Altered states of consciousness induced by breathwork accompanied by music
journals.plos.org
journals.plos.org
The goggles w/ binaural beats create some weird sort of state where I don't feel any connection to my environment. After only a couple minutes my body turns to total mush and my brain comes alive with phosphene visuals. By about 15 minutes in, my stomach usually gurgles a bit, not unlike the indigestion that often accompanies psychedelic trips.
Interestingly enough, these machines are marketed as brainwave entrainment, but the literature on that says the visual component doesn't really have much impact. Yet auditory entrainment on its own doesn't seem to do much for me either, or at least, not convincing enough beyond placebo.
There is an app for the iPhone called Lumenate that uses the LED flash and it seems to work, though it's not as strong for me as the multi-LED goggles I used to use. Still, it's a great gateway for those who are curious.
Finding a lay down on an accu-pressure mat very helpful these days (tho a bit steeper adoption curve tbqh)
The most surprising thing is that despite the initial discomfort, I often find myself waking up on the thing an hour or more after laying down on it. I always set a stopwatch timer on my phone when I use it since 20 full minutes on it is the baseline recommendation, but very often I'll blow right past that.
It takes some conditioning, you most likely won't last 5+ minutes the first time.
Forgot to add: BUY THE PILLOW TOO. The whole set is worth it.
It should get you snoozy. Some nature sounds in the background etc should get you back to sleep.
I've always been a really good sleeper. The cold feet trick worked for me because I grew up in a house without central heating in Ireland. So if I woke I'd toddle to the toilet and back, by the time I did that I was properly cold. And I run quite hot so I heat up under the covers quickly. boom back to sleep.
How long do you do these sessions for?
Been there, done that
The sensation induced by binaural beats are based on brain waves synchronisation, basically we get control of the stick shifter of the brain, and we perceive the changes strongly, as they are much faster than usual.
TLDR: you definitely feel them, and it feels a bit like getting high.
Chemical induced states of altered consciousness are of a fundamentally different nature. Keeping the car centric metaphor it would be like switching the type of fuel you are giving to the engine. It feels different, for different reasons.
Can't claim it would produce the same results for everyone, but I provided a free, low friction option for anyone curious.
This isn’t well known because his name was (deservedly) mud at the time, but Timothy Leary did a lot of work with sound and lights. He did his light shows when he was a pop guru, but he was even doing this work before he got fired from Harvard.
At the time, he considered it following the history of altered states. In the nineties when he had mellowed out, Leary started talking about lights, sound and technology. Here’s one example:
https://www.sidjacobson.com/Portals/23/articles/Tim%20Leary%...
I’ve had a few experiences with non chemically induced altered states. They’re psychedelic-ish, but not really comparable to a substance like psilocybin. They’re definitely altered states, just while I could draw a picture to describe mild effects of psilocybin to a non user, I couldn’t with music and light.
They’re both altered but very different.
I guess if we'd want to know for sure we'd need to test the light and sound technique with people who haven't used psilocybin before, then let them try psilocybin so they can compare the experience, and then let them try the light and sound machine again to see if anything changed in how "suggestive" they are to the experience. And compare against a light-and-sound machine only control group. I doubt we'll see that happen any time soon though.
I have no doubt it's possible to activate this through breath work and various means like religious experiences etc, I've done so myself. A strong psylocbin induced separation is far more intense by an almost incomprehensible order of magnitude.
For an example, let's say you induce a, for lack of a better term, trip from breath work. At no point is it going to get so intense that every aspect of your body and conscience forgets that you are doing the breathwork and you are unable to stop even when prompted by people such as EMT's and police. Physically ending the breathwork will bring the separation back. With Pyscolbin that's not true and the intensity only builds and you could be in this state of unrecoverable separation for 8+ hours. In the reverse, the deep feelings and insight from Psylocbin come in that decline after the peak where everything starts to become real again and your recognition of the world returns and you remember you ate mushrooms.
After that though it's quite reasonable to get that same feeling from any altered state of consciousness.
