Your body is truly amazing: it gets you to places where you need to be, it’s home to all the memories that shape you, and it’s your only permanent home. And while you may have some cool body tricks up your sleeve—whether you’ve mastered the art of the tongue roll or can flip your eyelids inside out—there are many more weird body tricks sure to amaze you.

The human body is a work in progress. As time went by, we evolved into what we are today. Experts are constantly unlocking new findings about the way our bodies work. These discoveries include some weird body tricks that you probably didn’t know about.

Curious to find out more? Let’s get started!

1. Blow at your thumb to calm down

Feeling nervous? Focusing on your breathing is one way to help calm yourself down. But this isn’t the weird body trick we’re about to share with you. In fact, mindful breathing has gained a lot of popularity in the past few years, so chances are you’ve heard about it before.

But a body trick you most likely didn’t know about is that you can calm down by simply blowing at your thumb. No, this isn’t a scam or a fake fact. There’s actually a link between your thumb and the main cranial nerves inside your body, which are responsible for controlling the blood pulse.

So, use this weird body trick next time you feel nervous. Just blow at your thumb, and you’ll start noticing that your heart rate will slow down, which will result in reduced blood pressure.

2. Keep your ears to the ground to hear someone better

When you’re in a very noisy place, such as at a loud concert, you can reduce the background noise by pressing the tragus inside the ear. Tragus is the small, pointed flap that covers the entrance of the ear canal and is located closest to your face.

Once you have your finger pressed on your tragus, direct your ear toward the person talking to you. This will help you hear them better.

3. Hold your nose to prevent a sneeze

The next weird body trick is great for when you want to prevent a sneeze, such as at a work meeting or a classical music concert.

All you have to do is press the skin around your nose, and you basically send a signal to your brain that there’s something wrong, which prevents your sneezing. When it comes to stimulating a sneeze, you’ve probably heard that looking at some bright light is pretty effective.

However, it’s important to note that you shouldn’t turn to this weird body trick too often. In fact, according to experts, repressing a sneeze could be dangerous to your health. It could lead to middle ear infections, ruptured eardrums, throat damage, damaged blood vessels in the nose, eyes, or eardrums, and even an aneurysm.

4. Grab an ice cube to stop a hiccup

Most of us know that a home remedy for hiccups is holding your breath. There’s no way you haven’t done this at least once in your life. But another weird body trick that actually works involves using an ice cube.

To get rid of your hiccups, grab an ice cube and place it on the back of your neck, right where the top protruding bone is. Simultaneously, place another ice cube two inches below your jaw for about 30 seconds. The hiccups should disappear soon.

Here are some versatile and easy-to-use ice sheets that you may want to always have in your freezer.

5. Ease heartburn by sleeping on your left side

Getting restful sleep when you’re dealing with chronic heartburn isn’t something easy to achieve. In fact, if you fall asleep in the wrong position, the acid slips into the esophagus, resulting in insomnia and agitation.

A weird body trick but a proven method to ease heartburn symptoms is sleeping on your left side. Even doctors recommend doing that, which allows gravity to maintain the stomach’s contents where they belong.

6. The elbow skin feels no pain

Here’s the next weird body trick: pinch your elbow skin as hard as you can. No matter how much you try, you’ll notice there’s no pain. How so? That’s because different areas of your skin feature different nerve endings.

Tough skin, such as that on elbows, has fewer pain detectors. This obviously doesn’t mean that you can’t feel any pain in this area; just remember how many times you hit your elbow and how you felt the impact. When you pinch, you get elbow skin, not the nerve itself found in the bone.

7. Stop breathing if you can’t get up

The next weird body trick may help you get up in the morning when you don’t feel like it. It may not do all the work for you, and you may still need to motivate yourself, but it can help. So, if you find it really hard to leave your comfortable bed in the morning, try to hold your breath for as long as your body can do that.

This will make your heart beat faster, and your body will switch to a far more conscious and active mode. You’ll notice the difference immediately!

8. Press your gums to stop the nose bleeding

Yikes, here comes the blood! Your parents probably told you when you were a kid and you were having a bleeding nose to lie down on the bed and wait for the crimson liquid to stop making its way out. If you’ve been telling the same thing to your kids, we’re here to tell you that the so-called trick is actually a myth and doesn’t work.

Doctors advise that lying down while experiencing a bleeding nose can lead to swallowing blood, vomiting, or choking. What you can try instead is pressing your gums right above the front teeth. That’s where the arteries that supply the nose with blood are, so a slight pressure could help a lot.

9. Bend your head forward to swallow pills more easily

Dealing with certain health conditions may require you to take multiple medicines at once. Or perhaps you’re simply taking more supplements and vitamins to ensure your body functions at its best. Either way, swallowing more pills simultaneously isn’t always easy.

So here comes the next weird body trick you can try: when you have to take some really big pills, bend your head forward. As it seems to go against the human anatomy, with most of us bending the head backward, the trick is really useful because it lets the pills go straight into the gullet.

10. When experiencing muscle stiffness, shake your head

Muscle stiffness can feel like discomfort or an ache in the muscles. It makes them feel tight and hard to move, particularly in the morning or after resting. If you wake up experiencing a “pins and needles” feeling in your leg or arm, there’s a weird body trick that can help you.

When this happens, shake your head to help the blood return to the limb faster. Sometimes some parts of your body stiffen when you sleep because some nerves in your neck get pressed too much.

11. If you scald your skin while cooking, press that spot with your fingers

Getting boils and burns while cooking is very common and can happen even to the best of us. It hurts a lot, and if you don’t treat the affected area properly, it can lead to a skin infection. Sure, running the skin under cold water is a good way to nullify the burn, but there’s a weird body trick that you probably didn’t know about that can help you when dealing with these types of accidents.

All you have to do is press on the affected area with your fingers. It may hurt a little to do that, but you’ll restore the natural temperature of that patch of skin and prevent blisters from forming.

12. If you think about dark spaces, your pupils will go bigger

This weird body trick won’t help you deal with first-degree burns or stop nose bleeding. In fact, it’s safe to say this trick is rather useless, but this doesn’t mean it’s less fun or interesting.

If you imagine you’re in the dark, your eyes will act as if you were really in a place like this, and your pupils will dilate. It’s crazy what our brains can do, isn’t it? But this weird body trick also works in the other direction. If you imagine you’re looking at some very bright light, your pupils will shrink to a small size.

You may also want to read This Is What Your DNA Can Say About You. 6 Amazing Facts!