The brain is such an interesting part of the human body. In my last post, I talked about the occurrence of making mistakes, and how we learn better from our successes. I find this concept fascinating, so I decided to do some further reading on the subject.

 Scenario: You’re getting ready to leave the house with your friends, and they’re all rushing you to meet them outside in the car. Hurriedly running up the stairs, you yell, “ONE MINUTE!” as you head back to your bedroom. Upon setting foot inside the room, you completely forgot what you came in here to get, and no matter how hard you comb through your memory you cannot seem to recall what it was that was so important. Deciding to give up because your friends are waiting, you angrily leave the room. But, just as soon as you put your seat belt on and pull out of the driveway, it hits you. You left your wallet upstairs on the bedside table! Ugh.

 We’ve all been there. Having mental lapses, commonly known as “brain farts”, can be such a pain. As it turns out, the reason behind these instances of short memory loss can be attributed to some brain activity that is much like that of your computer’s sleep-mode. Research has been done to suggest that these occurrences begin about 30 seconds before you make an error, or forget what it was you were doing at the time. They noticed that regions of the brain associated with the brain resting started to show activity during this time period. Contrary to that, brain regions that work when you are in an active state started to show less action.

It may be that this experience happens as a way for your brain to conserve energy. But I for one am not a fan of its inconvenience, as I just cannot remember what I walked into this room for!

Source: http://www.livescience.com/2461-mind-reading-hat-prevent-brain-farts.html