Stop procrastinating. If this is your default, but you have important things coming up you can’t afford to put off, think about them before you sleep. This will force your brain to act on them mentally and your mind will start the work while you sleep. Mapping out the process in the mental world before doing it in the physical, means your brain’s already done a huge chunk of the task before you’ve even started it.

Learn things easily. The best way to learn and remember something is to try to explain it to someone else. When we try to explain things to others, we tend to simplify the ideas, and it tends to help us concentrate on the most important bits of information you want to retain.

Make your boss go easy on you. If you think you’re gonna get into some deep shit with your boss at the next meeting, sit beside them. It’s very uncomfortable to talk negatively about, and be aggressive towards, someone who’s right in your space. It’s more than likely that they’ll take it easier on you.

Find out if someone is watching you. If you have the feeling that someone is watching you, try yawning. Do this while watching the person you suspect is watching you and see if they do it too. If they yawn too, then you’ve proven that you’ve got a stalker, because yawning is contagious.

Drop some name bombs. If you want to make an impression on someone, be memorable and appear charming, try repeating their name during the conversation. When we hear our names, we pay attention and feel like we’re being acknowledged, personally addressed and really engaged with. Just don’t overdo it. That’s creepy.

Appear friendlier. If you want to appear friendly and confident when meeting someone new, try to make a note of their eye colour. Don’t say anything, of course, but just make an effort to notice. This technique ensures the optimum amount of eye contact, which is a sign of friendliness and confidence.

Keep an eye on peoples glances. When you’re laughing in a group of people, you tend to glance at the person you feel closest to. This can be an easy way to spot office romances and such

Make someone agree with you. If you want someone to agree with you when you ask a question, slightly nod your head while you do it. In psychology, this is called mirroring. It means that people subconsciously do what you do, and are most likely to agree with you, if you’re sending positive affirmation signals aka. nodding.

Get information out of someone. If you want someone to open up to you, ask them a question. If they only give a partial answer, or don’t answer at all, just remain silent and keep eye contact for a while. This will pressure them into talking, because it’s uncomfortable. Just be careful, because this might just piss someone off and start a bigger fight.

Experiment with someone’s vocabulary. This one is just a little fun. When you’re having a conversation with someone, pick out one word they say. Each time they say it, just nod or give some other type of positive reinforcement. Now watch as they use that word all the time.

Tackle your eye contact anxiety. A lot of people find maintaining eye contact a source of discomfort and anxiety. If you find this difficult, try looking the person between the eyes. It doesn’t look that different to the person looking back at you, and it does make you look more confident and friendly.

Mind the feet. Feet are a part of the body that we don’t really pay attention to, but say a lot about how a person is feeling. If you approach someone and they turn their body, but not their feet, it’s a bad sign. It means that the’d prefer to be left alone. If you’re talking to them and their feet are pointing away from you, then they want to flee. If they move their feet and completely face you, then they’re engaged in the conversation.

Manage your worries before an event. If you tend to feel anxious or nervous before an event, chew some gum instead of biting your nails or having a smoke. Our brains are wired to believe we’re safe whenever we’re eating.

Fake a smile to feel better. If you’re feeling down, you can trick your brain into good mood by faking a smile. The feedback from the smile affects the brain the way a real smile would, and you’ll start to feel it.

Listen to classical music while you study. According to studies, music is a neat trick to help people focus and retain information while studying. But the genre makes a difference. They found that rap, hip hop and rock negatively affect concentration, while classical and instrumental work best. This is because lyrics and vocals tend to be distracting.

Learn wiser. If you have a lot of information you need to learn, try learning it in chunks of relevant information, rather than retaining it all at once. This is a combo of two psychological processes called ‘interleaving’ and ‘chunking.’ Essentially, if you strive to learn bits and pieces at a time that are contextually relevant, then it’s easier to remember and learn the rest of it.

Alleviate your motion sickness. In case you don’t know why this happens, it’s because your body tells your brain that you’re moving, while your eyes are looking at something that’s still, so your eyes tell your brain you’re stationary. This conflict leads to motion sickness. If you have a tendency to get this, look out the window and reset your brain.

Get rid of an annoying ear worm. At one point or another, we’ve had an annoying song stuck in our heads that won’t go away. The trick is to ask your brain to think about the ending of it. This is called the “Seigarnick effect” – that human remember uncompleted or interrupted tasks better than completed ones.

Asking for favors. According to something called the “Ben Franklin Effect,” our minds have a struggle to maintain consistency between our actions and our perceptions; sometimes they don’t match up. By asking someone to do a small favour for you, they trick themselves into thinking they like you.

Move through a large crowd. When you’re walking down a busy street or in a crowd, keep your eyes locked on the direction you’re walking towards. People tend to watch other people’s eyes in crowded areas, in order to see which direction they’re going.

Win at Rock, Paper, Scissors. An easy way to win at the game is to ask someone a question just before the game starts. If you drop a question then immediately proceed to say “Rock, Paper, Scissors,” chances are that they’ll throw scissors.

Want the job? Don’t be the middle interviewee. An easy way to make an impression at an interview is to either be one of the first, or one of the last. People have a tendency to remember what happens at the beginning of something, or at at the end, and blur the middle. If you’re the middle interviewee, you’ll be forgotten.

Ask someone for help without asking for it. If you’re carrying something heavy and you want to share the load, start a conversation. Then, just keep talking to them while you hand them the load. The majority of the people will automatically take the stuff from you without comment, or even thinking about it.

Appear wiser. If you want people to take you more seriously, each time to give advice, tell them it’s “what your father taught you.” People tend to trust father figures.

Make it easier to bond with someone. If you want to seem inviting when you meet someone new, make sure your hand is warm and dry when you go in for a handshake. Also, try mimicking their body language, as it builds trust and makes the bond easier.

Drop that annoying habit. The brain is incredibly gullible and will believe anything you tell it. So, if there’s something that triggers you and makes you anxious, and an annoying habit that you have, combine them. For example, if you’ve got social anxiety and you want to stop smoking, tell yourself that the next time you grab a cigarette, you’ll be forced to give a speech to a large and hostile crowd.