Mindset

Binaural Beats – More Focus, Better Concentration, Deep Relaxation

To the surprise of no one, science has shown that listening to music enhances exercise performance. Anyone who has had a manual labor job knows music helps you pass the time, and music can also enhance your performance for studying, writing, and working. There’s a specific type of music I use when writing – binaural beats.

What are binaural beats?

Binaural beats, or binaural tones, are auditory processing artifacts, or apparent sounds, caused by specific physical stimuli. The brain produces a phenomenon resulting in low-frequency pulsations in the amplitude and sound localization of a perceived sound when two tones at slightly different frequencies are presented separately, one to each of a subject’s ears, using stereo headphones.

No one really knows why binaural beats improve concentration and help you relax. Some claim it’s not that binaural beats boost performance on their own, but rather, they offer background “white noise,” which causes you to focus more via tuning out the white noise. I disagree.

Binaural beats impact mood directly. For example, I’m listening to “Cognition Enhancer For Clearer and Faster Thinking – Isochronic Tones (Electronic)” while writing this post. I feel more intense, as the beats are increasing adrenaline.

Some of the melodies remind you of the type of music you listen to at a spa, and are relaxing. Others are a more intense experience, and focus your attention on a high-intellect task.

Sometimes I do not want a rush, and listen to an “alpha waves” mix.

Indeed, many people are skeptical of binaural beats until they experiment with some. There are beats that will make you feel sick to your stomach. The music is powerful, it’s up to you to find the right waves / set / mix for yourself.

There are many YouTube channels with different binaural beats. Some of the sounds are several hours long. There are binaural beats with flutes, waterfalls, and frankly some – in a word, weird – sounds that change my brain waves and impact my thinking.

How do you listen to binaural beats?

For focus: If I am writing, I put on my headphones (you need good headphones to get the most out of binaural beats) and crank away for 2-4 hours.

Pro tip: I also take 3 capsules of Gorilla Mind (Smooth).

For relaxation: Even though you need headphones for a peak experience, I’ll run some binaural beats as background sound (no head phones) when stressed or before bed.

What binaural beats are best to listen to?

This depends on the task you are about to perform. There are intense beats for writing and focus and there are meditative beats for relaxation, sleep, and healing.

You need to listen to a lot of different beats to find out what your body needs.

Some of these beats are intense, and listening to those types of binaural beats when you’re stressed can actually make you more stressed.

Take your time finding the right beat. I tend to give each beat around 5 minutes to see if it works, although you can sometimes tell right away if one is wrong for you.

Binaural beat for healing:

Binaural beat for focus:

Binaural beat for intense meditation:

Binaural beat for reflection/contemplation:

Your preferences may differ, however, as your brain may respond differently to certain frequencies than my brain. There’s even some evidence showing women perceive different wavelengths depending upon whether or not they are on their menstrual cycles.

What are the best YouTube channels for binaural beats?

That question will depend on your personal preferences. I personally listen and subscribe to these channels:

There are several more channels to watch, but those three are especially good sources of binaural beats.

Try out some different beats with an open mind, and let me know how it goes.

Quantum Mindset

By Mike Cernovich Leave a Comment

Why do affirmations work? Why is your life better when you live as if you have free will, even though free will itself might be a myth? Why is the mind so powerful and why does imagination create reality? Why are people who use DMT and other spirit molecules overwhelmed with the feeling that everything is connected?

Fred Alan Wolf PhD in, Time, Space, Matter & Quantum Field Theory, explains the connection between quantum physics and mindset.

Some highlights:

“We are the creations of mind, and the mind that is creating us is our own mind, but we only see it as we are the actor.
“You have more power to change and transform yourself than you previously thought.
“The main realization is to recognize that your self is a projection. You’re an actor on the stage and you are the writer of the scenery and you are also director who is directing you as the actor in the performance you are presently having. We’re playing roles in a four-dimensional movie in which the film industry is just a two-dimensional representation of that.
“There is no separation between people. There is no actual difference between you and I….We’re really one mind in communication with each other and we are all projections of that one mind, like holograms.
“Whenever one of us create something positive, we also create the negative energy – the why you can’t do it. Creation means you also create at the same time, the negative of it. What you must do is put you mind on that you can do rather than you can’t do it.
“When Larry King asked me how to treat his depression, I told him: Ask yourself who is feeling depressed. Do not answer the question. The very fact that you can ask the question disrupts the feeling, and opens up the door for this other feeling to come in. After a while, you begin to identify with the person asking the question rather than the person feeling depression. Then the feeling dissipates.
“You can’t ask the question and have the answer to it at the same time.
“You can’t observe the momentum of an object and the position of the object the same time. If you’re observing momentum, you’re in the flow. If you’re observing the position, you’re no longer in the flow.
“A magician is somebody who knows there is no set answer to anything, and that there is no total cause and effect relationship between what is happening today and what has happened before, that the past is being created as much as the future. Once you get into the position of creating past, present, and future, you become a magician.

