Most people would likely agree that the feeling of great annoyance—often over relatively minor things—is quite universal; people don’t need to speak the same language or be from the same area to know just how aggravating a sock sliding halfway off in a shoe can be.
Similar annoying occurrences are often depicted on the ‘Mildly Infuriating’ subreddit, which currently boasts over 7.4 million members from all over the place. For many of them, the sub is a source of comfort that they’re not alone in being annoyed by the daily inconveniences in life, and if you’re curious to see what said inconveniences entail, scroll down to find some examples on the list below; but do it at your own risk, as they might leave you mildly infuriated, too.
Below you will also find Bored Panda’s interview with Emeritus Professor of Psychology Joseph Hellige, who was kind enough to answer a few of our questions about why we find certain things mildly infuriating.
#1 The Aluminum Foil Is Stuck Like This
Image credits: yas_00
#2 When You Tear Exactly Where It Says To, But The Bag Remains Sealed
Image credits: reddit.com
#3 The Pocket Size In Female vs. Male Levi’s Jeans. I‘Ve Just Bought The "Male" Model Which Fits Me Perfectly. Why Do Jeans Manufacturers Think That Women Don’t Deserve Large Pockets?
Image credits: Suspicious_Salad_864
Sometimes it doesn’t take much for us to become annoyed, or say, mildly infuriated; something as simple as uneven or unmatching items or gaps in places they shouldn’t be can make us noticeably irritated. The answer to why that happens seemingly lies in the way our brain is wired.
“In said examples, networks in the anterior cingulate cortex and connected regions activate when our expectations are violated, when we see or experience something different from what we expect,” Emeritus Professor of Psychology Joseph Hellige explained. “As simple as a gap when we didn’t expect one and as complicated as an insult when we expected praise. Registering a deviation from expectation is largely automatic.”
#4 That's Probably The Most Infuriating Thing About The Tape
Image credits: tetrodoxin1
#5 This Makes Me Unreasonably Mad Every Time I Walk By
Image credits: justyannicc
Prof. Hellige continued to explain that whether we find certain things or occurrences annoying or pleasurable depends on numerous different brain networks. “For example, the insular cortex is activated when we experience something physically unpleasant, like biting into rancid meat, or psychologically unpleasant, like overhearing someone criticize us.”
According to the expert, the seemingly minor annoyances vary from person to person based on context and life experience. “One person’s annoyance can even be another’s pleasure. The dissonance in Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring might grate on my nerves but be beautiful to a more trained mind.”
#6 Oh, Come On. Mildly Infuriating Indeed
Image credits: Gjallardoodle
#7 Nothing Worse Than Rock-Hard Butter, Thin White Bread, And A Whole Lot Of Hunger
Image credits: joonosaurus
#8 New Sports Bra Comes With Over 20 Tags Sewn In. It Takes Surgical Precision To Remove Them Without Damaging The Bra
Image credits: CitizenVixen
Dr. Hellige explained that the level of how strongly a person feels about certain annoyances relates to relative levels of activation among brain areas, including those in the limbic system and prefrontal cortex.
“The level of irritation also tends to increase when a person already feels stressed or is overly tired. Parents know this well; the never-ending questions from our three-year-old are a pleasure when we’re well-rested and unhurried, but after two nights of little sleep with a work project overdue, the same behavior becomes irritating.”
#9 Wore These "Waterproof" Hiking Boots For 30 Minutes In The Rain. Now I Have To Walk Home
Image credits: Duper18108
#10 All Of My Bananas Unpeeled Themselves As I Slept Last Night. I’ve Never Seen This Happen Before
Image credits: Peachy_moon12
#11 My Wife Is Grocery Shopping For Thanksgiving, And There's Only One Cashier Open
Image credits: deutschHotel
Since no one is immune to annoyances and infuriating things, arguably the only thing we can do is try to manage our emotions. Dr. Hellige suggested that first and foremost, it’s important to try and be well-rested and maintain low levels of stress. “Easy to say, hard to do,” he added.
“Try to keep things in perspective,” the professor of psychology continued. “Very few things are actually matters of life and death, but we have inherited some brain regions that aren’t so good at telling the difference. Fortunately, other regions, like our prefrontal cortex, work to slow us down, be reflective, and moderate the effects of some of those other regions. Take a deep breath, and let your prefrontal cortex do its work.”
#12 My Alarm Clock Likes To Randomly Change Its Brightness To Match The Surface Of The Sun. This Thing Is Unreasonably Bright (Not Edited, This Thing Lights Up The Entire Room)
Image credits: marktherobot-youtube
#13 It Finally Happened. I Was Prompted To Tip At The Airport Self-Checkout Station
Image credits: _seaweed_
#14 For The 1000th Time, I Made The Mistake Of Touching My Ice Cream Sandwich
Image credits: JELLY-ROCKET
The reason it’s important to try and manage our reaction to infuriating things—no matter how big or small—is because they often entail stress, which can accumulate and result in detrimental effects to our well-being.
“Beyond an optimal level of alertness, adding stress takes a toll on our judgment as well as things like blood pressure and heart health more generally,” Dr. Hellige pointed out. “There is no way to avoid all annoyances; nor would we survive long if we weren’t responsive to genuine threats. But, there are well-documented negative consequences of chronic stress. And, whether we realize it or not, constant annoyances over insignificant things add up.”
