Superheroes are the objects of fancy and admiration for millions the world over. They right wrongs, protect the weak, and rescue society from innumerable forms of injustice and peril. There’s only one glaring problem: They aren’t real. The incredible feats performed by these stalwart defenders are made possible by uncanny powers that, sadly, are fictional.

Or are they?

SEE ALSO: 10 Real-Life People With Real Superpowers

What if I told you that natural superpowers exist sealed away in our bodies, only waiting for the proper training to awaken them? Well, as unbelievable as this may sound, it is actually true. So if you’re ready to transcend your fragile human shell and become the superhero you’ve always dreamed of being, here’s a list of ten abilities that you can unlock to become a superhuman!

10 Superhuman Strength

Strength is a much more complex concept than many realize. It is not just about how much muscle we have, but even more so how well we use it. One need not be a bodybuilder to have super strength, as proven by grand master strongman and pound-for-pound strongest man in the world Dennis Rogers. Rogers has performed many incredible feats of strength, including preventing airplanes from taking off and holding back four Harley-Davidson motorcycles at once. These are impressive feats for any strongman but are especially incredible considering that Dennis Rogers is only 168 centimeters tall (5’6″) and 76 kilograms (168 lb). And he’s in his fifties. So how does he do it? The answer is plyometrics.

The goal of plyometrics is to access more of the dormant strength in our muscles by partially bypassing a natural function of the nervous system called the inhibition reflex. The golgi tendon organ (GTO)—present in every muscle—sends nerve impulses to our spinal cords every time we use a muscle. The spinal cord then responds with an inhibition reflex, which limits the amount of power your muscle can use. This process exists because human muscles are capable of creating a higher degree of force than they and other structural elements of the body can withstand. If not for this, reflex muscles would tear themselves from tension, and people would strike things with more force than their bones and tendons could handle without breaking. The GTO however, does not suppress your power only at the edge of damage. Through training with quick, explosive exercises, plyometrics gives us the ability to force out more power more rapidly, before the inhibition reflex occurs.^[1]

The intent of plyometrics is to train your muscles to release more power more rapidly from the muscle that you have, with the goal of generating as much power as possible before the inhibition reflex occurs. To achieve this, plyometrics is based on quick, explosive exercises, which focus on generating immediate force and developing your fast-twitch muscle fibers. In addition to training explosive burst techniques and exercises, an important part of developing fast-twitch muscle is exhausting slow-twitch muscles in other, more extended stamina-oriented workouts, at which point fast-twitch muscle fibers take over and begin to develop.

Plyometrics are wonderful, but muscle is still the source of that strength, so we still need some. There is a difference between how much muscle you have and how strong that muscle is. Both are equally important, and both are trained differently. Muscle growth, or hypertrophy, is best trained through pushing muscles to the point of exhaustion through high reps and consecutive workouts for the same muscle groups. Strength, on the other hand, is developed with lower reps of more weight and reasonable rest time in between.

9 Lightning Speed

You’re probably thinking, “Sure, there are some fast people out there, but there’s a difference between being really fast and ‘superhuman speed.’ ” However, anyone lucky enough to have had the illustrious pleasure of working with the late, great Bruce Lee would likely beg to differ. In order for Lee’s movements to be reasonably visible on film, they had to be slowed down two-fold. First, he would intentionally move slower so that the camera could capture his movements, and then afterward, the film would be slowed so that the eyes of the viewer could follow what was happening. If these measures weren’t taken, it would appear that the villains surrounding him would simply fall over for no reason without any visible cause.^[2] If speed beyond the comprehension of the human eye isn’t fast enough in your opinion to be considered superhuman, then you’re certainly a tough one to impress.

Fighting fast is one thing, but if we’re going to talk about real super speed, we need to take running and other types of movement into account as well. Luckily, this traces back to the same core concept, which is fast-twitch muscle fiber. This is the same fast-twitch muscle fiber discussed in the previous installment regarding super strength and is trained largely with the same type of concepts: plyometrics and explosiveness, as well as focusing these types of training on the muscle groups necessary for the abilities you want to achieve.

Fast movement, however, is not the only element of lightning speed. In order to be capable of utilizing this speed effectively, one must also have super reaction time. Without this, all the speed in the world is meaningless. The best way to train reaction time is through reaction-oriented activities, such as the hand-slap game and speed bag training, as well as through visual athletic training, such as robo-pong, focus loop, and brock string exercises.

8 Incredible Agility

So far, we’ve explored a few powers that will help you knock around the baddies. To do so, you’ll need to get there in time to save . . . whoever it is you’re saving. Super speed will help you with that, but you’ll need to round it out with the super agility to get past obstacles that most people can’t, and quick!

Parkour is just what you need. As stated by founder David Belle: “Parkour is a method of training which allows us to overcome obstacles, both in the urban and natural environments.” Likely the most notable paths for parkour users (traceurs) is across rooftops, as shown in the Rush Hour BBC promo, which was the introduction of parkour to the mainstream.^[3] Being agile enough to climb and jump and run across daunting obstacles may not sound like much of a superpower, but just watch any of the wealth of homemade parkour videos out there, and you’ll be shocked by the incredible things already being done by many across the world!