I’ve never been able to explain why Gorilla Mindset works. Maybe now we know – it’s the quantum physics of mindset.

Why I’m Relaunching Cernovich.com

By Mike Cernovich 1 Comment

Long-time readers said I lost my way, as they grew to enjoy my mindset content, cultural criticism, life advice, and mindset material while despising journalism and current affairs. I didn’t lose my way, but instead stepped up as we are living in historical times. Great men and women make history. HOWEVER….

I missed writing daily about timeless subjects. I missed discussing mindset, lifestyle, and books. I missed our deep conversations about the world.

Thus, I’ve relaunched Cernovich.

There’s no fancy design, it doesn’t even have a cool header year. You’ll find a few typos, too, as there’s no copy editor. It’s just me, and you, talking about life.

What you will find at Cernovich is daily writing, including book reviews, cultural commentary, and positive thinking.

Even my writing on current affairs will contain guiding principles that you can apply to your life, and use to understand the world.

I’ll be publishing articles almost every day, and yes, I am working on my book Audacity: How to Go from Nobody to Somebody (more on that later).

Anyhow, be sure to bookmark Cernovich, as that’s where you can find the writing and podcasting you’ve come to expect.

– Mike

Altered Carbon’s Experiment in Consciousness

By Mike Cernovich Leave a Comment

Altered Carbon is the most beautifully shot series in history, although the nudity may be a bit much for a family-friendly audience. Film noir meets cyberpunk meets a Raymond Chandler detective novel, Netflix’s production of Altered Carbon has me optimistic that Amazon, which purchased the film rights to Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash, will create something spectacular for cyberpunk fans.

Brian Tallerico has the best Altered Carbon episode summaries. Read those here.

Visually compelling, Altered Carbon carries on the myth of the mind-body dichotomy, as represented by cortical stacks (your self, memory, and consciousness) and sleevs (physical body). Characters fly freely through different sleeves, although less experienced users do develop a form of sea weariness (they get sleeve sick) when landing in a new body.

Is it true that one day we may become immortal, shifting our selves from one body to the next? That seems unlikely, based on what we know about consciousness.

Which are you more likely to hear people say, or to say yourself:

I have a body.
I am a body.

This has been studied, and the vast majority of people say they have a body. We think of ourselves as a mind within a body, even though we are also a body within a mind.

This is largely because we experience consciousness, or the sense we exist, and feel as if we are in a body. (Read more: A Brief Guide to Embodied Cognition: Why You Are Not Your Brain.)

You think of yourself a person because you’re in a physical body. Would you still be you if you were in another person’s body? You tastes, preferences, and even risk tolerance would change if you were put into a different physical body. Your physical body is having a conversation with your mind, and thus mind and body are not separate.

Your brains best guess of what you hear, your consciousness imposes meaning on the world, based on expectations formed through your sensory perceptions.

Your consciousness is a result of your body. You are a woman because of your biology, and this feminine identity is distinct from a male identity.

A woman whose consciousness was implanted into a hyper-masculine body would not be a “woman trapped in a man’s body.” She would become a man, in every sense of the world, as her body would rewire her consciousness.

Although Thomas Nagel explored these themes in “What is it like to be a bat?” Daniel Dennett prefers lions:

Dennett waited until the group talked itself into a muddle, then broke in. He speaks slowly, melodiously, in the confident tones of a man with answers. When he uses philosophical lingo, his voice goes deeper, as if he were distancing himself from it. “The big mistake we’re making,” he said, “is taking our congenial, shared understanding of what it’s like to be us, which we learn from novels and plays and talking to each other, and then applying it back down the animal kingdom. Wittgenstein”—he deepened his voice—“famously wrote, ‘If a lion could talk, we couldn’t understand him.’ But no! If a lion could talk, we’d understand him just fine. He just wouldn’t help us understand anything about lions.”

“Because he wouldn’t be a lion,” another researcher said.

“Right,” Dennett replied. “He would be so different from regular lions that he wouldn’t tell us what it’s like to be a lion. I think we should just get used to the fact that the human concepts we apply so comfortably in our everyday lives apply only sort of to animals.” He concluded, “The notorious zombie problem is just a philosopher’s fantasy. It’s not anything that we have to take seriously.”