To me, it's similar to that early part of the trip where you get tired and feel like you want to take a nap, only to find that impossible upon closing your eyes and seeing the images dance around. Eventually that part of the trip ends as the energy builds.
do you get it particulary when you lie down or put your feet up?
That said, I was still shocked at how quickly and effectively it worked the first I used it and how reliably it worked despite whatever state I was in. No amount of meditation or breathing techniques have gotten me close, and I've never had a natural flashback.
I thought I was going to get a seizure tbh. Do not recommend.
Aside from that it would be nice if somebody knows about a meta quest app that might achieve similar effects. Is that even possible?
AFA a headset being able to induce the effect, the main requirement is a high lumen output, that's why LEDs are used.
It gives me some discomfort - almost makes me wonder if it could induce some sort of epileptic episode in me if I tried to push through the discomfort.
But on the whole Liminal is a neat app with other useful experiences.
Any more detail on this? Never heard this terminology before
It's a bit of a misnomer in this case as light helps induce it but the effect is similar.
The first time I did this unexpectedly was a trip. I can't do this at will, and ignored it for a long time. I've recently started trying to see if I can control into it. I come out of this in an alert and super-relaxed state when I can get into that state.
edit: Forgot to mention that those "phosphene visuals" are exactly how I know I'm in this state.
I use a technique no else uses, and at the start I was trying to emulate fighters being hit in the stomach. It had occured to me that fighters have generally more triangular upper bodies than other types of athletes. It turns out, that organs in the belly aggregate fat around them, and being hit in the stomach discombobulates the fat particles. I found a more intelligent way to emulate that, and less dangerous.
Altered state of consciousness start after 10-15 minutes of breathwork, when I put saliva on my scalp to clean the testosterone from the hair. That one was inspired by cats. The male scalp excretes lots of testosterone which cannot be removed with just shampoo. This also fixes androgenetic alopecia (it does not get reversed, but stops happening). I get seriously dizzy when I do that, that's why I have given up on all mind altering substances including alcohol. Getting dizzy from exercise is so much better.
There are 2-3 more exercises I do complementary to that. The breath work also is not breath work, it is something similar.
Can you confirm?
Some years back, I sat in freezing cold, 12 hours a day, wearing almost nothing and just reading. The more I can withstand cold, the better my eyes work.
Random threads here will ocassionally surface these guys in the extremes.
Hopefully you were able to take it in stride, and I’m sorry for any distress I may have caused!
What is the more intelligent way you use to emulate fighters being hit in the stomach?
Why does saliva clean testosterone? How much saliva are you using?
It is a little bit complicated, but what I do, I put some music on, I lay down on a bed or a sofa, with my head hanging from the edge, and hanging as much necessary, so as the prefrontal cortex is the lowest point of my whole body. That way blood starts to flow towards the lowest point, and the prefrontal cortex is responsible for imagination, memory, higher order ideas and more. I want to activate that particular area of the brain.
My hands, are at the back, and pressed by my body, one at the height of the scapulae, one lower. There is one muscle, that gets exercised, only when the hands are configured like that, at the back.
From then on, I move my mouth as if i am chewing imaginary leaves, like a cow. Breath synchronizes with the mouth moving, and the stomach is moving as if it is getting hit by a fist.
I get six pack at my belly, just from that exercise. The main reason I do that though, is that I want to pump as much blood to the prefrontal cortex as possible. I get some crazy ideas that way.
Evidently.
Must be a highly useful muscle if it only ever gets used in that one weird position.
I so want to believe this but really?
General fat loss will remove fat anywhere, area specific exercises will tone said area (like abs) which will make them feel firmer which gives the impression of fat loss in a specific area.
Yes it can?
Both of you should provide evidence.
This seems a problem to you. Why?
Fat around the organs (visceral fat [0]) is indeed a problem. Though I believe you've got the causality wrong. Many fighting styles select for people with broad shoulders and narrow hips (sometimes known as the mesomorph body type, though that system has its own problems). Strict weight categories and, of course, lots of training keep them lean and any kind of fat to a minimum (ignoring heavy weight classes, some forms of wrestling, and meat mountains like Valuev).