Founded in 1990, parkour is a relatively new concept but has taken the world by storm and has many training schools around the world. This is important because parkour, when not learned under professional guidance, can be extremely dangerous for obvious reasons (including falling from the rooftops you’re jumping across).

7 Extreme Flexibility

Extreme flexibility is one of the most well-known of all real superpowers. Contortionists have been a staple of the performance world since as far back as ancient Egypt and possibly beyond. A master of this art is Daniel Browning Smith, also known as “Rubberboy.” Recognized by Guinness World Records as the world’s most flexible man, he is known for squeezing himself through unstrung tennis rackets, rotating his torso 180 degrees, bending in half backwards from a laying position, and, of course, squeezing into tiny boxes, not to mention all of the other skills commonly associated with the art.

Jujutsu and its cousins, Brazilian jiu-jitsu and judo, as well as other forms of technical grappling are highly effective and popular martial arts. These styles of ground combatives utilize submission, choking, limb-breaking, and various other types of grappling techniques, and flexibility is essential. Flexibility also increases the quality of many striking techniques, and that’s not just for flashy moves and high kicks. Speed and range of motion in power-generating body parts, like the hips, lead to more powerful strikes.

Healing and recovery are also dramatically increased with superior flexibility, as it decreases stress on joints and reduces pain, making us more resilient and getting us back into action more quickly after a particularly strenuous battle or damaging injury.

Training flexibility is largely based on engaging in all types of stretching regularly and frequently. Dynamic stretching involves gradually increasing reach, movement speed, or both, when moving parts of your body. Ballistic stretching is less controlled and relies on using momentum to push a body part beyond its usual range. Static stretching involves holding a muscle stretched at its farthest point and has two subtypes: static-passive, which is holding the stretched muscle with some external force, and static-active, which means using only the muscles to hold the stretch. Another type, isometric stretching, involves tensing of the stretched muscles, such as if a partner is holding your leg high while you try to push it down. (This is but one of many examples of isometric stretching.)

All types of stretching are necessary for extreme flexibility, but isometric stretching is the best for developing strength and range of motion for athletics and contortion, so using it as a primary focus in your training is key for this kind of ability.^[4]

6 Ultra Fortitude

For a truly superhuman body, fortitude and toughness are of primary importance, as superheroes are faced with constant threat to their bodies. Methods of body conditioning have been used for many years in the world of martial arts, one of the most common concepts being bone mineralization, also called calcification. Bones are primarily comprised of calcium, and the amount and density of calcium in those bones determines their size and structural strength. Resistance training in one’s workout routine is a simple and safe way to achieve mineralization. It is even suggested to help the elderly maintain their health.^[5]

When the body detects that its bones are absorbing large amounts of force, a natural mechanism sends more calcium into the bones, increasing their size, density, and weight, thus adding to the structural integrity of their owner’s body and, in some ways, even striking power. This concept is called Wolff’s law. Many types of martial artists through history have utilized this concept by striking objects repeatedly to cause a calcifying reaction in the bones, including the legendary Shaolin monks.

Davis’s law is a concept similar to Wolff’s law, the difference being that where Wolff’s law concerns bones, Davis’s law concerns soft tissue. The body’s capacity to respond to stress is not limited to bones, and the soft tissues of the body can be trained to harden through stress as well, resulting in more resilient muscles and organs, as well as a boost to pain resistance, which is important, as well.

Having a body that can structurally survive as much punishment as possible is great, but how much pain and suffering the hero can endure before giving in to a villain or extraordinarily arduous task is another thing and also extremely important. Pain has two primary concepts behind it: threshold and tolerance. Threshold represents how much stimulus is required for something to feel “painful,” and tolerance represents how much of that pain one can physically and psychologically endure. Unfortunately, there seems to be no way of increasing one’s pain threshold, but tolerance can be trained, and to a remarkable degree.

A good place to look for this is once again is to the Shaolin. These incredible warrior monks perform superhuman feats of pain regulation, such as lying on spears and having large stones smashed on their stomachs. How do they do it? Meditation. By controlling their minds, the Shaolin can actually distract themselves from and even reduce pain, making it nearly, if not totally, irrelevant. If that’s not superhuman pain resistance, than what is?

5 Surviving Extreme Temperatures

In 2007, Wim Hof set a world record when he immersed himself in ice for 72 minutes in nothing but shorts and boots, and this isn’t even his most incredible feat. He has also climbed Mount Everest, again, in nothing but shorts and boots (he was only stopped from reaching the summit by a foot injury), and run a marathon in the desert without water.

Wim Hof, or “The Iceman,” as he is known, manages such things with a heightened connection to and control of his body. This may sound like something that is likely a trick or hoax, but Hof has always done his work under scrutiny by scientists and journalists, all of whom verify his claims.^[6] Though he has been observed by the scientific community closely enough to prove his legitimacy, exactly how his methods work remains a mystery to science.

So how is it possible to train something that can’t be identified? And how is it that we can be sure that Wim Hof isn’t a one-off freak of nature? Because he teaches people. That’s right, you can take lessons from the man directly, and even if traveling to Europe to train with the man is too much, there are training videos on his website!

4 Enhanced Immunity

Another accomplishment of the Wim Hof method is increasing your immunity! This was proven when Wim Hof was documented resisting that symptoms of an endotoxin introduced in a medical laboratory. The scientists were astonished by what they witnessed but doubted that anyone else could replicate Hof’s feat. To test this, 12 students of Hof’s were brought in, and all of them resisted the toxin, just like Hof!

