Contrary to the name, shower thoughts aren't exclusive to showers. From long walks to mowing the lawn, many everyday activities seem to have the right circumstances to allow the brain to have these little aha moments.
But they also happen to be situations where it's difficult to take notes — turns out that mechanical engagement is perfect for free association, but getting a pen and paper can take you out of the experience.
One TikTok user, however, seems to have beaten the system. He goes by the nickname Shower Thoughts Guy and constantly produces videos that allow him to keep this title. Continue scrolling and check out his best one-liners.
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There haven't been a lot of experiments on why we get random insights, but psychology does have one theory that describes a mental state that seems to foment these kinds of thoughts. It's called the default mode network.
"You become less aware of your environment and more aware of your internal thoughts," John Kounios, a psychologist who studies creativity and distraction at Drexel University in Philadelphia, told WIRED.
At the same time, you might make a decision that will take your life... and one day you will.
The common thing in these activities is they are physically or mentally active, but only mildly — they're also familiar or comfortable enough that we stay engaged but not bored, and last long enough to have an uninterrupted stream of thought.
Kounios explained that our brains typically catalog things by their context: Windows are parts of buildings, and the stars belong in the night sky. Ideas will always mingle to some degree, but when we’re focused on a specific task our thinking tends to be linear.
That Satan punishes sinners is an idea conflating Satan and Hades, as is Satan living in hell. If you're coming from a Christian perspective then...no he doesn't on either count, that isn't in the Bible. Satan is evil because he tempts people into doing wicked acts with loaded promises and lies, thus sending their soul to the eternal fire of hell. He doesn't live in hell, he doesn't sit on a throne and punish the wicked. Satan lies and manipulates to send the souls of others there in place of him.
Kounios likes to explain it with a stack of bricks in your backyard. You walk by them every day with hardly a second thought, and if asked you'd describe them as a building material (maybe for that pizza oven you keep meaning to put together). But one day in the shower, you start thinking about your neighbor's walnut tree.
"Those nuts sure look tasty, and they’ve been falling in your yard."
You suddenly realize that you can smash those nuts open using the bricks in your backyard!
As far as Eureka moments go, using a brick as a nutcracker is pretty lame, but as an illustration of how the default mode network frees the things in your brain from external associations, it works wonderfully. As ideas become untethered, they are free to bump up against other ideas they've never had the chance to encounter, increasing the likelihood of a useful connection. And this guy seems to be aware of that!
Oh, thanks for ruining my day. Before now I never had to think about that. :'(
Finally! Someone gave an answer to this. Now I can stop scrolling and go to sleep. Thankyou
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You use the paper and then you use the soap and water
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It raises another question. Does a seeing person look at the toilet paper to know to stop wiping? Can't they feel the difference?
I presume you can see and already know the answer to this.
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My grandma has been blind most of her adult life and she says she is able to tell by the way the toilet paper feels against her skin. And she uses a wet wipe or baby wipe after the toilet paper.
When it is past three wipes that it doesn't feel slippery, and the butt starts to hurt a bit. In case using water and soap is inconvenient, eg public restrooms.
I guess when it doesn't feel slippery anymore. You can kinda feel when your ass is dry.
I remember I was in a book conversation about Borges, a famous argentinian writer who got blind at an old age (he died in the 80's). And one of the participants asked that question out loud: how would he know if he...ehem.. After toilet...ehem...you know... he was... cleaned? Laughs, then awkward silence. Damn. I couldn't think of anything else afterwards.
That's really weird. Borges was such a serious person.
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Bidets…for the blind and those who can see. No one wants to see crap!
My fiance is blind "I feel it through the toilet paper" was his answer
I presume, by *feel*. If they have always been blind then they would sense clingers lol
Um, I'm a seeing person, and I don't look at my used toilet paper. I can tell by the feel. Am I weird for that?
You just know that someone, somewhere out there is at this moment reading that and thinking, "I'm supposed to check?"...
The same way I do. Just by the way it feels. Does this guy mean he looks at the used TP to see if he needs to wipe more??
Unlike barbaric America, it's standard in most countries to have a bidet.
I"m not blind but I know that I don't want to have a sh*tty day...I wipe WELL!
I can see just fine and I rarely look. ????? What is with all these people relying on sight? I rely on feel, if my butt is clean, the toilet paper doesn't slide any more, it's harder to wipe dry paper over dry skin. Plus it's much easier to just open my hand while it's down there anyway to drop the soiled paper into the bowl.
If it doesn't smell and isn't slimy..nose and hands are better receptors than eyes in some situations
They use a bidet or maybe they have someone wipe for them. Common sense not deep thinking often prevails
By how it feels through the paper. Are you really looking every time you wipe?
There's a blind guy on Youtube who answers this question and others like it. Tommy Edison XP.
Here's a blind dude answering that question, I love this guy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xd9DLzmLxFc
Please consider using water next time..it's a lot better,trust me
This is so dumb. We wipe. Then we get more paper and wipe again. Or use a bidet, and wipe. You just wipe extra, you fool.
It's not dumb honestly. Your reply Still doesn't answer the question. How does someone who cannot see wipe extra when they don't know when they're done in the first place? Just use whole roll of tp every time they poop or what?
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By now my brain is questioning my existence and currently im only on the 15th one
Oh yeah. If i never searched up im bored during school, I never would have come across bored panda :)
that would beat the pants off of any fireworks show you could imagine, though
Yep. That's the issue I have with Gremlins. "Never feed them after midnight", but there's no feeding window of time given....since, technically ever minute from 12:01 AM until it turns 12:00 AM again is after midnight.