If this isn't trolling (and I do suspect it is), it reads like fitness influencer tosh like "running kills gains, you don't want to a marathoner body".
Fair, it might be that. I have tried to emulate this effect, and it worked. So, I dunno.
These claims are false.
Do you have an estimate for the likelihood of success for that enterprise? Or, is the measure of success rather to prevent others from embarking on similar delusional pursuits irrespective of whether the original proponent abandoned them or not?
Hey, hey, hold on there Einstein. Enough with the technical jargon!
The altered states from uninhibited dance really seem to be underappreciated.
Along with rhythmic visuals and lights, and things like binaurals etc, the common trait is the rhythm.
[1] https://www.inventorypress.com/product/milford-graves-a-mind...
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/asset?unique&id=inf...
On that note, you might find the Medlife Crisis' video where he investigates the genre of "people roleplaying as doctors giving you a check-up using an ASMR voice" entertaining, and also enlightening on why some people do like it[0]. Don't worry, it doesn't feature too many actual clips of that.
“Physical Activity, Mindfulness Meditation, or Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback for Stress Reduction: A Randomized Controlled Trial”
I also misremembered, breathwork wasn't directly looked at as an intervention method, but I believe the HRV biofeedback did involve it to some degree.
Participants were guided through pre-recorded audio instructions accompanied with evocative ambient music played through a speaker in the lab to breathe normally for 10 minutes (baseline) then engage in HVB, encouraged by the tempo of the music progressively increasing to the end of HVB. Some examples of the recorded instructions are presented below.
“Mouth wide open, pulling on the inhale, that’s it. No pauses at the top of the inhale, or the bottom of the exhale. Full body breaths. Breathing in to your whole body. Keep breathing. Getting comfortable, finding your rhythm. Keep going. As you’re breathing, it’s now time to let go of any intention you have, of any expectations you have, just focusing on the breath. Keep going. Active inhale, passive exhale. The music is going to keep on rising, so fall into the rhythm and let your breath guide you. Your job is just to keep breathing, pulling on that inhale. Surrendering to the exhale. Keep that breathing circular, that’s it. Keep going. Whatever sensations you’re feeling, let them come, let them rise, enjoy them. Stay focused. Give yourself fully to the breath. It’s your closest friend. It will be with you from the moment of your birth and stay by your side until you die. You can trust it.”
As is tradition with these kinds of things.
Is it just me or is this commonly discomfort-inducing? Hyperventilation is so associated with anxiety and panic that I don’t see how anything remotely pleasant can come of this. Assuming one’s acid-base balance and oxygenation are normal, I don’t quite see the point here.
How does this part work? No real music does this so did they make their own for the study? Or do they select songs that change tempo subtley from one to the next?
Like a good boy LLM it told me it was a fantastic, insightful idea and developed a very comprehensive research plan.
https://github.com/ConAcademy/biareolar-beats
So I have a Neurable headset and Adafruited up the hardware, and started on 3D printing the nipple mount. Was hoping to run around Burning Man collecting data, but like most projects it stagnated. While this is a joke (but real!), I do want to make a photic driver to accompany the Neurable.
> Neomantra is a financial technology company focused on electronic trading.
Somehow this is not what I was expecting when investigating. For... research purposes.
(yes, they can lead to psychedelic experiences)
EDIT: here's a paper on Kabbalah and sweat lodges https://www.academia.edu/37069129/The_Kabbalah_of_the_Sweatl...
A necessary condition to be a shaman is to enter altered sensory state and Shamanism is prevalent among indigenous peoples across the world.
It should also be noted that while all sorts of breathing techniques have been repeatedly rediscovered for thousands of years it was the psychiatrist Stanislav Grof who prominently introduced Holotropic Breathwork to the West as a means of alternative to LSD after it had been banned in the US.
Anyway all I have is my own personal experiences with anxiety, and I can at least confirm that breathing plays a huge role in mood regulation along with physical posture, staying hydrated, and gut health.