The Wim Hof method may be incredibly impressive, but it’s not a cure-all, and as dangerous as it may be, for many potential contaminants, the only way to protect ourselves is to expose ourselves. Tolerance to poisons and other toxins is most commonly achieved by consuming or injecting a very small, survivable amount into one’s body at a steadily increasing rate as the body’s natural defensive reactions continuously toughen the body’s immunity to said toxin. This term for this is “mithridatism.”^[7]

Vaccines are a similar concept, created as “imitations” of a disease that cause no illness and are intended to provoke a response from the immune system, which then produces antibodies and T-lymphocytes which protect us against the illness in question.

3 Apnea Diving

Apnea diving, or freediving, is so popular and well-known that it is not only a superhuman ability but also a sport! AIDA International Freediving is a democratic, international organization that sets rules and regulations for safety in the sport, in addition to maintaining world records and organizing events all over the planet. Although scientists believed for years that humans could only survive underwater for a few minutes tops and at depths no deeper than 50 meters (164 ft), some of the world records in this sport include dives to depths well over 200 meters (656 ft), with some lasting over 11 minutes on a single breath!^[8]

This is possible because of an evolutionary adaptation called the “diving reflex.” The action of this reflex is to shut down and/or slow physiological functions that use oxygen, thus allowing our bodies to operate on less oxygen for a longer period of time. Blood shift is another phenomenon also necessary in freediving. This function allows the lungs to fill with plasma, preventing their collapse from pressure.

Though recognized as a sport worldwide, freediving is still extremely dangerous to the ill-prepared. Improper preparation and faulty or mismanaged equipment have caused numerous deaths in the sport. Because of this, it is important to seek proper instruction.

2 Echolocation

Many have heard about how some blind people can use echolocation to navigate their surroundings, but a 2013 study from Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich biologists shows that sighted people can learn this skill, as well! It turns out that the ability to echolocate is a talent that lies dormant within everyone. This is because our brains have learned to shut out echoes so that we can focus more effectively on the primary source of a sound, rather than having the constant distraction of echoes of everything around us. The trick to learning echolocation is to learn to “tune in” to the echoes that already exist in the world.

The LMU experiment consisted of sighted people outfitted with a headset that contained earphones and a microphone. The participants made a vocalization, and the appropriate echo in relation to objects and spaces in the room was created through the earphones. This test allowed sighted people, over a few weeks of training, to learn to extrapolate information regarding shape, size, and distance from the given echo.^[9]

1 Mind Control

Controlling others like puppets may not be realistic, but implanting thoughts and altering the way people think very much is. The human subconscious is frighteningly vulnerable, and controlling minds through planted suggestion is more accessible a skill than many would presume. This is why the reader should learn about this, not only to use if need be but also to defend against it should one come across a user of these techniques.

The essential element of this process is to go after the subconscious mind while the conscious mind is otherwise focused, and here are the five most common techniques: Covert hypnosis entails convincing someone that your thoughts are their own through suggestive, focused conversation. When one engages in pattern interruption, they create a brief hypnotic moment by forcing someone’s concentration through an abnormal behavior (such as placing a hand on someone’s chest in place of shaking their hand in a greeting—the moment it takes them to analyze the situation will cause a brief hypnotic state). The Zeingarnik effect is concentration that naturally occurs in people toward incomplete tasks. This can be achieved by telling someone an incomplete story, otherwise causing them to focus on an incomplete task. During this period of distracted focus, they are highly suggestible. Another method is to use ambiguous phrases or comments that require someone’s focus to analyze, causing a brief period of high suggestibility. Finally, there are hypnotic keywords, subconscious-evoking phrases like “imagine if . . . ” that can cause a rise in accessibility to someone’s subconscious. This technique is a bit vague and weaker but still very commonly used.

Controlling others is not, however, the only use of these skills. One of the most important uses—and the reason this item was saved for last on the list—is that these tricks can be used to help develop ourselves. The reader may be overwhelmed by the sheer apparent degree of effort needed to attain the things listed here, but by getting control of oneself using techniques such as self-hypnosis, it is remarkable what challenges the average person can overcome and what accomplishments they are able to achieve.

Using mind control on yourself is largely made up of neurolinguitsic programming (NLP), which in this context, is largely made up of two techniques: The flash technique is an NLP exercise in which one visualizes an image associated with a negative feeling in a given circumstance brightly and vividly. The person then implants in that imagined image another, much smaller gray scale image of their preferred feeling in that circumstance. Gradually, the preferred imagine grows to take over the negative image, with the color draining from the negative image to the preferred image. This process is repeated over and over until psychologically successful. Anchoring is associating an internal response with an external or internal stimulus in order to reaccess the internal response (similar to how seeing something nostalgic will remind you of how you felt when you first saw it). This effect can be manually created by choosing a simple, self-creatable stimulus—such as making a hand gesture or touching yourself in a certain way and repeating that action when you want to associate the anchored feeling to a given task at hand.^[10]

Though only a few techniques in each category have been listed here, there are actually a great number of others that can be used to achieve the same forms of control.

