Human beings are extremely smart. We discovered electricity, figured out how to get people on the moon, cured or eradicated countless diseases and are constantly coming up with even more innovations. However, sometimes, our brains just don’t figure out the easiest ways to do things without getting a little extra help from someone else. Put some scientists in a lab, and you’ll get a vaccine for COVID-19 within a year. Put some regular people in their kitchen, on the other hand, and they might not discover the best way to clean a microwave or blender for decades.
Someone recently asked on Reddit, “What’s something you did ‘the hard way’ for the longest time, because you didn’t know there was a much easier way?” And thousands of readers responded with their best life hacks. We’ve gathered some of their most helpful answers down below, featuring tips that you might be embarrassed to admit you never knew, but don’t worry: your secret’s safe with us. From keyboard shortcuts to cleaning tips that will save you time and effort, we hope you learn something new from this list of tips.
Be sure to upvote the replies that you find most brilliant, and then let us know in the comments if you have any more life hacks that might spare your fellow pandas from doing things ‘the hard way’. Then if you’re interested in checking out another Bored Panda article featuring products that feel like life hacks in and of themselves, you can find that right here.
#1
Recently found out that if you deliberately spread your cheeks when you sit down on the toilet, everything goes a whole lot cleaner, and you save on toilet paper. As someone with IBS, kinda a game changer.
Image source: birdsafterdark
#2
CTRL backspace to delete entire words instead of letter by letter
Image source: chrisdante05, Stefen Tan
#3
I thought working hard (giving 120%) brought many benefits. Turns out, I still get the same benefits + my sanity by only working 80%.
Image source: SuspectNumber6, Marten Bjork
#4
We had a pool when I was a kid, swam at the public pool all winter. So lots of water time. Worst thing was having to get out and go pee, because as a girl you’d have to pull your bathing suit down and sit there cold and naked and then have to pull on a cold, wet suit and it was sticky and icy and awful. I’d hold it until I absolutely had to go.
Occurred to me as an adult you can just pull the crotch part to the side, and it stays put while you pee.
EDIT: Thanks y’all, I am so gratified to learn I was not the only one! If I can help even one person avoid the awkward dance of pulling up cold, wet, twisted suit straps then my work here is done.
Image source: A-D-T-P, Bruce Christianson
#5
My dishwasher is across the kitchen from my utensil drawer. For years, while unloading the dishwasher I would stuff as many utensils as I could in my hands. I’d inevitably drop some, and there are a few knicks in my hardwood floor from dropping forks and spoons.
One day at work, a coworker unloaded the dishwasher and removed the utensil basket and carried it over to the utensil drawer. I never felt so dumb
Image source: regcrusher, Nathan Dumlao
#6
Existed.
Turns out I had undiagnosed ADHD. Getting a diagnosis and medication, at the ripe old age of 27, was life-changing. It’s like your whole life you’re walking against a current, never knowing any different; then, suddenly, the current is gone.
(Disclaimers: everyone’s ADHD is different; medication isn’t a magic “cure”; medication isn’t the solution for everyone, and that’s okay.)
Image source: acover4422, Nik Shuliahin
#7
Parchment paper. No more scrubbing off baked- on cheese and sauce. If it goes in the oven, I use parchment paper.
Image source: ethottly, Nadya Spetnitskaya
#8
Cleaning the damn microwave. I struggled to scrub all the dried up bits off then a friend told me to just put a small dish of water in it and turn it on for a couple of minutes. Everything wipes right out. I was such a dumb a*s.
Image source: patti2mj, Lissete Laverde
#9
I’ve been opening pistachios with my thumbs for 30 years until I saw my wife use half a shell to wrench her next one open and then my mind exploded.
Image source: man-panda-pig, Karolina Kołodziejczak
#10
Keep shaking the shaving gel and struggling to more than a quarter of the can out…till it dawned on me that they are pressurised and every shake causes it to lose pressure therefore makes dispatching it harder…I’ve now used many and actually got the bottom of every can by simply not shaking them…I’m 40 and also an engineer.
Had a complete and utter brain fart since I started shaving.
Image source: pob125, Marco Verch Professional Photographer
#11
Clean your blender by making a hot water and dish soap smoothie.
Image source: AlterEdward, PNW Production
#12
Dating – when I was a kid I thought you had to have some elaborate scheme or hook to get someone interested in you
Later I realized all you gotta do is be honest and up front.
Image source: billbaparker
#13
My BlackBerry had the worst predictive text system I’d ever seen. It kept suggesting accented characters, words that didn’t exist, and was a total clusterfuck in every way.
After a year or so I was browsing the settings and found that predictive text had been set to “French”.
Image source: LateMojito, Asterfolio
#14
A few things.
One, put an absorbent-fabric scrunchie on each wrist before washing your face. They stop the water from running up your arms when rinsing and getting the insides of your robe sleeves uncomfortably wet.
Two, before leaving on a trip I change my bed linens and towels, so when I get home exhausted my bed is fresh and crisp.
Three, if it will require ironing, don’t waste my money. I will wear it exactly once.
Image source: plutosdarling
#15
I used to own more than one color and style of sock. F**k that s**t
Image source: jasonasselin
#16
Hanging pictures. I used to meticulously measure and line up so my nails so they’d match the hardware on the back of the frame. Now I just use a piece of painters tape, lay it on the back of the frame, mark hardware on the frame and then remove the tape and place it on the wall and that gives you the exact placement for your picture hanging hooks and nails.