#15 It’s Getting Out Of Hand. Asked To Tip For An Online Purchase, When I Put $0, It Redirected Me To This
Image credits: mxrcarnage
#16 Printer Pulled This Nonsense Right Before Alerting Me It Was Low On Ink
Image credits: Defiant_Ad9788
#17 This Happens To Me Every Time
Image credits: twotonekevin
Luckily, the pictures of mildly infuriating things are arguably not as stressful or annoying as having to deal with such things in real life. So if you feel like they don’t affect you or you know that you can manage your emotions, continue to our previous collections of mildly infuriating things here and here and see what other things might make fellow netizens somewhat infuriated.
#18 This Typo Caused Me To Fail The Entire Assignment
Image credits: nlwfty
#19 ATM At Grand Central Ate My Debit Card
Image credits: rivibird
#20 They're The Same Number
Image credits: coffee-headache
#21 There’s No Way Anyone Believes This Is An Efficient Way To Display Drinks. Had To Open 5 Doors Until I Found What I Wanted
Image credits: PaleBlueDotEnthused
#22 Taste The Feeling (Frustration)
Image credits: HUNAcean
#23 So Close
Image credits: reddit.com
#24 Why Does This Always Happen?
Image credits: Trader_Gambler
#25 Explaining Silent "K" To A 2-Year-Old Is Needlessly Annoying
Image credits: dayofthedude
#26 This Is Why I Hate Paper Straws
Image credits: RoboLoco51
#27 The Way The Plastic Film Doesn’t Come Off Of The Fridge Handles. Been Like This For 3 Years
Image credits: dodoloko
#28 I've Been Stuck Here Waiting For The Train To Move For The Last 40 Minutes
Image credits: potato_soup303
#29 The Way These Canvases Were Hung Up In The Bathroom Of My Local Sushi Restaurant
Image credits: stephanonymous
#30 I’m 28
Image credits: Eyeamanon28
#31 When Converse Shoes Do This. I Hate When The Tongue Doesn't Stay Centered
Image credits: Number-91
#32 All The Icing On My Donut Stuck To The Bag
Image credits: Sololop
#33 The Giant Hole(S) In My Loaf Of Bread. We Pay $8 For This Specialty Allergy-Free Bread, And Half Of It Is Unusable For Sandwiches. I Had To Laugh
Image credits: Bighawklittlehawk
#34 I Got A Free Printer From Somebody Moving, Turns Out The Ink In It Can't Be Used Without A Subscription
Image credits: fiftyfourseventeen
#35 You Are Given 0 Time To Interpret This Sign And All Of Its Arrows
Image credits: Tm23246
#36 When You Take A Pregnancy Test And Get No Result
My husband and I are dying to find out. So, I took a test, and I did not get "pregnant" or "not pregnant". I literally got NO results. A defective test - it's really frustrating. Trying a different brand test tomorrow morning.
Image credits: WarDog1983
#37 Spent 3 Hours On This Puzzle For This. I Swear I've Triple-Checked, All The Other Pieces Are In The Right Spot
Image credits: chasinghappin3ss
#38 Wrong End Of The Fork Fell Into The Bowl. Not The End Of The World, But Certainly Mildly Infuriating
Image credits: kingbob123456
#39 Waited Two Months For A Doctor's Appointment, Left An Hour Early
I called and said I'd be 30 minutes late. They said, "Sucks to be you, if you want to reschedule the next availability is February".
Image credits: LizzyShort
#40 First Time Wearing These Weatherproof Steel-Toe Boots. Two Hours Into My Shift, The Leather Has Already Completely Cracked
Image credits: TheLastGarf
#41 The Security Tag In This Book Didn’t Come Off Cleanly
Image credits: 1019gunner
#42 Our Food Processor Is Battery-Powered, But The Battery Only Lasts For 2 Minutes, And I Can't Use It While It's Charging
Image credits: Jaybro838
#43 Brand New Shoes With Their Own Shoelaces
Image credits: reddit_0885
#44 The Sizes For My Uniform At Work
Image credits: wittyusername535
#45 This Roll Of Toilet Paper That Gets Thinner And Thinner As You Unwind It
I started to rapidly unspool it to see how far it went on like that because I figured it couldn’t be far. Still searching for the end of it.
Image credits: Miserable_Waterfall
#46 The "Medium" Sized T-Shirt I Got My Husband For Christmas With An Actual Medium Shirt On Top. There Are Slight Size Differences, And Then There Is This
Image credits: stoofkeegs
#47 That Was Only Wine Opener As Well
Image credits: TheHoundsofLondon
#48 After Finishing My DIY LED Cloud Lights, Part Of The Strip Just Happens To Change To A Different Color
The only way to fix this is by taking all of the polyester fiber down and restringing a new set of lights that aren’t faulty.
Image credits: IdioticShrimp
#49 Wanted To Use My Nintendo eShop Card, But Peeled Off The Code With The Sticker
Image credits: BurntBox21
#50 When Our Plates Chip, It’s Always In The Same Way And Size
Image credits: MrCantPlayGuitar