So there you have it: ten learnable superpowers ripe for practice. Clearly, in the brevity of this listicle, the complete process of learning such wondrous things is not expressible, but all of the items are out there and ready to be trained. All that’s left now is to reach out, grab for destiny, and, of course, always use your powers for good.

Excelsior!

Jason Karras writes, therefore he is.

We’ve probably all met at least one person in our lives who has a really good memory, is really good at doing math in their head, or something along those lines. Most of the time we just assume this person is some kind of genius, or perhaps a savant, and we think it’s beyond us. However, for those of you who wish that you could have some of those abilities, the good news is that you actually don’t need to be a prodigy to learn them. There are many mental superpowers that anyone can learn, as long as they are willing to put in the time to practice.

10. Want A Cool Party Trick? Learning To Speed Solve A Rubik’s Cube Is Entry Level

Everyone knows the Rubik’s cube, and most people have at least idly picked one up, solved one side, and then gave up when they realized they would have to destroy their work to fix another side. A lot of people have never bothered to go much further past this, but many wish they could complete one, at least to say that they finally did.

For those of you who feel that solving a Rubik’s cube is out of reach, and that trying to solve one as a speed-cuber is even more out of reach, the nice thing is it actually isn’t really that hard. If you can solve one side, you can get the rest done, as long as you follow the right movement patterns. You see, there is a simple pattern of movement that will change other parts of the cube, but leave the parts you didn’t want changed as they are as you finish with the movement pattern. As for how hard it is to be a speed-cuber, a nine-year-old in China named Yihang Wang has done it in under five seconds with decent consistency, so you can learn how to do it in a few minutes if you really practice and set your mind to it. 

9.  Training Yourself To Have An Incredible Memory Is Easier Than It Sounds

Some people see someone with a really good memory, and they’re shocked by that person’s genetic luck, and how they just “have” a good memory. This all goes back to so many people thinking that talent is something you just have, and not something that is mostly a learned ability. However, the truth is that true photographic, or eidetic, memories are considered a myth by most researchers, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still have a great memory. The trick is, you actually need to train and discipline your mind properly to do it.

Now, while there are a ton of mnemonic techniques that can help you which we don’t have room for here, the main concept is just understanding how your memory works. Memory actually has addresses in your brain that trigger it, based on the context when you memorized whatever it was. This can make it hard to remember things, as we have to recall what else was going on at the time, but if we can train ourselves to use triggers that make more sense, we can control our memory much better.

Furthermore, if you use something called chunking, you can actually increase your working memory as well. Short term memory can hold up to nine chunks of information at a time, but if you take items and put them into categories, you can expand this capacity.

8. Learning To Count Cards Is Both Easy And Potentially Profitable

In movies like The Hangover, we see a character using crazy math calculations in order to count cards and get our main cast all the money they need to hopefully escape a sticky situation. The technique is made to look almost impossibly inaccessible to anyone who isn’t some kind of crazy genius at mathematics, and the drama is tuned up to the highest degree. However, the truth is it isn’t actually that hard to learn to count cards.

It does require discipline and practice, just like anything that you want to learn properly, and you will probably want to practice memory techniques as well to make sure you don’t make errors under pressure. However, it doesn’t require complex math. In fact, all it really requires is arithmetic, which is something most of us should have mastered long ago. As for whether it is legal, what happened in The Hangover was illegal as it was a conspiracy involving several people. However, if you are working alone without electronic help, you can count cards all day and all they can do is kick you out and tell you not to come back. 

7. Learning Human And Animal Body Language Is Like Teaching Yourself An Extra Sense

Most of us know a decent amount of human body language just from being, well, human. But there are many things we don’t know about the science involved, and if we teach ourselves to learn these tricks, it can feel like opening up an entirely new sense. This can be especially helpful with pets, who speak an entirely different language than we do.

Dog body language is mostly well known, but a lot of people don’t quite know cats so well, as studies on them haven’t been as common until more recently. What we do know makes it relatively easy to understand them though, and can open up new understanding between you and your cat. The most important thing is to watch their tail movements, which indicate most of their mood. A raised tail, for example, indicates interest and openness, but a thrashing tail means your cat is really, really angry and frustrated.

As for people, one trick many don’t know about is that by watching which way their eyes are moving, you can often tell if they are telling the truth or not. The trick is that when remembering things, people typically look left, and when thinking of something new, they probably look right and upward. If they are looking right and downward however, it could indicate they doubt their own words. 

6. Learn Classical Logic And Apply it To Your Everyday Thinking

A lot of us tend to think of ourselves as pretty logical, for the most part, and we like to believe that we are already applying logic most of the time to our everyday lives. However, while it is true most people are at least trying to be logical most of the time, that doesn’t mean they always are, or that they couldn’t be more logically sound if they took the time to learn classical logic. Now, the reason a lot of people don’t think too highly of it is that at its most basic level it can seem almost absurdly reductive, but that’s kind of the point.

The idea behind classical logic is to break things down into simple statements, like, “If I eat until I feel full, I ate enough; if I eat after I feel full, I ate too much.” It also breaks everything down into simple true, false, or both statements. This is actually really easy enough to learn, even if the more complicated version involves algebra. If you do teach yourself to start applying classical logic to everyday life, you can impress people with your complex problem solving skills. Also, by  forcing yourself to look at things logically, it will be much harder for the news to emotionally manipulate you as well.

