9 Everyday Things You Didn’t Know You’ve Been Doing Wrong Your Whole Life
When using everyday objects, we don’t tend to use them mindfully. Since we don’t put much thought into it while going about our day, we don’t realize that we’ve been using them wrong all our lives. These things can be as simple as brushing your hair or even drinking orange juice. Let 5-Minute Crafts shine a light on the things we’ve been using incorrectly to help make our lives easier.
1. Sliding a bobby pin into your hair with the bumpy side up
This means you’ve been keeping the wavy part of the bobby pin visible and the flat side under the hair. However, the trick is to do the opposite. You slide the wavy part of the pin into your hair, keeping the flat side visible. This prevents the pin from slipping away and it clings onto your hair nicely.
2. Tearing off the sugar stick from at one end
Tearing the sugar stick from either side will give you less sugar, but a convenient way to pour out the sugar in your beverage is by tearing it apart from the middle.
3. Drinking coffee right after you wake up
Many people make a habit of drinking coffee right after they wake up. However, our stress hormone, cortisol, is at its peak when we wake up. Drinking coffee soon after getting out of bed can increase your cortisol levels, which may cause health problems. That’s why it’s advised to consume coffee when your cortisol levels are low. For instance, if you wake up at 6:30 a.m., you can have your first cup of Joe between 9:30 a.m. and 11:30 a.m.
4. Combing your hair from the top
Brushing your hair from the top promotes hair breakage. Instead, begin a few inches from the ends or at the middle of your strands, then brush down to the ends.
5. Eating your Chinese takeout as it is
You don’t have to deal with the mess of tangled noodles in a box anymore. All you have to do is unfold the box and lay it flat to make it into a plate. This saves you a lot of time and effort not having to look for separate plates or getting a new one.
6. Keeping your laptop on your bed
Using your laptop in bed can be harmful to your health and the device in general. It can block the air vents and cause the laptop to overheat. Hence, the air vents must always be kept uncovered by using laptop desks/stands, cooling pads, connecting your TV to the laptop by using the former as a monitor, and more.
7. Storing the peanut butter right side up
When you store peanut butter in its natural position, it develops a layer of oil on the top, resulting in constant churning and twisting to have an oil-free scoop. Instead, store the item upside down as it distributes the oil content in the jar evenly. You can also refrigerate it upside down to get creamier peanut butter.
8. Stirring a spoon in a cup in a circular manner
Stirring the beverage in a circular motion creates splashes and sloshes, and it also touches the sides of the cup, which is a huge no-no. On the contrary, if you stir it in linear motion, meaning stirring in “6 to 12” or north to south, it ensures that the sugar will dissolve in the beverage faster.
9. Keeping the short end of the bendy straw outside a juice box
Traditionally, we’ve been taught to insert the longer end of the straw into a juice box, with the smaller, bendy part always poking out of it. The trick is to flip your straw upside down so that the smaller bent part of the straw sits at the base. This makes it so we can enjoy every last drop of the juice inside the box.
However, there have been debates about this, claiming that the longer end of the straw has a sharper end to poke a hole in the carton, whereas the smaller end doesn’t. Not having a pointy edge will make it tough to pierce the box, sure. Also, not enough of the straw will necessarily poke out of the box.