Are you Left Brained or Right Brained?

If you would split the brain right down the middle into two symmetrical or equal parts, you would have a right and left hemisphere. Although equal in size, these two sides are not the same, and do not carry out the same functions. 

The left side of the brain is responsible for controlling the right side of the body. It also performs tasks that have to do with logic, such as in science and mathematics.

On the other hand, the right hemisphere coordinates the left side of the body, and performs tasks that have do with creativity and the arts.

Both hemispheres are connected by the corpus callosum and serve the body in different ways.

There are a lot of quizzes and you can test yourself to see which one you are.

Here is a link to just one of them: http://www.web-us.com/brain/braindominance.htm

Now a bit about me. I love math. My major in high school was Physics and Mathematics Science. In college I studied computer science. I am able to speak three languages, Persian, Japanese and English. I am right handed. So I should be a left-brained. Right?

We human are such amazing creatures. We still don’t know so much about our brain. I’ve heard it said that we use less than 10% of our brain’s capacity.

Have you ever felt that you have an urge to do something for yourself but you don’t know what it is. Have you ever felt that urge drive you crazy sometimes? I am not talking about the urge to have a big cheese hamburger (which, truth be told, does drive me crazy sometimes.) When we feel these urges, some of us may know what it is and we go for it, some of us may need a trigger to take us there. I was the latter one. I tried to find my hidden urge by doing writing, painting on canvas or paper, or learning music. I still felt there must be something else inside me that must be hiding.

It was May 21 2015, I came back home from work with a lot of anger, and frustrated feelings. I tried to watch TV, to distract myself, it didn’t work. I tried to eat junk food to distract myself, and it didn’t work either. I couldn’t stop to switch off my brain not to think what had happened at work.

Like a zombie I sat behind my computer and opened the MS Paint app. I grabbed the mouse and moved it fiercely around and around. I saw the cursor on my screen moving in every direction, creating lines without any clear shapes. I grabbed that black mouse like I was sitting on the back of a black dragon that was going to take me anywhere, everywhere. That dragon took me to the top of rainbow arch, to the bottom of ocean, among the flowers or on the silver moon. I felt I could touch everything that I wanted to. I could kiss the moon and kick the rainbow arch to see how those beautiful colors like soft powders were pouring on my screen. I could even feel the breeze of air through my hair. Inside of me I was screaming and laughing loudly like a child; I was happy and felt free. My black dragon came and rescued me from darkness.

I painted and painted and painted, I didn’t know for how many hours. My eyelids were heavier and the pain in my wrist from moving the mouse around and around pushed me to look at the clock on the corner of my screen. It said 2:00 in the morning! Every part of my body was tired, but my brain didn’t want to stop; my brain still wanted to dance and sing with that dragon. The cursor was moving faster than ever, lines showing clear shapes more than ever. This morphine of painting was in my blood and giving me so much pleasure that I didn’t even care about time or my pain and my exhausted body. My brain now was telling me about my hidden urge. Yes that’s it, I had found it. In two months I painted almost 80 pictures and showed them to everyone that I knew, from families to friends. I’ve come to realize that painting gives me a lot of pleasure and joy that I wish I could explain it to you.

Given all of what I’ve shared, you may have wondered what the result of the brain test was for me.: It said that I am both; left and right brained. As developers or designers we may be stereotyped into one class or another. In my opinion, I don’t believe people are Left OR Right brained. I believe all of us are both left AND right brained and we should explore both sides to find what makes us happy. What do you think?

If you’d like to see some of my MS Paint projects, you can find them at:

https://drive.google.com/a/stgconsulting.com/folderview?id=0B1kk1IvWjzxqVlJ6bmxPNzlGZ00&usp=sharing

I hope they bring you as much pleasure as they have brought me.