How to Bio-Hack Your Brain with Light, Sound & Vibration
The BiohackingCongress is the community of people who want to live happier, healthier, and longer. Biohacking includes many different aspects that are intended to manage health. There are a lot of innovative technologies and methods that appear every day in the industry. And we do our best to bring great experts to our events so our community has the opportunity to exchange opinions and to gain exclusive knowledge. In this article, we spread some light on how to biohack the Brain.
Patrick K. Porter, Ph.D., Founder and Creator of BrainTap gave an enlightening lecture on How to Bio-Hack Your Brain with Light, Sound & Vibration at the previous Biohacking Congress in Silicon Valley.
Dr. Porter explained how to biohack the brain drawing on his experience of more than 30 years in the light, sound, and vibration industry. BrainTap is the first portable light and sound neuro-trainer and, through over 2300 clinics, has sold millions of his 1200+ brain-hacking sessions that create peak states of consciousness.
First of all, many people think about our brain that we can turn it off and on. There is a part of our brain it's called the survivor brain, a.k.a. sympathetic nervous system. Also, there is another part of the brain called the thriving brain, a.k.a. parasympathetic system. At his lecture, Dr. Porter shared his knowledge about how we can hack that part of reality.
As the industry's pioneer, Dr. Porter started in the 80'th, there was no notion of biohacking and no neural feedback; there was health optimization. So, the lecture contained personal experience and science collected by years. Mr. Patrick shared some of the science of its evolution and how biohackers are using this technology now.
"If we think about our bodies right now, they haven't changed since the time we were being chased by Saber-Toothed Tigers who lived in America during the Pleistocene epoch (2.5 mya – 10,000 years ago). Our bodies would have maybe 5 to 6 stressful events in a whole week back when the Saber-Tooth Tigers were chasing us. Today, because of technology, we probably have anywhere between 5 to 6 stresses even before breakfast," Dr. Porter started.
"When we think about our day-to-day life, today, most people sit around on their computers all day long. When you're on the computer, the worst thing you can do is sit there. Our nervous system is designed to move and breathe. By moving and breathing, we keep optimizing our nervous system, which optimizes our brain function. We're talking about hacking our brains; we have to look at how we get our nervous system so our environment can do it and technology does it," Mr. Patrick explained.
Most people think of meditation as a clue: I'm going to the mountains and meditating there, which made me relax. "The reality is to meditate is very difficult, in fact, over the last 30+ years, we measured over 40 000 people, and we've only found one person meditated that didn't cause brain stress. That's because of something called our monkey mind. People involve their conscious minds too much. Hence, you usually have to learn to meditate through someone who is a master or knows a different technique,” Dr. Porter noted.
“How can we do this with nature? If you were Plains Indian, what would happen: you'd go out during the day, you'd be hunting and gathering, you might remember those stressful events, maybe, once or twice a day, not three or four times before breakfast. But then, at the end of the day, you gather together as a tribe, and you'd maybe have a dance, you would have the drums beat, the rhythm, and the cadence. It is called a nicer chronic tone generator", Dr. Porter continued.
Let’s have a look at how our ancestors lived 200 years ago. They wake up from the sunlight, no matter whether it was hot weather or rainy. They did not do the regular ritual we have nowadays: wake up with the alarm.
Dr. Patrick Porter explained: "The worst thing you can do for your nervous system is set the alarm at night. Because the moment you set the alarm, you set up something called anticipatory stress, which means your brain knew at whatever time you set up for 6 or 7 in the morning, the jury to get jolted out of bed. You're relaxed, and suddenly, you get this signal that wakes you up. Depending upon how the rest of your day is going: you have too much work to do, you get in a fight with somebody at home… You might have stayed in that low-level chronic stress from the time that you experience that stress through the rest of the day. Most people are living in that series. What were we in ancient times? At the end of each day, you would go back to your tribe and sit around the fire. Now, what do we do today with technology? Most people don't have a real sleep ritual."
If you want to biohack your sleep, you need to start turning off the lights at least 2 hours before going to bed. There should be no room for things that stimulate you. BrainTap is the technology imitating what happens at a nighttime fire. The technology works that the lights are tuned in the same way that the sound: you get in the left eye and in the right ear. Hence, coherence in the brain is created.
At first glance, it might be frustrating how the flashing light might relax you on the conscious level but the reality is the conscious mind runs 5% of the show, 95% of biology is run by your subconscious mind. For instance, your heart is beating over 86 000 times a day which you do not control, you get anxious and stressed and speed it up but most of the time it is unconscious, You are breathing over 21 000 times a day all of these things are being stimulated by the unconscious.
The brain and the nervous system are interchangeable in this conversation because the brain is 70% of the nervous system. Therefore, when we talk about the nervous system, we mean brain functions.
Another biohack to upgrade your brain is music. These are different frequencies of music. People like Mozart claim that they tune in to the music of the spheres, that everything is musical. Dr. Porter noted, "We found out that there is something called the Mozart effect, which means if you put music on while you're studying, your brain thinks better. You are smarter just by playing that music in the background. The key is to remember if you're going to learn something faster and better, you play something like this baroque classical music. Now there's a lot of new age music that does the same rhythms and frequencies.”
Another hack is the ocean. Mr. Porter clarified, "When you go to the ocean, you sit down next to it. Even if you don't feel relaxed in a few moments being there, usually 3 to 4 minutes, your body will mimic what's going on in that ocean. The ocean resonates at about 10-hertz frequency, which means you're going to start creating citicoline that will trigger the world's greatest pharmacy - the human brain. When you trigger that response, you start to feel good. If you know someone who says, "I love the ocean," that's because citicoline is the same neurotransmitter that happens when you fall in love. You're getting the same chemical reaction where you can trigger that by using light sound vibration."
Additionally, Mr. Porter explained why it is better to meditate in the mountains. “The earth has a resonating frequency between 0.1 in 100-hertz frequency, and the brain has a resonant frequency between 0.01 in 100-hertz frequency. The brain and body are going to match their environment so as a mountaintop. When you go to the mountaintop, that frequency response is 7.8-hertz frequency. While you're in the mountains, your body will go to the theta state without you doing anything. If you were a guru, you would go to the mountains to stay in a deep meditative state. Now we can imitate that again through light sound and vibration. It is essential to realize that what happens to us is not what's happening around us. It's what's happening through us: through our sensory-based systems, through our eyes, ears, and body. We interpret reality, and we make it happen with BrainTap.”
If you want to try BrainTap Pro App And Headset® to improve clarity, quality of sleep, and get more energy, feel free to check it out at the section Top Biohacks on our website.
The BiohackingCongress team is thankful to the splendid Patrick K. Porter, Ph.D., for giving the wonderful lecture!
Watch the full lecture of Dr. Patrick Porter with a year-long subscription to all BiohackingCongress videos by this link.
We are looking forward to meeting you!
Based on the lecture by Patrick K. Porter, Ph.D.
Special Access to
Exclusive TopBiohacks
and more