drink a large glass of water, whether you’re anxious, angry, or sad. That doesn’t always fix it, but sometimes it does, and if it didn’t, at least you’re a little more hydrated.

When you wake up in the morning, drink a large glass of water before anything else. You will feel more awake, and you may avoid morning constipation.

Image credits: DeathByBamboo

#38

I used to take about 3 Ibuprophen when having a panic attack that lasted more than a couple minutes (they were seriously severe, sometimes lasting hours, and often wound me up in the ER). Ibuprophen relaxes your muscles within about 15 minutes, and once your muscles start to relax, your mind can kind of start to calm down a bit, and you can then gain control. Just be careful to not take more than 4 at the most, or you can cause problems with your liver.

Also, a good way to stop being dizzy, or to cure a mild headache– shut your eyes very tightly, then open them really wide while looking down to your left. Don’t move your whole head, JUST your eyes. Shut them again very tightly, then open again very wide, while looking down to your right. Repeat this again, while looking up to your left. Then again, looking up to your right. Then do this again, while looking up like you’re trying to see your eyebrows. Again, it’s important to keep your head still, and only do this while moving just your eyes. Helps me almost every time.

#39

If you get a brain freeze push your tongue or thumb against the roof of your mouth to get rid of it.

#40

Stolen from Joe rogan podcast, but hanging can alleviate all sorts of upper body aches. As in grab something and hang like your doing monkey bars. I used to always have a slight ache and pain in my left shoulder after any lifting, that day and the days following. Started to hang for 15 second intervals 5 or 6 times post workout and the days after and boom the aches disappeared.

#41

Eat a diet of raw fruits and vegetables, add in grains, no processed/chard meat, then follow it up with a healthy dose of exercise and skip alcohol/smoking anything… all while keeping a very low body fat content and don’t forgot to get plenty of sleep.

You are basically guaranteed +10-15 years to your life bar.

Think of getting to level 50 by just grinding away killing bunnies for +1xp
Source: boredpanda.com