Note: this post originally had 45 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
If you’re a parent to a young child, you won’t know when the day will happen, but there will be one day which is the last day you will ever pick your child up and hold them in your arms.
As a non-parent, this one freaks me out. When was the last time I was picked up? Why was I picked up? Why wasn't I picked up after that?
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When you're reading you're really just staring at a dead tree and vividly hallucinating. Also the dead tree is tattooed.
If ur reading on a device ur just staring at a bunch of pixels with different colors
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These are great! They remind me of the old SNL sketch "Deep Thoughts" By Jack Handey
my favorite: When I was a kid my favorite relative was Uncle Caveman. After school we'd all go and play in his cave, and every once in a while he would eat one of us. It wasn't until later that I found out Uncle Caveman was a bear. -Jack Handy
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Everyone alive today has a lineage that goes back to the dawn of life on Earth. Someone told me that once, I'm not qualified to say if it makes sense scientifically but makes sense logically.
We are made up of the matter that was part of the life that came before us. We breathe the same air the dinosaurs breathed. Going farther back, we are made from the materials that made our sun. We are star people. Humbling and awesome all at once.
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I’m pretty certain that tiktok needs to go away. At least from bored Panda.
You pass the anniversary of your death every year without knowing it.
Thanks, that was morbid. It's messing with my brain.
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If you decide not to have children, you are first one of your thousands of ancestors to have made that decision, and you will be the absolute end of a lineage of human beings that goes all the way back to the dawn of mankind.
I don't get the one abt Mr & Mrs incredible naming their son Dash before they knew his power
In the Pixar movie "The Incredibles", their son's superpower is speed (dash/dashing). Superpowers manifest when the child is a little older, not when they are born. So they named their kid "Dash" before they knew he could dash (move really fast).
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I often think how many you tube channels, instagrams or facebook profiles were owned by people who are now dead.
:( i was on fb recently and i saw somebody who had my dead uncles fb as friends
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Giving this post a thumbs up! Some of these were quite thought provoking. Great Bored Panda material.
You know your name is just a set of sounds to grab your attention or be referred to
What if nothing existed??? What if just…nothing…existed?!?!?! It makes me panic thinking about it 😰
If nothing existed them you wouldnt be able to panic
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You are a dark wizard, because you are animating a corpse with your mind and forcing it to do your bidding. It hasn't ceased its bodily functions yet but when you relinquish your presence it'll fall deader'n a doornail.
I think it's just a bit of fun, not deep philosophical musings on the nature of reality
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They aren't dumb, some of them are just a little obvious or not too logical.
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If you’re a parent to a young child, you won’t know when the day will happen, but there will be one day which is the last day you will ever pick your child up and hold them in your arms.
As a non-parent, this one freaks me out. When was the last time I was picked up? Why was I picked up? Why wasn't I picked up after that?
Load More Replies... When you're reading you're really just staring at a dead tree and vividly hallucinating. Also the dead tree is tattooed.
If ur reading on a device ur just staring at a bunch of pixels with different colors
Load More Replies... These are great! They remind me of the old SNL sketch "Deep Thoughts" By Jack Handey
my favorite: When I was a kid my favorite relative was Uncle Caveman. After school we'd all go and play in his cave, and every once in a while he would eat one of us. It wasn't until later that I found out Uncle Caveman was a bear. -Jack Handy
Load More Replies... Everyone alive today has a lineage that goes back to the dawn of life on Earth. Someone told me that once, I'm not qualified to say if it makes sense scientifically but makes sense logically.
We are made up of the matter that was part of the life that came before us. We breathe the same air the dinosaurs breathed. Going farther back, we are made from the materials that made our sun. We are star people. Humbling and awesome all at once.
Load More Replies... I’m pretty certain that tiktok needs to go away. At least from bored Panda.
You pass the anniversary of your death every year without knowing it.
Thanks, that was morbid. It's messing with my brain.
Load More Replies... If you decide not to have children, you are first one of your thousands of ancestors to have made that decision, and you will be the absolute end of a lineage of human beings that goes all the way back to the dawn of mankind.
I don't get the one abt Mr & Mrs incredible naming their son Dash before they knew his power
In the Pixar movie "The Incredibles", their son's superpower is speed (dash/dashing). Superpowers manifest when the child is a little older, not when they are born. So they named their kid "Dash" before they knew he could dash (move really fast).
Load More Replies... I often think how many you tube channels, instagrams or facebook profiles were owned by people who are now dead.
:( i was on fb recently and i saw somebody who had my dead uncles fb as friends
Load More Replies... Giving this post a thumbs up! Some of these were quite thought provoking. Great Bored Panda material.
You know your name is just a set of sounds to grab your attention or be referred to
What if nothing existed??? What if just…nothing…existed?!?!?! It makes me panic thinking about it 😰
If nothing existed them you wouldnt be able to panic
Load More Replies... You are a dark wizard, because you are animating a corpse with your mind and forcing it to do your bidding. It hasn't ceased its bodily functions yet but when you relinquish your presence it'll fall deader'n a doornail.
I think it's just a bit of fun, not deep philosophical musings on the nature of reality
Load More Replies... They aren't dumb, some of them are just a little obvious or not too logical.
Load More Replies...