Eight Ridiculous Workplace Exercises From the "Brain Gym"

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Brain Gym for Business and Brain Gym

Author: Gail E. Dennison, Paul E. Dennison, and - on Brain Gym for Business - Jerry V. Teplitz
Date: 1994; 1986
Publishers: Edu-Kinsthetics, Inc, Ventura, CA
Discovered at: St. Vincent de Paul Thrift, Oakland

Questions These Titles Raise: Will you have to wipe down your brainpan?

Representative Quote:

"Mom says that SPACE BUTTONS clear her head for the type of quick decision making she needs at work. Put two fingers above the upper lip and rest the other hand on the tailbone. Hold for a minute, breathing the energy up the spine. (page 28, Brain Gym)"

"We do HOOK-UPs whenever we feel sad, confused, or angry. This cheers up up in no time. The activity is done in two parts. Grandpa is doing part 1. Grandma is doing part 2." (page 31, Brain Gym)

Just a few years back, before being reduced to holding tanks for Frito Lay products en route to the nation's septic tanks, Americans' bodies were used for archaic purposes like "work" and "play." By the 1990s, both involved sitting all day in front of a screen, a sorry state of affairs that helped Gail and Paul Dennison find willing buyers for their goofy Brain Gym books and tapes.

These promised that you could think more clearly - or, in their words, "stimulate the caratoid arteries that supply freshly oxygenated blood to the brain" - by doing this:

​This is what I look like every time I think, "Hey, where's my phone?"

Based on science the same way that fruit snacks are based on fruit, Brain Gym purports to sharpen the wits of sedentary kids and office workers through a regimen of no-impact exercise. The effectiveness of these routines is uncertain, but they are undeniably hilarious:

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That one should be called, "I don't remember eating fish."

The next -- also from Brain Gym for Business -- is even more suggestive:

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I saw that same technique used at a Barstow truckstop, once, but then it was called "Twenty dollars or fifty?"

This next one just looks like a regular day at any office job:

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Let's say you've worked right through lunch and just can't focus. Why not take a break and let your imagination roam?

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This guy dreams he's losing on Family Feud.

Next: Highlights from regular Brain Gym, which is even more silly