5. Learning To Read Lips Is Useful, But It Can Be Misinterpreted

You’ve probably never thought too much about learning to read lips. Most people don’t. This is usually because we tend to think of it as a skill that’s something you only learn if you’re hard of hearing. It helps you figure out what people are saying when your ears are not working properly, and allows the person to better understand a conversation without needing the other person to know sign language. However, it can be useful for more than just people who are deaf, as sometimes when looking right at someone we might miss a word or two due to sound, and not want them to repeat themselves, or we might be trying to pick up part of a conversation from across the room.

Now, while anyone can read lips, it is important to know that reading lips should be largely based on context and not just what you thought you read. You should also be careful not to take action simply from what you thought you read from their lips. The reason for this is that a lot of words or phrases will make the same exact movement as other words or phrases, and context is not always enough to entirely make up for this.

4. Learning Just The Fundamentals Of A Wide Variety Of Subjects Has Multiple Advantages

It can be easy to get frustrated during your early years in college. You might be annoyed at having to take a bunch of general education courses that don’t seem to fit your major. This is a very common complaint, but the colleges stand firm, claiming that it is important for you to learn all of those things. Some people think it’s a conspiracy from the colleges to get you to spend more money going to unnecessary classes, but there is actually a good reason for all of this.

The thing is, while specializing is great, that doesn’t mean that you get to reach the skill of a specialist just by specialization alone. Most subjects have a lot of interconnected things that might not necessarily be a direct part of your major study, and making all these connections as you learn will help increase your understanding of your field. It will also make you a more well-rounded person capable of impressing people by at least understanding the basics of a lot more subjects. Finally, it will also help you with employers, who are looking for people with a more diverse skill set, and can help land you jobs in interconnected fields.

3. Even Sighted People Can Benefit From Learning How To Use Echolocation

Echolocation is something a lot of people think is just a skill that is unique to heroes like Daredevil, who are not at all real (well, as far as we know…). Now, while it is true that you are unlikely to ever learn to be able to use echolocation to the level that Daredevil can in the comics,  you can learn to use it to great effect, even if you can see just fine.

Some of you are probably wondering what the point of this is if you can already see, but echolocation is basically using your brain to create a sonar map. Anytime something is blocking your vision, you can use echolocation to get a better visual map of what might be behind the things that are obstructing your view. Some may think that only blind people can learn this, but the fact is that blind people actually don’t have extra hearing, and some studies have shown sighted people picking it up easier than blind people.

2. Train Yourself Not Just To See Or Hear, But To Observe

This all goes back to the basic principles of Sherlock-ian deduction, which can be best illustrated by a conservation Holmes once had with Dr. Watson where he  asks the good doctor if he knows how many steps lead up to their flat at 221b Baker Street. Watson cannot answer, and Holmes replies, “You see Watson, but you do not observe.” This fundamental principle is the basis of all of Sherlock’s deductions, as he has trained himself to actively observe everything around him, as opposed to just seeing it like most of us do.

Now, some may think this is splitting hairs, or just something you need if you are a detective, but there is a good reason for normal people to train their brains to think like this. There is something called situational blindness where we can see something daily, and be so used to the general schematic of it, that we don’t notice small changes. These changes could even cause you to have an accident in the wrong situation, so it’s good to actively keep your eye on things. Furthermore, by applying this skill to observing people, you will get a better handle on subtle mood shifts that you might have missed in your friends and workers.

1. You Can Become A Human Calculator By Learning Some Simple Tricks

Let’s start off by being clear that while everyone can learn it, there is a good reason this one is number one on the list. It’s easily the most impressive skill to learn, but it’s also going to require the most practice of any of them to really get down. That being said, for those who think this is a skill beyond them because it requires advanced math aptitude or skills, you can rest easy knowing that really isn’t the case. You may have seen people at the county fair or somewhere similar managing complex multiplication faster than you would be able to enter it into your calculator, and thought they were a real-life Will Hunting. However, they are using simple tricks and not advanced math. 

The first trick is knowing the basics of arithmetic really well, and understanding how to round up or down and simplify things by breaking them into chunks. If you know the basic principles, you just need to memorize most of the square roots, and then learn a simple formula you can use as a shortcut for advanced multiplication. If you understand that ((A Squared) – (B Squared)) = ((A + B) * (A – B)), how to plug in the right numbers, and you know your square roots, you too can be a math magician.

Have you ever fancied yourself as a linguistic whiz, adept at juggling many languages? Maybe you speak multiple languages with ease. But have you tried learning any of the top ten most challenging languages for non-native speakers?

These ten languages aren’t the language for a lingual hobbyist but linguistic beasts who are not easily discouraged! Interested yet? Let’s jump right in and learn why each offers a special tongue twister.

Related: 10 Extraordinary Languages That Do Not Involve Speaking

10 Mandarin Chinese

Mandarin Chinese is a language so vast and intricate that it leaves many feeling like they’re solving a never-ending puzzle! Before we can even talk about how verbally challenging this behemoth is, we must talk about writing it.

Mandarin’s writing system has thousands of unique characters to memorize; it will either break your brain or you’ll find your zen in the flowing character style.

