Often when starting a session I'll quickly test my headphone connection by pulling one side off my head the 'wow-wow-wow' should disappear isntantly then reappear when put it back on. If your headphones are connected properly, you should immediately notice a gentle 'wow-wow-wow' beat from the mixing of the tones in your head. The volume should be at a comfortable level, and the noise just barely audible beneath the tones.

While there are many ways to explore binaural beats, the standard 'relaxation' approach is to listen to the sound while lying down with eyes closed. Either way, you will need earphones or earbuds to actually experience binaural beats, as the principle requires isolating the stimulus to each ear. Gnaural can play sound directly through your computer sound system, or create a sound file that you can burn to CD or put on your iPod/MP3 player. How to use Gnaural (click here for a quick start guide) While you can design schedules any way you like, the default session ('schedule') built in to Gnaural is a 'relaxation' schedule, and runs for around 74 minutes - basically because that is the most that will fit on a standard CD-R disk. My sessions generally last about 17 to 25 minutes, although 8 minutes is probably enough to produce the desired effect. These help me keep my mental focus as my brain activity slows-down, by gently nudging me periodically, and thereby keeping me from drifting in to a sleep-like unconsciousness. Which is one of the reasons I like to place spikes - short, 12- second rise-and-falls in the schedule - in my session schedules every 6 minutes or so. It is my own observation that as my brain starts to synchronize with the beats, it actually becomes hard to hear them, as if my overall brain wave activity is cancelling them out. Within 8 minutes, you're brain should be fairly well in-sync with the binaural beats. Once satisfied that all is functioning properly, you should simply relax and let the binaural beats take your mind on a ride. But if I still hear a 'wow-wow-wow' sound with one side off, my headphones weren't plugged-in to my computer or MP3 player, mixing the stereo output to mono. How to use Gnaural (click here for a quick start guide) Gnaural can play sound directly through your computer sound system, or create a sound file that you can burn to CD or put on your iPod/MP3 player.

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