Nov 14, 2017 - Binaural beats therapy is an emerging form of soundwave therapy in which the right and left ears listen to two slightly different frequency tones.
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How do I find interesting frequencies to listen to?Newbie here. I've just got my technician license and a Baofeng radio. If I randomly scan the frequencies in my area (San Jose, CA), I rarely (= never) hear anything aside from a couple of NOAA channels. What am I missing? Is this an antenna or location problem or I am not listening to the right channels? I don't care about transmitting, but I would like to experiment with antennas and having a few stations to listen to would be helpful. Thanks.
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For as long as she can remember, Jessica Trimberger has lived with anxiety. âI find it hard to be motivated and am generally jittery,â she says. Trimberger, who owns a company that makes small-batch beauty products, also has trigeminal neuralgia â a facial nerve disorder often called the âsuicide diseaseâ due to its painful and hard to control flare-ups. âAnxiety and stress are some of my largest triggers,â she says, adding that the medications sheâs tried have only left her groggy and feeling âout of it.â But nine months ago, Trimberger found something that did help her feel better: a soundwave phenomenon known as binaural beats â subtle, surreal beats that are sometimes cocooned in relaxing music and seem to pulsate deep inside the brain. When Trimberger first learned about binaural beats, she says she began searching and found a free recording online. Thinking âit couldnât hurt,â she listened and found the experience was better than she expected. After just 10 minutes, she became relaxed enough to better tolerate her pain. Encouraged, she listened again, night after night. A month of binaural beats later, Trimberger says she noticed something miraculous. âI was happier, better rested, and not in pain,â she says. â[Binaural beats] are one of the best things to happen to me.â The illusion of binaural beatsIf youâve ever done an online search for âstress reliefâ or âanxiety cure,â chances are youâve already heard of binaural beats. These otherworldly beats are big on YouTube, promising to cure everything from insomnia to fear, while improving poor memory and an anemic happiness level. While it may be easy to dismiss binaural beats as the next wellness gimmick currently enjoying its 15 minutes of fame, thereâs some science behind these sounds⦠which arenât actually sounds at all. Experts credit a Prussian meteorologist named Heinrich Wilhelm Dove for discovering binaural beats way back in 1839. Also called âbrain entrainment,â theyâve largely been considered an oddity more than a useful medical treatment. âBinauralâ means ârelating to both ears.â When you play a tone with a slightly different frequency into your left and right ear â say, 200 hertz (Hz) in one and 210 Hz in the other â they travel separately to your inferior colliculus, the part of your brain that gathers auditory input. There, the tones âsquelchâ together into a so-called âbeatâ at a perceived new frequency. (In this case, it would be 10 Hz.) Although it sounds hard to believe, essentially, âyouâre hearing something thatâs not really there,â explains Troy A. Smith, PhD, an assistant professor of psychological science at the University of North Georgia in Gainesville, Georgia, who has studied binaural beats. No one is arguing whether or not they exist, by the way. âThe question is,â says Smith, âdo they influence cognitive processes?â In other words, what the heck do they do to your brain? Some people believe that once binaural beats introduce a new frequency to your brain, your brain waves feel compelled to sync to it, effectively launching you into a different âbrain state.â Your brain has five different types of waves. Generally speaking, low-frequency waves are linked to âdeltaâ and âthetaâ states which can boost relaxation and improve sleep. Higher frequencies reportedly boost your brain waves into a âgammaâ state which may make you more alert, focused, or better able to recall memories. Mid-range frequencies have been linked to attention. Your brain moves into an âalphaâ state when your focus turns inward (as in meditation) and a âbetaâ state when your attention is tuned to the world around you. âThereâs lots of evidence that brain waves correlate with these stages,â says Smith, and makers of binaural beats believe they can help people navigate between them all. Since opening their online store in 2011, Binaural Beats Meditation has served âhundreds of thousandsâ of customers, according to James Matthews, the siteâs customer happiness manager. âWe continue to see an increase in interest⦠from individuals, but increasingly so from therapists using the music to help clients, health and wellness organizations, and businesses around the world.