If writing in Mandarin didn’t pose enough of a challenge for you, now we can discuss the challenges of speaking it. First, the grammar is an entirely different beast when compared to English and other Western languages. With no articles and a unique sentence structure, you might find constructing a sentence the same as building an Ikea desk with no hardware.

And to top it all off, Mandarin has four different tones that can completely alter a word’s meaning. You could end up saying someone is ugly when you meant smelly. Neither is great, but one is obviously going to hurt more.

This is one language you might want to ditch language apps and learn from a native tutor instead.

9 Arabic

Arabic is a Semitic language that originated in the Arabian Peninsula and is spoken by over 400 million people. It is the official language of 26 countries and has a rich cultural and historical significance.

So why is this language spoken by over 400 million people so difficult to master? The simple answer is variations. There are a lot of Arabic dialects, and each can differ significantly in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar.

Additionally, the writing system offers challenges like flowing from right to left. While that may be simple enough to master, the language also adds letters that can look different depending on their position in a word, with vowels often going incognito mode. Soon it can feel like you are decoding secret messages. And, like most languages, there’s the proverbial cherry on top of grammar. Arabic is no exception; it is full of intricate and intriguing verb forms and noun declensions that add to its already difficult level.

8 Japanese

Japanese undoubtedly deserves a spot on this list. Over 128 million people speak Japanese, mainly in—you guessed it—Japan. It’s hard not to be captivated by its unique writing system. However, the social and cultural aspects of the language are what really make it a challenge.

First, let’s look at writing Japanese. It is an art form blending Chinese characters (kanji) with two syllabic scripts (hiragana and katakana). Memorization and context will be your friends when mastering this writing style.

The next challenge is one where practice and repetition are all that will help. Japanese takes sentence structure and flips it from what English speakers are used to. Verbs go at the end of a sentence, and getting used to this arrangement is no easy feat. Just remember subject, object, then verb, and you’ll do just fine.

Now, this is what really earns Japanese a spot on the list. Context is king, Japanese culture places a lot of importance on social context, and various levels of politeness and honorifics need to be used correctly. Choosing the wrong one can make or break a conversation, so you must stay on your toes.

7 Korean

At first glance, you might look at Korean and think it isn’t that different from Mandarin or Japanese, but you would be wrong. It’d be like someone from Texas meeting someone from deep in the Louisiana Bayou.

Three things make the Korean language a challenge:

1. Grammar

2. Homophones

3. Phonetic writing

Korean can be a brain twister for non-native speakers, mostly because of its grammar. Word order, sentence structure, and verb endings are all things that lingual learners are going to have to master. And like Japanese, there is the honorific system, where vocabulary and verb forms change according to the speaker and listener’s status. Add double consonants, aspirated consonants, and vowel combinations that could leave English speakers tongue-tied.

Next up is a challenge that everyone learning English can relate to. Homophones! Korean is packed with homophones—words that sound the same but have different meanings. If you aren’t paying attention, you might say leg instead of bridge or fever when you meant ten.

The Hangul writing system might feel like learning to read and write all over again for English speakers. With phonetic letters representing sounds, the unfamiliar characters can be a tad overwhelming.

6 Finnish

Finnish is nothing short of a linguistic rollercoaster. It’s famous for its mind-bending grammar, intricate cases, and intriguing vowel harmony system. Oh yeah, and let’s not forget its extensive, compounding vocabulary!

Diving headfirst into Finnish grammar might feel like tackling a linguistic Rubik’s Cube, with 15 cases to juggle depending on sentence structure and context. Then there’s the tantalizing dance of Finnish vowels, ensuring they mesh just right within words, not to mention the ever-evolving consonant gradation. Just writing that sentence is making my head hurt.

But wait, there’s more! Finnish vocabulary loves borrowing from other languages, morphing those words to fit snugly into its unique grammar and pronunciation. It’s like a concussion where everyone looks familiar, but you just aren’t quite sure.

5 Hungarian

Hungarian is notorious for giving language learners a run for their money; it’s no wonder why this linguistic labyrinth made the cut.

Hungarian is an agglutinative language, meaning words can be assembled by stacking prefixes and suffixes like a Jenga tower. And if that’s not intimidating enough, try wrapping your brain around 18 different cases! In English, there are 3.

Also, Hungarian isn’t related to any Indo-European language, so good luck trying to find familiar vocabulary. Plus, Hungarian has some truly exotic vowel and consonant sounds that’ll have you practicing your pronunciation until the cows come home.

To master this one, you’ll have to focus on learning vocabulary in context and digging into the roots of Hungarian words.

4 Basque

Europe’s oldest enigmatic language proudly stands alone, unrelated to any other known language on Earth. So you know it’s going to be a challenge.

The Basque language is basically an exclusive club. Since it has no linguistic relatives, you won’t find any cognates or familiar-sounding words to help you. You’ll just have to dive into the deep end to learn about the complex grammar, agglutinative structure, and peculiar pronunciation. But learning the language could mean a study abroad trip to an idyllic area between France and Spain.

3 Icelandic

You might’ve heard that Icelandic is a bit of a tough nut to crack, and you wouldn’t be wrong! This North Germanic language has held on to its Viking roots better than Thor grasps his hammer. Iceland’s isolation means the language is relatively unchanged, making it a challenge to learn but also a linguistic time capsule.