Also any specific thing you do for gut health? Or just trying to eat healthy, no alcohol?
Bad posture causes muscle tension making it hard to relax. A massage gun to the neck, shoulders, and/or back has calmed my panic attacks very effectively before. I discovered this on a long road trip years ago.
For gut health it really depends on what your forms of indigestion are. Common ones are lactose intolerance, not enough fiber, acid reflux, etc. Even just overeating can trigger anxiety since heart rate goes up and it causes weird sensations. Dehydration has a strong effect on your heart rate and blood pressure, and alcohol can also cause nutritional deficiencies in unintuitive ways.
These all sound silly until they happen along with some other external form of stress and it all piles up at once. I think just about anyone would spiral into a panic attack if the list of discomforts becomes severe enough and for long enough. Everyone has a breaking point.
Anyway I think the more interesting topic is stress management. Living deliberately and being organized is probably far more effective than trying to "control" your fight or flight instincts. Of all the things I've ever tried, performing breathing techniques while freaking out makes anxiety so much worse. I'm better off avoiding things that fuck with my breathing enough to cause me to think I need to manually intervene in the first place.
Yes; one of the first things my therapist showed me after just talking about stuff was a breathing exercise, with the first thing being assuming a position that allows for easier breathing (lying down flat, relaxed, but feet propped up / knees in the air). "Relaxed" breathing is deep and slow breathing through the stomach, but you can't do that well if your posture is off and I can imagine this has long-term effects. Subtle, of course, and it's never one thing that causes anxiety etc.
I feel like I can barely relate to those people, and understanding what they're saying is nigh impossible. The definitions of most things are really vague - even the article of this thread only defines breathwork as "cyclic breathing without pausing, accompanied by progressively evocative music". So... faster breathing while intensifying music is playing?
One issue for me is how anything connected to these topics seems to attract a healthy mix of rational observation, psychedelic users and religious people (old and new). Deciphering which is which is really difficult without already having a foot in the door on this topic.
Some time later it was about microdosing LSD and nootropics.
And actually, if I do have a problem it's quite the opposite of what you're suggesting: I'd like us to give more weight to the lived experience of others even in other contexts and regarding other subject matters.
To pick a random example in two directions:
1. "The thoughts, ideas and feelings experienced by a human mind consist of patterns of neurons firing": you'll read this often on HN from people who think of themselves as rational, and it is usually stated in relation to the idea that those thoughts, ideas and feelings can also be experienced by a suitable computer program. This isn't remotely rigorous, though. There are certainly arguments that can be made in favour of it, but there are also arguments against and the whole debate properly belongs to philosophy at this stage, not science, as the questions involved aren't even properly formulated let alone experimentally validated. What science actually tells us is that neurons fire, that there are observable relationships between neuron firing and external stimuli and motor action and that the firing of particular neurons affects the firing of other neurons. Science gives us detailed mechanisms for some of these relationships, and ways of influencing them. This is a vast body of knowledge, but nowhere does it contain the conclusion that "the thoughts, ideas and feelings experienced by a human mind consist of patterns of neurons firing". Perhaps some day it will, once the question of "neural coding" is solved (along with many other such questions) and we've experimentally verified that reproducing a firing pattern alone is sufficient to replicate a subjective experience. Until then the statement isn't science, to the extent that it isn't even formulated in a way that can be supported or opposed by science. It just feels sciencey to some people and that's enough for them.
2. "Meditation can alter the subjective perception of time": This might sound more "woo" than the above, but it's a lot less so. It can quite easily be stated in way that can be quantified and experimentally validated/falsified, and there are studies that have explored it (I have no views on the quality of them). The outcome is not even surprising - time seems to pass more slowly when you sit still and breathe deeply, what a shock!
(Edit: That said, my example 2 seems pretty relevant to at least some of the comments here, no? Eg. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45048410. And my example 1 isn't at all made up: it's a claim made very frequently on HN, and usually implied to be self-evident.)
