Scribbling rapidly on a paper, time ticking, pin drop silence with so many questions still left unanswered. Suddenly, from a corner of the examination hall someone sneezes! The silence breaks and so does the act of blessing — “God bless you” from someone’s mouth.

This unforgettable memory from school and the habit of responding to a sneeze with ‘God bless you’ is something that we tend to keep for the rest of our lives.

Interestingly, there is a story that explains the reason behind the response.

Responding to a sneeze with a ‘God bless you’ was declared as the correct response to someone’s sneeze on February 16, 600 AD by Pope Gregory I.

According to history, due to the plague of 590 AD, blessings were imparted on people to save them from being affected by the plague. Hence, as a precautionary measure, whenever a person sneezed, ‘God bless you’ became the most used response. However, there are lesser known facts about it.

Sneezing is like falling in love

When you see your crush in front of you, your heart skips a beat. It is said that when a person sneezes the heart skips a beat which is not exactly what the heart does. A sneeze changes the blood flow rate and blood pressure due to which the rhythm of the heart undergoes a change which is generally called skip of the beat.

Sneezing makes our body reboot

Just like the smartphone in your pocket needs to reboot once in a while, the human nasal cavity needs to be reset, according to a research at University of Pennsylvania, and to do that we sneeze.

Sneeze can travel around 100 miles an hour

The air moves out of the nose so quickly because of which a noise is produced. The faster the air moves, the louder the sneeze. The speed with which the air comes out is equivalent to around 100 miles an hour of speed.

Spray of the sneeze can reach five feet

So when the teacher asked to cover the face while sneezing, it had a significant reason behind it. With basic etiquettes it also helped in saving the people in vicinity.

Sneeze and sleep don’t go hand in hand

A person cannot sneeze while sleeping hence, if your roommate sneezes while sleeping you now know that there is some pretention in front of your eyes.

Try to sneeze with eyes wide open

This is that one challenge that you can pose and never lose. A person can never sneeze with eyes open. Eyes tend to close automatically when a person sneezes.

Sneezing vs Workout

One sneeze engages throat, chest, diaphragm, and abdomen. Hence, it is not less than a workout!

So next time when you sneeze and no one is around to say ‘God bless you’ to you, don’t worry just let your heart skip a beat.