Icelandic’s grammar system is the main challenge. There are four different cases for nouns, adjectives, and pronouns, each with its own rulebook for declension. Plus, there are irregular verbs you have to remember.

Icelandic’s love affair with declension doesn’t end there, folks. Every noun comes with its own declension pattern, altering itself based on gender and case. You basically have to possess Loki’s silver tongue to wield Icelandic masterfully.

To top it all off, Icelandic vocabulary is like Odin’s treasure room. There are words derived from Old Norse, a plethora of compound words, and neologisms (that’s a fancy word for new words). But if you’re reading this, you probably already knew that.

2 Polish

Polish grammar is a wild ride! With seven cases for nouns, adjectives, and pronouns, each word’s ending shifts depending on its role in a sentence. And once you get to verbs, each can have up to six different tenses.

Pronunciation and inflection are the secret spice in this sausage. Your inflection modifies nouns, verbs, prepositions, and conjunctions. And you can’t flop on the pronunciation, either. Polish has a trove of unique sounds, like nasal vowels and consonant clusters, which can make non-native speakers tongue-tied.

1 Navajo

Navajo, a Native American language primarily spoken in the American Southwest, is a real test for language enthusiasts. Navajo grammar is like a puzzle, with prefixes and suffixes snapping together to form words. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg! The language also features a captivating tonal system where pitch and stress can transform the meaning of words and phrases.

If for some reason you doubt just how challenging a language Navajo can be, here is probably the greatest social proof you’ll ever find. During WW2, the Allies used Navajo code talkers to transmit sensitive information because the language was too hard to learn and be cracked by the enemy. So, yeah, good luck with that one.

Schools in the United States have set aside the month of February to teach history as it relates specifically to African Americans, their impact on sociopolitical events, and their contributions to society as a whole. Every kid who grew up in America knows of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., but there were thousands of amazing people who fought for civil rights and did wondrous things for humanity.

The real unsung heroes in American history aren’t just African Americans; they are African American women who often took a backseat to the accomplishments of men. Here are ten amazing women you likely never learned about during Black History Month, presented in no particular order.

10 Diane Nash

Diane Nash was born in 1938 in Chicago, Illinois, where she was raised far from the disturbing segregation that was rampant in the South at the time. She planned on becoming a nun in honor of her Catholic upbringing, but that all changed when she attended Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. There, she saw and experienced racial segregation for the first time under the banner of Jim Crow laws when she was forced to use a “Colored Women” restroom for the first time in her life. That event changed her, and she abandoned her plans and became a full-time activist for civil rights.^[1]

She threw herself into the Civil Rights Movement and was instrumental in integrating lunch counters via sit-ins. She also participated in the Freedom Riders and helped to desegregate interstate travel, co-founded the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and worked on the Selma Voting Rights Movement, which further helped to push the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Her efforts helped make it possible for millions of African Americans to vote in the United States.

9 Ella Baker

Ella Baker was a civil rights activist born in Norfolk, Virginia, in 1903. She spent the better part of 50 years of her life working behind the scenes alongside some of the biggest names in the movement. Baker spent years organizing events for the likes of Thurgood Marshall, Martin Lither King Jr., and many more, but her influence extended to those she mentored. Baker had numerous mentees under her belt over the years, including the aforementioned Diane Nash, Bob Moses, and Rosa Parks.

Baker was the primary advisor and strategist of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and has been called one of the most important African American leaders of the 20th century. In her own words, she described why she wasn’t as well-known as her peers: “You didn’t see me on television; you didn’t see news stories about me. The kind of role that I tried to play was to pick up pieces or put together pieces out of which I hoped organization might come. My theory is, strong people don’t need strong leaders.”^[2]

8 Katherine Johnson

When people think back to the early days of NASA and the Apollo missions, they tend to focus on the men who set foot on the Moon. There’s nothing wrong with that—they achieved amazing feats of daring exploration, but they never would have made it there had it not been for the work of Katherine Johnson. Johnson worked for NASA as a mathematician who calculated complicated orbital mechanics. Her manual calculations of complex equations made it possible for the astronauts and engineers to point a rocket to the sky, land men on the Moon, and bring them home safely.^[3]

Her work began before NASA even existed and helped the Mercury program with calculations of trajectories and launch windows. She was instrumental in launching the Space Shuttle program and has contributed a great deal of information and expertise for NASA’s various missions to Mars. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015 by President Obama and was a lead character in the 2016 movie Hidden Figures, which focused on the female mathematicians who made space travel possible.

7 Septima Poinsette Clark

Septima Poinsette Clark was born in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1898. She grew up to become a prominent civil rights activist who focused her work on the teaching of literacy and the education of children. Her belief was that the Civil Rights Movement followed the path that “knowledge could empower marginalized groups in ways that formal legal equality couldn’t.” Her focus on education brought her to the attention of other civil rights activists, including Dr. King, who called her “The Mother of the Movement.”

