I Tried Brain Tapping: Here's What Happened
By Marissa Del Mistro
As I write this, I feel light and elated as I just finished my first brain-tapping experience. I feel like I’ve been let into a fantastic wellness secret, and I am excited to share it with you.
What Is Brain Tapping?
Even as recently as a month ago, I didn’t know brain tapping existed.
Brain tapping is a form of meditation that provides powerful benefits for your mind and body. Unlike regular meditation, it doesn’t ask much of you—except to lay down, relax, and do your best to surrender to the words, lights, and sounds.
Brain tapping uses gentle light and sound therapy with specific frequencies and wavelengths with the goal of helping you achieve deep meditative states. Unlike meditation, brain tapping doesn’t require years of disciplined practice. The state of deep relaxation it provides can lead to mental clarity and positive behavioral changes. One of its most touted benefits is improving sleep quality.
It works through:
Altered Brain Activity
Brain tapping influences your brain’s natural rhythms and patterns by delivering lights and tones via an audio file and headset. As these light and tone frequencies change, your brain’s frequency varies accordingly.
Dissociation
During the session, you enter a twilight state where you let go of thoughts related to daily stressors, busy schedules, and worries. This state of dissociation disconnects you from negative thoughts and increases your self-awareness, similar to deep meditation.
Stabilized Limbic System
Brain tapping helps calm your body, promotes rhythmic breathing, and induces muscle relaxation. The limbic system, responsible for motivation, emotion, learning, and memory, is harmonized during the session.
Neurotransmitter Production
Brain tapping stimulates the production of neurotransmitters like serotonin, beta-endorphins, and norepinephrine. These neurotransmitters are crucial in improving overall well-being and are often low in individuals with depressed moods.
Increased Cerebral Blood Flow (CBF)
Brain tapping enhances CBF, which is essential for optimal brain function. Low CBF is associated with anxiety, depression, attention problems, and impaired cognitive function. Aging leads to decreased CBF and cognitive decline. Brain tapping helps counteract this by increasing CBF, particularly in the left frontal and prefrontal lobes.
Visualization
Brain Tap facilitates visualization and imagery of the life you desire. In a state of hypermnesia induced by tapping, your brain is not limited by time. It has direct access to the subconscious mind. This lets you visualize your goals and desires vividly, engaging all your senses, including sight, smell, taste, sound, and touch. This can heighten imagination, increasing the likelihood of manifesting your desired outcomes in real life.
My Experience with Brain Tapping
I was anxious walking into the session. I was nervous it would be a bizarre experience and leave me feeling strange. However, upon entering the lounge, I found it was very zen-like and friendly, with soft meditative music playing. I spoke to the receptionist before being welcomed into a private room.
The room had a bed, not unlike the ones you are asked to lie on when visiting a doctor. However, it had one significant difference: a Therapy Infrared and PEMF Mat.
The mat utilizes PEMF (Pulsed Electromagnetic Field) therapy to help ground the body in the Earth’s natural magnetic field, offering a full-body reset. It uses infrared technology, which provides deep-penetrating heat to enhance the benefits.
The mat I used also had amethyst, jade, and tourmaline crystals that, when heated, can penetrate between 3-8 inches into the body. The mat is intended to alleviate chronic pain, increase blood flow, and relieve minor muscle pain, which can help athletes —yes, runners!—in speeding up the recovery process.
When I lay on the mat, I noticed the little grooves, which were very slight. I was immediately taken in by the warmth of it, subtle enough like a heated blanket but certainly more relaxing. The doctor asked me to get comfortable and then handed me the headset, which included a fashionable visor — for the lights.
Then she left the room and played the meditation, which lasted for about twenty minutes, as it was just my first session. They do get longer the more you do it.
The meditation focussed primarily on stress relief and visualization, reminding me of my power and capabilities. At one point, it asked me to visualize cutting a lemon, then eating it, and I felt my mouth salivate, and I needed to swallow! I kept my eyes shut but could still feel the flickering lights from the visor on my eyes.
The headset utilizes a scientific technique called “auriculotherapy,” which focuses on trigger points in the ears known as meridians. These trigger points directly influence the balance of the body’s organs and systems. Traditionally, acupuncture needles are used to activate these points. Brain Tap offers an alternative to acupuncture for anyone who is not a fan of needles. Around nine LED lights were set at the optimal frequency to promote a sense of serenity and balance when applied to these trigger points.
This was all in tandem with the meditation, as the lights and tones emitted by the headset generated a frequency between 7.5 and 12.5 Hz, which aligns with the brainwave frequency known as “alpha” Our brain has a natural tendency to synchronize with this frequency, leading to its entertainment. The alpha brainwave state is commonly associated with light meditation and enhanced creativity. When the brain is in the alpha state, it operates without a strict sense of time. This phenomenon helps explain why we often feel like time slows down when we visit the beach, leading to the concept of “island time.”
It also incorporated pulsed tones and gentle light pulses to replicate the frequencies associated with “theta” brainwaves. Theta waves range from 3 to 7.5 Hz and are associated with deep meditative states.
I loved it. I felt like my body was asleep, yet aware, as my mind peacefully danced through the meditation. I didn’t fall asleep as some people do, but I did enter a very relaxing state.
How It Works
Following my session, I had a quick but very informative session with the leading doctor at the lounge, who provided me with an insightful explanation regarding regulating the nervous system, and how if we lose track of this, it’s not in a state of homeostasis, it goes into flight or flight. This is meant to be used only temporarily, and any significant stress exceeding 20 minutes a day is just not good. There are many reasons our nervous system can become out of whack, such as:
Trauma
PTSD
Sitting all day
Injuries
Chronic pain
Relationship Issues
Chronic stress
Family problems
Depression
Chronic Anxiety
Workplace stress
Brain tapping is a way of working to regulate the nervous system, helping to relieve these problems.
Is It Safe?
According to my research, brain tapping is safe. However, it is essential to note that flashing lights can pose problems for people with certain medical conditions such as epilepsy, seizure disorders, brain injury, or photosensitivity. If you have any of these, it’s best to speak to a medical professional to determine whether light and sound technology suits you.
Brain Tap’s Downfall: Accessibility
Would I do this every single day if I could? 100% yes! I would love to do brain tapping right before bed, as I imagine I would have the world’s best sleep.
Can I afford to do this daily? Nope!
However, if you have the resources to do this regularly, it is the ultimate act of love for your beautiful brain! While I went to a lounge, you could even do brain-tapping from home with the headset and membership.
To Brain Tap or Not to Tap?
I had a brilliant time and would love to make brain tapping a regular part of my wellness routine. Whenever I can, I will be going. I highly recommend you try brain tapping if you get a chance.
Related Posts: What Is Halotherapy? I Tried It, I Tried Riding an Electric Bike for the First Time + Tips, Best Meditation App for Beginners
Marissa Del Mistro is a writer, editor, and always on the hunt for the perfect workout. Marissa absolutely loves trail running, dancing, and cycling. When she’s not writing, Marissa loves cooking, podcasts, traveling, and exploring her home in the beautiful unceded Coast Salish Territory of the Lekwungen and W̱SÁNEĆ nations.