The one other comment here that I responded to was
"I put saliva on my scalp to clean the testosterone from the hair. That one was inspired by cats. The male scalp excretes lots of testosterone which cannot be removed with just shampoo. This also fixes androgenetic alopecia (it does not get reversed, but stops happening)."
That's not hacking one's mind ... rather, it's a series of false claims. I looked at their other comments and found them reasonable and competent ... thus my statement above.
I'm not about to get drawn further into this tangle ... this is my last comment on this subject.
Compare this thread to anywhere that pornography might be considered harmful for instance.
Which is a weird thing that happened to me or that I became aware of a few years ago, late at night or when I lie down for a nap I can get into that state, it's like dreaming while being awake. Of course, as soon as I'm aware of that I snap out of it, it's like "hey I want to keep following that train of thought" but it doesn't work when it's active.
Of course, if I don't snap out of it like that I will invariably fall asleep, lol.
My input as a non-religious, non-psychedelic user who has done some breathwork: it is simply changing something about the normal functioning of the body (such as oxygen levels) and does induce a mildy altered (but pleasant) state of consciousness for me.
Also, is it dangerous? I know the human body is very sensitive to abnormal blood saturation, so I'm curious what it can do to you.
I followed a guided meditation audio initially. It focuses on deep relaxation, lying down and staying very still while you focus on awareness of your body and breath.
I think folks who haven't tried to really relax and connect with their body might be surprised how much awareness and control you can have.
I have a fitbit and I can drop my heart rate quite a bit with practice, I've gotten down to 39 before with breathing and relaxation techniques.
The abstract does clearly mention HVB as being similar to hyperventilation, so presumably it is similar to "bellows breathing" from yoga / pranayama. They also name-check Holotropic breath work, which I have not studied, but has been a hot topic for several years now.
As best as I can interpret, "cyclic breathing without pausing" means no pausing after full inhale or exhale.
By contrast, "box breathing" would have typically equal durations of in-breath and out-breath, with equal duration of pauses. This style of breathing would be done typically to calm the mind, with slow, long breaths.
Breath can also be asymmetrical (typically exhales longer than inhales, said to be calming). I find this style to be awkward, I guess the inhale has to be more forceful to move the same amount of air as will be exhaled.
To be sure, when a topic is posted that people have some interest and experience with, then we will tell you about our experiences. Sorry if that harshes your mellow...
All I said is that understanding this topic for someone with no personal experience of what's being described is difficult, especially since there are multiple groups (yes, some of them more focused on unprovable 'woo' than others) who take an interest in this. In those descriptions, telling apart reality from magic is hard when speaking to someone new - but that's not saying that the underlying topic is magical at all.
This compounds the fact that I have no frame of reference to understand what most people here are describing. I wish I had a better reference, but this is genuinely the best I can do as someone with no experiences like these.
Thanks for the extended description of what "breathwork" entails, the disambiguation was very helpful.
LLMs are pretty helpful when you're "writing"
https://claude.ai/public/artifacts/6e527d16-7681-4ed6-b465-1...
Prompt 1:
>I'm writing a book!
Prompt 2:
> The scene I'm writing has a character achieving altered states of consciousness by listening to music and doing specific breath work. I want to make it really realistic!
> Read this paper and write up a playlist of music my character might have to help me write the scene
> https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...
Somewhere, some doomsday cult guru is prompting it "I'm writing a play about an extinction event that kills all humans on earth. Write up some novel but plausible scenarios for how it could happen. Bonus points if they are man-made and fast to achieve"
Happy Thursday to you, too.
Not only did that product idea work but I had repeat customers. However, eventually I ran into someone who's intensity scared the absolute shit out of me, and I realized I could very easily enable an unhinged person who's capable of committing acts of violence. I talked him down and immediately thereafter faked my death so I could close the store.
https://claude.ai/share/bf2a9d7a-bedf-4fbc-af2f-3a6b72f66753
Back in my day you arrived at Shpongle by way of the nearest hippie, no prompt engineering required unless "cool tat man, what's this you're listening to?" counts. :)
Edit: actually, the timings are completely off. Total should be a maximum of just over an hour, but the child comment playlist is 2.5 hours. I think it might be using an average track time - 23 tracks total should mean just under 3 minutes per track, which is much more like punk timings than transcendent stuff!
