I’ve been using gamma brainwave audiovisual entrainment since April with the Mind Alive’s DAVID Delight Pro device. On May 18, I switched it up to gamma 38-42Hz on Mondays and Fridays and SMR/gamma on Tuesdays and Thursdays and maintained the effect. My writing and photography work went down because I began using my cognitive energy to apply for, be approved for, learn, and open a shop for my imagery under the City of Toronto ShopHERE program.
I’m writing more again for this July’s Camp NaNoWriMo, and I’ve been able to maintain my reading since I began the gamma experiment. I’m also starting to automatically remember to visualize newspaper or magazine articles I come across on Twitter. I kind of forget the verbalizing part, but hey, at least I visualize more!
The last two weeks, I no longer need to rest for at least 30 minutes after gamma. (Shows the brain has a learning curve and/or doesn’t return to original baseline anymore.) Because of that, I tried switching the order of SMR/Beta and SMR/gamma. I usually do SMR/Beta audiovisual entrainment first thing in the morning and gamma right after lunch.
But I have a theory that gamma brainwave enhancement would potentiate the brain waves trained after.
So since SMR/gamma is gentler than gamma 38-42Hz, I decided to do it first thing in the morning and SMR/Beta in early afternoon on Tuesdays and Thursdays to see if it makes SMR/Beta’s effect more potent. I don’t want to enhance my thinking brainwaves (Beta) too late in the day in case it keeps me buzzing all night.
So far, my theory seems to be right. Of course, only a well-designed study with controls would definitively prove that. But for myself, I’ll continue this change to see if last week was a blip or true. Let’s see if the good affect and good energy my neurodoc noted, continues on the day I do SMR/gamma after SMR/Beta.
_____
Update 28 Dec 2020: On September 10th, I began turning on the audio during the SMR/gamma session but not the gamma-only session. I can tolerate the rapidity of the gamma sound when it’s for a short period in between SMR, but not when it’s for the full 30 minutes.
Today, I increased the light intensity of the gamma session by one “notch.” I’d been feeling like the gamma wasn’t having the same effect, almost as if I’d developed a tolerance to it. It sounds strange because I have never developed tolerance to audiovisual entrainment other than my brain learning what this form of light patterns is all about. You find once you get used to audiovisual entrainment and the subsequent lowering of blood pressure, that you no longer get dizzy from it or as tired. (The dizziness and fatigue always dissipate within a few minutes, I find, before no longer happening or, in the case of fatigue, not as much.) However, with gamma, I had the distinct impression that I had become tolerant to it in the same way that one becomes tolerant to medication and then the doctor has to up the dose.
Today confirmed that sense. I increased the light intensity by one notch, felt nauseated briefly in the way I used to — nausea being equal to the brain being stimulated — then that was gone, and I felt an instant gamma calming, which I hadn’t had that quickly and that much in a long time.
The question is why with this one frequency did I become tolerant? And I think this is related to why out of all the brainwaves I’ve had trained during brain biofeedback, only gamma doesn’t “stick”? With this tolerance experience, I no longer think it’s because of my unusual high stressful situations. Perhaps my neural networks all need to be healed before gamma brainwave enhancement can effect permanent change. Well, that’s not going to happen for me.