â What are the most common reasons their customers are motivated to try binaural beats? âAnxiety, stress, and sleep,â Matthews says. âWe also have many people using our music for pain relief, either as an alternative or complementary addition to prescription medication â depending on the severity of their condition.â The concept of binaural beats isnât that different from music. âHumans have enjoyed and benefited from music for thousands of years,â says Matthews. âThe work weâre doing seeks to continue this tradition and help people find increased happiness and well-being through the power of sound.â Some studies â albeit small ones â show that binaural beats can have a positive effect. For instance, a Montreal study of 15 âmildly anxiousâ volunteers found a significant reduction in their anxiety when they listened to binaural beats at least 5 times each week for a month. During a European study, 15 young elite soccer players were asked to listen to binaural beats during their sleep for 8 weeks. They swear they slept better. And when researchers in Richmond, Virginia, requested 36 adults with chronic pain to listen to two recordings of binaural beats for 20 minutes each day for 2 weeks, 77 percent felt their pain lessened. Thereâs even some evidence that binaural beats can have more than mental health effects. Some data indicates they may even be effective at managing tinnitus (ringing in your ears). Still, not everyone is convinced theyâre a panacea. âI have taken a lot of physics classes and still would not say this is real or makes sense,â says Dr. Clifford Segil, a neurologist at Providence Saint Johnâs Health Center in Santa Monica, California. The beat goes on?Segil says binaural beats are being marketed as a âmodern biofeedback mechanism.â And while he feels no harm can come from listening to them â so long as people donât crank the volume for long periods of time and damage their hearing â heâs quick to point out: âThe benefits are less clear.â âBinaural beats may be good for meditation and relaxing, but that is probably all they are good for,â Segil says. âItâs challenging to say listening to these tones is going to cause a personâs brain waves, as measured on an EEG (electroencephalogram), to synchronize with the toneâs frequencies.â The brain pathways for sound tracks through the brain stem, then into the thalamus, and then into the auditory cortex. Segil says heâs unaware of any legitimate research that notes binaural beats stimulate this pathway any more than white noise or calming music. (Both of which have been extensively studied.) âListening to calming music in our busy lives probably does reduce stress and reduce anxiety, but itâs challenging to say that these tones can increase focus, concentration, or confidence,â he adds. âI would think that listening to âelevator music,â classical music, and music like Enya are equally likely to result in these benefits.â Last year, Smith and one of his students, Lynn Cameron, studied the effects of binaural beats on long-term memory. The first experiment didnât show that listening to binaural beats had any measurable effect. Neither did the second. Or the third. But during that final experiment, which monitored participants with EEGs, they did notice something interesting. When participants listened to binaural beats, their neuroactivity changed. âBinaural beats did seem to change the way participantsâ brains processed information during the study, but it didnât necessarily make it better,â Smith says. In other words, binaural beats do something to the brain, but exactly what isnât yet clear. If someone tries binaural beats and feels it meets their expectations â whatever they may be, âit may be that theyâre cued into the part of the change that worked for them,â says Smith, âbut we have no idea what works for some people and not others.â Should you march to this new beat?âIf youâre not paying for it, it canât hurt,â says Smith. Bhojpuri dj song mp3 download. Segil agrees. âI think taking time to relax during our busy lives and carve out time to meditate and listen to music is beneficial,â he says. â[Binaural beats] are probably reasonable to use while meditating or doing yoga, but I would not expect them to make you ace a test.â Nevertheless, for people like Jessica Trimberger who say listening to these sounds are having a positive effect on their well-being, itâs an outcome thatâs, well⦠hard to beat. Trimberger says she now faithfully listens to binaural beats for roughly 20 minutes each day. Since adding them to her daily routine, she claims sheâs been able to stop taking medication for her trigeminal neuralgia. She says the flare-ups she used to endure roughly once a month have also disappeared. âBinaural beats have changed my life in a way I cannot even explain,â she says. âI sleep better every night. I am in less pain. I feel less stress and anxiety. Itâs made almost all aspects of my life better.â Listen to a selection of various binaural beats in the videos below:
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