This has been a very aged fallacy I have ever heard that even some practioners and intellectuals believe in. It is not true that we are using only 33% (other version says 10%) of our brain. In fact we are using 100% of it.

If I got lucky to find the source of my statement, I will post it immediately.

The brain organ is a wonderous thing isn't it? There have been many theories on brians, our usage, and the development. The first 5 years are crucial in brain development, after that, many brain cells die if they were not used. The best way to use your entire brain is to continue learning throughout your entire life. The other 2 thirds of our brain is waiting to be used, so use it! Learn something different and new. Get involved in classes to use different areas of your brain (language, perception etc.)....

The brain organ is a wonderous thing isn't it? There have been many theories on brians, our usage, and the development. The first 5 years are crucial in brain development, after that, many brain cells die if they were not used. The best way to use your entire brain is to continue learning throughout your entire life. The other 2 thirds of our brain is waiting to be used, so use it! Learn something different and new. Get involved in classes to use different areas of your brain (language, perception etc.).

I would like to start by saying that this is a particular field that has my interest. I'm a psychology student, for starters. The most recent discoveries concerning the brain, that came to my attention, state that our brain is rather flexible. Indeed this conflicts with the long-believed statement that brain cells tend to die when they're un-used. In fact, what happens is the brain adapts itself. We use actually all of our brain cells, however most of these are used for automatic actions like breath, body-temperature, e...

I would like to start by saying that this is a particular field that has my interest. I'm a psychology student, for starters. The most recent discoveries concerning the brain, that came to my attention, state that our brain is rather flexible. Indeed this conflicts with the long-believed statement that brain cells tend to die when they're un-used. In fact, what happens is the brain adapts itself. We use actually all of our brain cells, however most of these are used for automatic actions like breath, body-temperature, etc. The neurons (cells of the brain) that are used for a certain task become more complex when this specific task is preformed more often. So practice makes perfect! But let me add up to this: not only does the structure and organisation of the neurons become more adapted to routined tasks (however complex these tasks may be), the things we do most take up the biggest part of our brain. For example a busdriver would have a bigger part of his brain active on things like anticipating traffic, using the controls of a bus etc., whilst a writer would have a larger lingual area in the brain. Again these are recent findings, but in the real life situations they are no less valid.

Let me get it down in as few lines as possible. Let look at the brain as a group of neurons. The brain is then designed to use these neurons for all the task we face in life (from brushing teeth, to simply looking arround, to very complex school-stuff or work) and assigns neurons to these tasks. The more often we need a certain task, the more the brain-cells try to specialize in this, and therefore more neurons are included in the task and more connections are made between neurons.

We use a part of our brain for conscious task (the so-called one-third), whilst a big part simply acts as a director who keeps things going the way they should.

Has this answer been helpful to you? Please let me know!By the flexibility of the brain I'm not only talking about the first five years. The brain remains dynamic (changeable) our whole life! This is very important in my answer. It's never to late to learn new things. However, there is evidence for a certain 'peek period' for learning, where the brain would be more sensitive toward adaptations. It's said to be around the 20 years of age, and that's also when the rest of the physical body is at a 'peek' of dynamic and fit-ness.

Let me clear you one thing that less than 10% of our brain is being used throughout of our life. More than 90% of our brain is referred as unconcious brain. In Vedic era, all systems of spiritual learning like "practicing yoga" or "mantra chanting" had been based on the following facts :-
How to use our 100 % brain power?
How to reach from our conscious to super conscious level?
...

Let me clear you one thing that less than 10% of our brain is being used throughout of our life. More than 90% of our brain is referred as unconcious brain. In Vedic era, all systems of spiritual learning like "practicing yoga" or "mantra chanting" had been based on the following facts :-
How to use our 100 % brain power?
How to reach from our conscious to super conscious level?
How to increase our life expectancy?
So more than 90% of our brain is waiting for us ....that when will we able to use it?