What is ASMR

Well first of all ASMR stands for "Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response". The first time I heard this words I didn't understand anything, so that's why it is better to explain it with simple words. I would say that ASMR is a sensation you feel in your head or back, like a tingle. This is caused when you are feeling something really satisfactory,with a low and pleasant sound o even with visual stimuli you like. It is really hard to explain an abstract concept like this, so that's why I always tell everybody to try it.

There are lots of ways to feel ASMR and in YouTube there is a great diversity of these kind of videos. But here everything complicates. First of all I have to say that not everybody feels ASMR,I even think that only a few can feel it. This shouldn't be a problem, but sometimes these people think that these kind of videos make no sense and that are even creepy. At the end they despise this community and think that we, the people who listen to ASMR,are freaking weird.

On the other hand there are also problems for the ones who can feel it. Everyone is different so each person has a different "trigger". With this I mean that maybe a person feels good by hearing someone whispering but not by hearing someone tapping an object. Each one has to find his or her own trigger. For example I really feel pleasant by listening someone whispering, tapping hard plastic and moving liquid objects (like bottles or sprays). And of course there are sounds that I really hate, like metal and crystal ones.

To end this topic I want you to know some things if you are thinking of trying it. One basic rule is to wear headphones. Most videos use binaural sounds and can only be perceived by using them. The other thing I would say is that you have to be in a completely silent atmosphere, just to listen to ASMR and not to other thing that can interfere in it. But the most important one is to relax and enjoy!

So that's more or less all. Of course there are lots of more things to talk about ASMR like artists, different triggers, its benefits... but this post can't be very long, so you will have to discover it by your own. 

See you!

Drugs

Hello to everyone! Today I´m going to talk about drugs and their effect in society.

According to the RAE a drug is a substance preparation with a stimulating, depressing, narcotic or hallucinogenic effect. When we talk about drugs we relate them directly to dependence, violence or addiction. However some of them have benefits for us or are used for medical treatments such as marijuana, may be used for asthma, spasms, muscle convulsions, pain and as an enhancer of cancer therapies in places like Germany, Italy, California and Holland. But it´s also true that drugs cause a lot of problems.

These lasts years the consumption of drugs has increased: alcohol and marijuana are the most consumed ones, and cocaine addiction increases every day. Nowadays young people like to try drugs because at first they cause them happiness and wellness, but the long-term effects can be terrible for their health: like the destruction of neurons; development of psychiatric illnesses such as psychosis, depression or schizophrenia; injuries to the liver; malfunction of the kidneys and nerves; development of contagious diseases such as AIDS or Hepatitis; heart problems such as heart attack; early death…

They also cause problems in our society, there are 4 million accidents each year because of drugs, 38% of homicides are committed under the effects of them, they are also cause for unemployment, family problems and divorces.

There are different ways to consume drugs: snorting, smoking, through injections, orally… Now it is very easy to get drugs, so you have to be very careful and not fall into this dangerous area.

Brainstorm on GMOs

Hi readers!

Today I’m going to talk a little bit about GMOs, which stands for Genetically Modified Organisms, and I’m also going to explain my opinion on this subject. Before I start, I want to make clear that I’m going to focus on organisms meant for human feeding (mostly vegetables), mainly because covering the whole subject of GMOs would take massive explanation on topics I don’t even begin to comprehend. Having said this, let’s start.

First of all we have to know what GMOs are in the first place; according to wikipedia, "A genetically modified organism​  (​ GMO​ ) is any organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques’’. And how can this be useful for us?

• They have given plants resistance to droughts, pests and diseases since 1996, and also increasing massively the average yields and its sustainability, decreasing the cost of production, and therefore, the general cost of products on this sector without decreasing its income to their producers.
• It can provide us with cheaper ways of obtaining bio chemicals, and hormones, like insulin, which can be now easily produced by genetically modified bacteria, instead of having to use full grown mammals, like pigs and cows, to extract the hormones from their livers.

There are thousands of uses more, but for the sake shortness of this post, you’ll have to research them by yourself.