Image source: Navyblazers2000, Darshan Patel
#17
If you hold the space bar on your cellphone it’s way easier to ~~select words in a text you want to copy~~ move the cursor where you want it to be (sorry, wrote this while tired). Did it the hard way, the way you get angry at your fat fingers for far too long.
To clarify:
Write some random word in a text message. Hold space bar for a second or two. Slide thumb back and forward on the space bar and the cursor will move. Makes it easy to just remove one letter in a long misspelled word.
Image source: FullbordadOG
#18
When I was a kid I was bad at nail clippers. I knew to put my nail in the chompy bit at the end, but I didn’t realize that the handle/lever folded out. So I would just squeeze really hard until I broke my nail off in the blades. This went on for an embarrassingly long time before my mom saw me and taught me how to open the lever.
Image source: tomyownrhythm, Marco Verch Professional Photographer
#19
For a while on Google Docs I would copy text from another source and quote it in an essay, but just using CTRL + V would use the same font from the website I’m quoting instead of the font that I want. If you use CTRL + LShift + V it pastes the text in the font that you want
Image source: colton_421
#20
Asking women out.
Ignore everything you saw on tv/films/video games, read in books/websites, or heard from people with long list of tips/steps or ideas.
Just tell them you find them attractive or like them. From there ask for their number or set up a date and time.
We tend to make this way harder than it should be.
This also applies to women wanting to ask a guy out.
Image source: RexCrimson_
#21
For dusting things like baseboards, windowsills, and picture frames, the best tool is a (clean) paintbrush. I always used to either use a cloth or something made specifically for dusting, but the paintbrush is much faster and easier. I keep a cheap 2-inch paintbrush exclusively for dusting now. Also works great on cobwebs.
Image source: leftthestrick, Toa Heftiba
#22
I have mixed hair and would always brush from root to end because that’s how everyone else did it and how I was taught. Wasn’t until I was watching a movie in my late 20s and a character’s maid brought up that the character with mixed hair needed to brush out the knots on the end before working up to the roots. I gave it a try and then got confirmation at work from other girls with similar hair that that’s how it’s supposed to be done when you have a certain type of tight curls…the years I spent crying while having chunks of hair ripped and torn out 😭
Image source: 2baverage, KoolShooters
#23
Weightlifting
Rest days actually help you build muscle, not the other way around.
Image source: FearGunner
#24
Putting a towel over the sink to catch your hair when you shave. For like 20 years I had to feel like i was trying to do counterforensics to not invite the ire of every woman I’ve been around. One drunk night with a buddy I was talking about making some kind of electrostatic hair catcher and he’s like “Why don’t you put a towel down?” Mind= blown!
Thanks for nothing, dad.
Image source: GoodolBen
#25
The snip tool on Microsoft. I used to click print screen and then crop down everything. Snip tool is a game changer.
Image source: Western_Quarter_7346
#26
Putting out candles without releasing a bunch of paraffin smoke.
Don’t blow out the candle or snuff it. If you do that, the wick releases a bunch of smoke and stinks up the place. Use a toothpick or a dental pick or any comparable tool (or even buy a “wick dipper” tool from a candle shop) and dip the candle wick under the molten wax. The wax quenches the flame instantly without any smoke at all. Just be sure to lift the wick out of the molten wax so the wax doesn’t solidify over the wick and leave it inaccessible.
The other benefit of this is that it leaves the wick coated in wax, ready for the next time you light it.
Image source: Berkamin
#27
Windows Key + V opens a list of your last 10 copies.
I think the option is turned off by default also so pressing Windows Key + V enables it initially.
Image source: XabiAlon, Christin Hume
#28
After taking a shower, you can dry yourself off (after turning the water off, of course) while still in the shower stall to prevent the bathroom floor from being wet
Image source: three-sense, Hannah Xu
#29
When looking at something in the sky through binoculars, look at the object and then put the binoculars in front of your face.
Image source: Academic_Chemical476
#30
Cleaning things off of glass.
I used to spend a long time with unpleasant solvents and/or abrasive scrubby sponges to get soap scum and bird c**p and other such residues off of glass. Now, I use a razor scraper and shave the stuff off the glass. Often, I don’t even need to use a cleaning solvent or water. Razor scrapers are amazing. And they’re mis-named. You don’t use them to scrape anything. You shave or plane the junk off of glass and other hard surfaces with the blade.
Even paint comes off of glass super easily with a razor scraper.
Image source: Berkamin
#31
Pumping gas. For years I held the handle the entire time. Life changing when I realized I could lock the trigger in place
Image source: likes_big_books, sippakorn yamkasikorn
#32
As a kid, whenever my bicycle wheels got warped (I crashed into stuff a lot), I would fix them by smashing the rims with a hammer. It mostly worked.
Eventually I learned that you can just tighten and loosen the spokes to straighten warped wheels. So much easier, and much less destructive.
Image source: ClownfishSoup, Daniel Salcius
#33
Putting the colander inside the pot on top of the food and using like a lid to drain.
Instead offpouring the food into the colander and then putting it back in the original pot
Image source: ClassicTower475, Jonathan Pielmayer
#34
Not me but a friend of a friend hated having baths. She said it was uncomfortable lying back against the taps because they would dig into her back.
It never occurred to her to lie at the other end!
Image source: robertodurian, Roberto Nickson
#35
When you learn that *scissors* –
cut your pizza, it’s *legit*!
Pizza cutter? Leave it, brother.
Piece of utter *s**t*…
Image source: truthorbrick, Benu Marinescu
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