Though she was a prominent figure who played a pivotal role in the movement, her work was somewhat unappreciated by some prominent leaders. This was the result of the gender inequality that was not only going on throughout American society at the time but within the Civil Rights Movement itself. Her impact on the movement centered on the creation of “Citizenship Schools,” which taught adults in the Deep South how to read. Spreading literacy throughout the American South helped to fuel the movement and impacted thousands of people.^[4]

6 Esther Jones

At the height of her fame, most people in Harlem knew who Esther Jones, otherwise known as “Baby Esther,” was. Jones was a regular performer in the Cotton Club, where she entertained the masses by singing in her signature “baby talk” style. She recorded Helen Kane’s “I Wanna Be Loved By You” with multiple uses of the words “boo-boo-boo” and “boop-boop-a-doop.” Those may sound familiar if you’ve ever seen or heard the famous cartoon character from the 1930s called Betty Boop. Though she is drawn to look like a white woman, she was directly inspired by Jones.

Jones’s story is a common one in African American history, as her likeness and singing style were appropriated without her consent. Kane brought a lawsuit against Fleischer Studios claiming the character was a deliberate caricature of her work, but the trial determined that Baby Esther was responsible for the “baby” style of singing, which proved to be the original inspiration for Boop. Jones never received the money or fame she deserved while she was alive and has since gone on to be known as Betty Boop’s “black grandmother.”^[5]

5 Mary Kenner

Mary Kenner was born and raised in Monroe, North Carolina, where she grew up to become an inventor. She found an early love of discovery from her father, which helped to push her to become the inventor of the sanitary belt. Her device inspired modern-day menstrual pads, but thanks to racial prejudices, it languished without a patent for 30 years.^[6] The company she originally pitched it to scoffed at selling it once it was revealed that Kenner was an African American woman. Today, versions of her invention are sold across the planet to hundreds of millions of women regardless of their race or Kenner’s.

Throughout her life, Kenner invented numerous devices still found commonly throughout the world today. All told, she was issued five patents for household and personal use items, including a bathroom tissue holder that kept the next tissue in the roll outside the box and readily available, a carrier attachment for an invalid walker, and a back washer mounted on a shower wall and bathtub. She never made a lot of money from her inventions and instead hoped to make life easier for people.

4 Marian Anderson

Marian Anderson was a prominent singer born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, back in 1897. While there were many talented African American performers throughout the early 20th century, Anderson holds the distinction of being the first black person to perform at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City in 1955. Her rise to fame came out of the turmoil of racial persecution and segregation. In 1939, she was forbidden from performing at Constitution Hall in Washington, DC, by the Daughters of the American Revolution due to the fact that the audience was integrated.

The incident brought her talents to the attention of the international community as well as to some prominent Americans. Eleanor Roosevelt recognized her abilities and helped to bring Anderson to Washington to perform an open-air concert on Easter Sunday 1939 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.^[7] More than 75,000 people made up the integrated audience, with millions more tuning in to listen on their radios. Her accomplishments earned her numerous awards over the course of her life and helped pave the way for other talented African American musicians performing in a divided nation.

3 Claudette Colvin

While most people in the United States and around the world know the name Rosa Parks, far fewer are aware of another pioneer in the Civil Rights Movement named Claudette Colvin. Nine months before Parks refused to give up her seat, Colvin did the same at the age of 15 in Montgomery, Alabama. She was arrested and became one of five plaintiffs challenging Montgomery’s segregated bus laws the following year. Browder v. Gayle went all the way to the Supreme Court in 1956. Colvin was the last to testify in the case, which ultimately determined the Alabama laws unconstitutional.^[8]

She wasn’t recognized by many of the black leaders in the movement at the time due to being so young. She was also unmarried and pregnant and had no civil rights training, but she wasn’t bitter about not being recognized in the same way as Parks: “I’m not disappointed. Let the people know Rosa Parks was the right person for the boycott. But also let them know that the attorneys took four other women to the Supreme Court to challenge the law that led to the end of segregation.”

2 Ida B. Wells

Ida B. Wells was born into a life of slavery in Holly Springs, Mississippi, in 1862. She was freed via the Emancipation Proclamation during the Civil War and became the provider for her family at the age of 16 when both her parents succumbed to yellow fever. Eventually, she became a teacher in Memphis, Tennessee, where she co-owned a newspaper called the Memphis Free Speech and Headlight—the first of many important publications she would put her name upon. She rose to prominence as an investigative journalist following her work covering numerous lynchings in the United States.^[9]

This brought the ire of whites who sought to intimidate her by destroying her newspaper office and printing press, but that only pushed her to further action. She moved to Chicago, Illinois, and became one of the most outspoken African American activists in the burgeoning women’s suffrage movement. She helped found the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909 by joining others in the “founding forty” and helped spark the flame that would ultimately become the Civil Rights Movement in America.

1 Dr. Mae Jemison

Mae Carol Jemison was born in Decatur, Alabama, in 1956 but moved with her family at the age of three to Chicago, where she could take advantage of a better education. That education served her well, as she is best known for being the first African American woman to travel into space. She was a part of the crew of the Space Shuttle Endeavor on September 12, 1992. All told, she spent 190 hours, 30 minutes, and 23 seconds in space, but that was hardly the only amazing achievement in her life. Prior to joining NASA’s astronaut corps, she served in the Peace Corps for two years, during which she used her training as a physician in Liberia and Sierra Leone.^[10]

She remained with NASA until 1993, when she left to found a company that researched the application of technology in daily life. Her work with NASA earned her an appearance on an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, in which she played Lieutenant Palmer. She holds nine honorary doctorates (in addition to her Ph.D.) in engineering, science, letters, and the humanities.