Then, Why don’t we use this technology more often? The answer is ignorance. A great percentage of people think that GMOs are bad, mostly because people tend to smack gibberish about what they fear. There are rumours that say that GMOs can generate from economic crisis to cancer, but all of them are just nonsense, which may be originated from the misunderstanding of research articles to the association of nuclear power (which is the origin of cancer misconception) with any kind of genetic alteration. There are too many ‘’fiction tales’’ out there for me to explain them all, but I’ll try to give some basic ideas on this technology.

First of all, I have to say this, or I swear my head will explode: THERE IS NO NUCLEAR ACTIVITY INVOLVED. Having that out of the way, you can sit down, there’s a long path ahead:

• Opposite to popular belief, GMOs are exhaustively tested, and go through lots of laboratories and standards before it even reaches the soil (FDA,EPA,USDA,etc…), which means that you probably won’t have your ‘’tomaco’’ soon.
• Pesticides GMOs produce are much worse than ‘’old’’pesticides. Although it would be good news for farmers who unconsciously mix all the pesticides available like it was some kind of shampoo mix laboratory scientist we all played to be in the shower when we were kids, it’s not like that. Recent studies have shown how their pesticides only affect their targets, and don’t kill the bees or your children.

In conclusion, GMOs are too demonized, but if you research a little bit, you’ll discover they aren’t bad at all, and definitely not responsible of any dementors, wingardium leviosa or Illuminatis, just some ol’ regular veggies, that won’t kill people.

Contagious Yawning

Hello, what’s up guys? Today I'm going to talk you about something very curious and that probably most of you don’t know why it happens.

Yesterday, my father told me that on his way to Madrid by train he was talking with one friend when he started yawning; suddenly his friend started yawning too. Seconds later, one of the passengers from the seat in front of them, and another that was sitting next to my father, started yawning too. It was a contagious yawing!!! Does this situation ring a bell with you? Has that never happened to you? For example when you’re in a conversation with another person and he casually yawns. As you wonder whether he's bored with the discussion, you will find that you're yawning too. Also when a man;walking by, sees you yawning, and pretty soon he yawns; and it's carried on and on, passing from one person to another in a domino effect. It is pretty funny, but do you know why this happens?

Scientists are still investigating what makes us yawn, but there is a well-known fact: yawning is contagious. Scientists say that much of the yawning is due to suggestibility. You don't need to see a person yawn to involuntarily yawn yourself; hearing someone yawn or even reading about yawning can cause the same reaction.

Previous studies about yawing suggested that there is a connection between contagious yawning and empathy. However, then they discovered that contagious yawning decreases as people age and may not be associated with empathy. Now, a new study supports that it isn’t related to facts as empathy, tiredness or energy levels.

And that’s all folks! I hope that with this you have learned a little more about yawing and that you have enjoyed it.

Bodybuilding

I’m going to write about a sport that many people consider unhealthy, ugly and useless: bodybuilding. Many people see this sport only as muscular men lifting weights in a gym, but bodybuilding is much more than that.

As well as in other sports every athlete looks for an objective, for runners and swimmers it is to be the faster, for basketball and soccer players it is to win by collective work, by making good tactics... In weight lifting the thing is to be the strongest, but in bodybuilding the target is to get the best shape and the correct volume of your body.

It is a very tough sport because they have to follow a lot of rules, it involves methodical and very hard trainings and a lot of diets. Bodybuilders have to control every single food they eat. They have two kinds of diets: volume diet and definition diet. In the volume diet they have to eat a lot because they want to get more muscle volume. In this phase their training is much tougher because they have more energy. In the definition diet they eat much less because they want to lose weight and they want to reduce they body fat percentage, all of this because they want to get shredded to show off their muscles. Because of their eating less, their trainings must be moderated to avoid injuries.

Their trainings are based on exercising different muscles along the days of the week. In bodybuilding the best body is not the biggest, in this sport the most valued body is the one that is eesthetic and proportioned.

Bodybuilding is not only about lifting weight, I think that this sport is about sculpting a body by hard training and by following meticulous diets.