Consider, too, how your consciousness influences what your body sees.

Your sense of self or “I” is a creation – or what Anil Seth calls a hallucination – of your perceptions.

The sensory information coming into the brain hasn’t changed at all. All that’s changed is your brain’s best guess at the causes of that sensory information, and that changes what you consciously hear….We don’t just passively perceive the world. We actively generate it.

The world as we experience comes as much from the inside-out as from the outside-in.

Will we ever be able to move from one sleeve to another, as in Altered Carbon? Perhaps we would, although you may not recognize yourself at the end of the journey.

P.S. If you find the mind-body problem interesting, you’ll love Gorilla Mindset, which solves it in a practical, life-improving way.

How to Become Impossible to Ignore

By Mike Cernovich Leave a Comment

Imagine you’re give a rousing speech. The crowd applauds. You have their attention. And then what?

Dr. Carmen Simon explains what happens next in Impossible to Ignore: Creating Memorable Content to Influence Decisions.

Soon you’re forgotten as the crowd moves on to the next speaker or event. Indeed, this is why media appearances are overrated. People see you on TV (and I’ve been on the biggest shows in the world) and then forget about you. It’s not what people see, it’s what people remember.

“People act on what they remember, not on what they forget.”

How can you be memorable?

Everyone is a content-machine. Being remembered matters even if you’re not giving speeches, it matters if you meet someone you’re attracted to. Will an attractive person who is hit on many times throughout the day remember you when you send that text asking for a date? What content are you creating in your day-to-day life?

The guiding principle of your content is to ask, “What do I want people to remember?” Recognize that if you’re going to make 20 points in a slide show, people will only remember between 5 and 9 of those slides (the Seven-Plus-or-Minus-Two principle), and that’s if they aren’t scrolling through Twitter, feeling self-pity, or fantasizing about something else.

Choose one or two points or take-aways, and emphasize those points. One of the many helpful charts Simon includes is, “Decide the Salient Point and Repeat it.”

Consider my own videos. What do you remember from them? Chances are not much, well you do remember one salient point. You remember my name – Cernovich.

“Aaaand we’re back, it’s Mike Cernovich of Cernovich dot com.”

This video by Soros-funded Media Matters was edited to make fun of me. I’ll admit, it was funny. But was it effective in discrediting me?

Simon’s work is supported by Dr. Robert Cialdini as well, who writes in Pre-Suasion:

“Even though cut-heavy TV commercials draw more total attention, they produce significantly less memory for the ad’s persuasive claims and significantly less persuasion. It’s easy to understand why: viewers attention isn’t fixated on the ad’s best points but is scattered all over the materials relevant and irrelevant points.”

(Notice the use of a block quote? How much of the above will you remember? Now focus on what’s highlighted.)

Impossible to Ignore gets meta.

“It’s not what you comprehend, it’s what you remember” is a line from Tony Buzan’s books that improved my life. A good student, I could understand challenging material, and yet I didn’t always remember it later. Buzan taught me the power of drilling, and I used this method to achieve high grades in competitive courses. (My exact method of studying in “blocks” is here.)

The end of each chapter contains a summary of the material. Why? Because you’re more likely to remember the content if you review it at the end.

In that regard, we get to Impossible to Ignore’s only weakness – It’s dense. It reads like a graduate school treatise. For someone like me who has done the background reading, Simon’s book is a joy to read and a valuable reference. (Simon’s book may be designed to draw in clients for her consulting practice, in which case Impossible to Ignore’s weakness is a strength.)

Impossible to Ignore is one of the most important books you’ll read if you are a lawyer, saleswoman, public speaker, or parent who wants to reinforce a message with your child.

For example my daughter has taken to pulling on our dog’s fur. Rather than tell her NO, DON’T, I frame it positively, and guide her hand to pet Julius gently. Simon explains:

“If your content is aimed at convincing people to change and existing habit, it’s important to remember that habits are formed by doing, not by not doing. Frame your message in a positive way. Imagine if the famous slogan, ‘Just do it’ was ‘Don’t procrastinate.’

That you should frame a message positively rather than negatively is also keep to NLP persuasion. “Don’t do that,” works far less effective than, “Do something else.”

Thus in Gorilla Mindset I teach you how to improve your inner monologue or self-talk through positive habits, namely Change the Conversation. Rather than NOT talk about something, CHANGE YOUR FOCUS to talk about something else.

Spend some time with Impossible to Ignore. It’s an experience you’ll remember for the rest of your life.

P.S. I take 3 capsules of Gorilla Mind every morning to give myself more focus and better memory. You can pick up a bottle of Gorilla Mind here today.