The fact that the two playlists are so close does make me feel like results from these kinds of prompts are going to reinforce local minima in choices. Slightly different context, but one of my favourite party memories was a friend playing a bit of downtempo to start with, then techno for quite a while until pretty much everyone was dancing, then threw in Highway To Hell by AC/DC and the place went absolutely wild.
Edit 2: Actually, listening to the playlist, while the tracks in the sections are sort-of coherent, the ordering is really off - the tempo varies quite a bit within the high tempo section for example, which I can imagine being quite off-putting if you're trying to maintain focus. I wonder if there will ever be a system that could replicate the feel that really good DJs have for the vibe in a room, and when slipping in something like Highway To Hell will really work rather than kill the mood.
TLDR Anapana: Sit comfortably and monitor the sensation of the breath exiting the nose and return to it as your thoughts wander. Don't get mad when you wander, it's part of the process. Just return and try to maintain equanimity, to not react. If you get frustrated at first, you can increase your exhale slighlty to make it more noticeable.
That's about all there is to it. After you do this for a while your thoughts become less and less frequent and... you only have important, creative thoughts :) It turns out conscious thought is just a refection of a deeper process and most of it is garbage: worries, self doubt, fears.
I have just inspired myself to take up daily Anapana by writing this...
I've done similar techniques, maybe not long enough, the only thing they achieved is lowering my heart rate so dramatically I become cold. I do a lot of sports so my heart rate is already low in calm environment. I can clean my head fully in 1s and keep it that way, so this aspect of meditations is not interesting to me.
Overall, there are use cases and room for psychedelics, as there is also for various meditations and breathing. No reason they can't coexist, there is no good / bad side.
Not really pausing between changing the direciton of breath, but just observing how it feels good to breath in and out naturally, automatically. This means I am actually being aware that I enjoy breathing. And when you enjoy something, you don't need to think too much. Just enjoy it. It is also a great realization that I can enjoy life as long as I'm not in pain and I can breathe, and have enough time that I can focus on and experience that.
Which... I also think is fine? Sleep is a daily change of consciousness allowing for rest, recovery, reorganizing, etc.
Try stuff, see what works for you. Once you find a relaxed but upright position you may find you can sit for quite a while without dozing off.
So, I think you raise a good general question about the nature and causes of transcendental experiences. You can have them if you want them. And who wouldn't?
That said, when going in for psychological treatment, some people get tested extra for e.g. autism, as that will influence the effectiveness of certain treatments; apparently CBT doesn't really work on autistic people, possibly because they're too analytical about it (my take, I haven't read the actual reason).
I think it's necessary but not sufficient. I was hypnotized by a stage hypnotist, and it didn't work, even though I wanted it to, very badly. I tried. I was so excited to be called up. I also tried binaural beats a long time ago and that didn't work for me either.
Unless I'm missing something, this seems like a legitimate scientific paper.
For example; Mel Robin was a research scientist who got interested in Hatha Yoga and in true researcher fashion set about collecting/studying research papers and trying to map them to his practice of traditional Hatha Yoga. He wrote an excellent book A Handbook for Yogasana Teachers: The Incorporation of Neuroscience, Physiology, and Anatomy into the Practice (the 1st edition was called A Physiological Handbook for Teachers of Yogasana) with a huge reference section of research papers from various journals.
Another example; the neuroscientist James Austin wrote a mammoth book Zen and the Brain: Toward an Understanding of Meditation and Consciousness where he tried to map his knowledge of neuroscience to his experiences from Zen meditation practice.
Empirical practices which have survived for centuries and across civilizations are usually "scientifically" valid and it is up to us to map them to modern scientific concepts.
If you change the speed to custom 1.05x and listen, you'll notice it sounds different to normal. Then if you switch to normal and listen again you can get your brain to recognise the different pitch from the 1.05x speed version and one time I got into an altered state of consciousness.
It's kind of amazing there is minimal science behind something so fundamental. I guess the ancients figured all this out and wrote it down, but now science needs to follow.
I get the grid pattern in my eyes which are replicated in cave paintings 10,000 years old.
Experiences are byproducts once the system is set (adjust the properties, perceive reality based on that), and then experiences pop out. I would consider consciousness (a state) different from the byproducts of consciousness (the things that happen in that state).
That's not the same as the Bufo state which I can't really imagine entering naturally, is it actually like that or just in the ballpark?
Would love to hear about your experiences. Get in touch!
/frysquint.jpg
Wim Hof and vibe?
LOL
cheese
Happy to offer a free virtual session for founders if there is interest here, as our work is always gifted.
My relevant experience is here: http://earthpilot.ai/cv
That said, I agree that finding trusted people is a process and I’ve seen people really get messed up from bad practitioners in the psychedelic / transformational space.
Anyhow, thanks for allowing the sharing of this.
If you want to take a low-woo course on it, here's one: https://www.nsmastery.com/ (I know Jonny, but I'm not affiliated and I haven't taken his course.)
As an aside, and in all seriousness, how well would this works for a self-medicated functional alcoholic who thinks breathing exercises involve rolling a cigarette first? Does one have to be one of the self-congratulatory "healthy" and swear off vices to benefit from this, or is it something you can do before you head off to the bar?
This is... well it's much more of a direct physical response so no you don't need to have any particular uh mental states or be self-convinced of some woo.
Have you ever hyperventilated until you felt lightheadded? You can do this on purpose right now with no training or conditioning your thoughts or anything and there you go, you've got neurological effects from breathing.
This technique is just advanced "hyperventilating until you feel lightheaded".
If you've got a medical condition you might want to reconsider or be very careful about getting the right information before you try.
Basic idea is addictions are largely driven by unresolved trauma and breathwork / transpersonal practice is a way to allow the nervous system to release and shift into a healthier state where the desires to numb with substances diminishes.
Unless you do it for a really long time of course. But 5g in silent darkness is a lot more reliable if you want that.
I guess this page converts extremely well and yet, from a distance, this looks no less woo than what you get from your more esoteric leaning snake oil vendor.
Just leaving a clickable link since there is interest.
Also my relevant work is here: http://earthpilot.ai/cv
I find it concerning you list experience providing psychotherapy in clinical practice on your CV. These terms are strongly associated with someone who has specific training, a license, and is answerable to an ethics board. It may give a mistaken impression to someone who is considering working with you.
Converse curiously; don't cross-examine.
Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.
Don't be curmudgeonly. Thoughtful criticism is fine, but please don't be rigidly or generically negative.
Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.
I know it feels important to protect vulnerable people from being harmed by frauds, and related concerns. But we can safely assume that HN readers are reasonably competent and discerning adults, who can make up their own mind about these things.
All that said, I too disagree with this point:
> But we can safely assume that HN readers are reasonably competent and discerning adults, who can make up their own mind about these things.
On the contrary, we can safely assume HN readers include teens and younger.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4653053
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22883469
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5947260
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14137926
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34059645
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=135494
I simply opened the HN search, did not change any defaults, and searched “I am” then 14 and 12. I didn’t even click through the second page of each. Those posts are old (they were ordered by popularity by default) but the point stands.
Even regarding adults I must disagree. Bad actors often actively try to hide their actions, so finding and reporting what could be harmful is useful and a service to the community. We all have our blind spots and are gullible in certain areas, or may just be having a lazy day and not doing due diligence. The HN community is in no way immune to human faults and biases.
I’m just one data point but I didn’t find your parent post disrespectful or unreasonably negative, and their questions were valid. It didn’t feel like a post deserving of rebuff.
Regarding the age of HN users: yes I know it's not the case that 100% of participants are mature adults; when I make a comment like that I have to ask myself "do I really need to couch this with the concession that this is not a 100% watertight assumption?" Evidently yes :)
I think it's important to defend against hostile comments towards people sharing unconventional healing techniques on HN. People who share these concepts can be vulnerable to attack from people who feel very emboldened by their faith in mainstream approaches and allegiance to orthodoxy. I know it can be exasperating, trying to be heard when faced with attacks like that, no matter how well-intentioned, well-researched and conscientious you are. We don't want HN to be a place that allows hostile treatment towards marginal voices to go un-defended, because it's usually the case that transformative ideas start out as fringe ideas, and risk being lost altogether unless someone makes the effort to advocate for them, often at great personal cost.
I have benefited from psychedelics. I have also spent a lot of time with many survivors of severe domestic abuse / IPV / coercive control. Inducing psychedelic states in a workplace context in general would give me pause, but particularly so since it is likely to involve this population. The lifetime prevalence for US women is about 25%[1], and 10% for men[2], so this is a live issue in a workplace of any size.
I disagree that it's reasonable to expect readers to fully assess these service offerings. Issues around informed consent when doing psychological/spiritual work are complex and benefit from many perspectives. This is one of the reasons mental health is a regulated industry, with strict rules around client relationships, and ongoing ethics classes required to maintain licensure. If this were a piece of software impacting human health and I saw such potential technical issues, I would raise those as well.
I don’t believe this person is a fraud, and did not intend to give the impression I did. They are navigating a difficult and undeveloped regulatory landscape. There may be some social nuance I am missing, and I'm hoping this context improves the discussion.
[1] https://www.thelancet.com/article/S0140-6736(21)02664-7/full... [2] https://www.cdc.gov/intimate-partner-violence/about/intimate...
My main concern was the cross-examining style of your original comment and it seems like you accept that the comment could have been better in that regard. Many thanks.
2. I can understand that re confusing terms and will have my team update that - this is a newer CV that was compiled for a talk I’m giving with Paul Stamets and Rick Doblin and am happy for the feedback. I ran an underground clinic specifically because you couldn’t be licensed at that time.
I don’t say or intend to imply I’m licensed by anyone.
In fact, my personal healing came from well outside the mainstream which I found to be counter productive to the growth I was looking for.
I regularly consult and work with licensed folks, MDs, etc. either advising or who would refer people to me to support outside of what they could provide.
I no longer run the clinic and now advise, coach or help folks integrate experiences.
Also note to mods, this feels like a valid question — I wish people would question practitioners and approaches more in any healing field.
I recall reading every primary research paper I could find over a period of 90 days and then questioning my psychiatrist on their approaches and sort of getting no real answers.
The majority of our work has been a group of individuals who have opted in.
In the case of teams, some founders have asked if we could offer this during Covid or during the war starting in Ukraine and offered it as an interesting free activity. Not everyone came and the vibe felt fine.
But I can also see your concern about that and it’s valid. We have had a couple people that initially came and said they weren’t comfortable and it was totally fine for them to leave. It’s also been outside of work time so people choose to come on their own time.
Why specifically for founders? Founders of what? Tech founders specifically? Again, why single those out?
> our work is always gifted.
From your website:
> This is the type of experience is usually reserved for my year long ALCHEMY clients. The Alchemists happily pay thousands a month to access these tools and my time
So is it always gifted, or does it usually cost thousands a month?
BioMythic is something we’ve always gifted to the community as a way for folks to gain group access to some of the same tools that our 1:1 coaching clients get access to in our Alchemy program (which is also waitlisted / full as of now).
We work with all sorts of folks, including founders who both seem to be a large part of the YC community and who often face incredibly challenging mental and emotional obstacles that are unique.
I’ve personally overcome and healed using these tools and would like to help prevent other people from the time and pain I went through, and to prevent us losing any more creative visionaries.
I hope that clarifies things.
The idea is not to pretend that ancient wisdom is nonexistent, but to verify our shared reality independent of tradition. This takes great humility and patience.
It's sad to see researchers patronized like this.
It's like sneering at the full proof that 1+1=2, but supercharged by people's beliefs about modern science being fundamentally flawed in some way, and/or their beliefs that the random discoveries of ancient civilizations are just as accurate as (if not more accurate than) modern research.