Achieving Good Sleep
Based on our observations of the brainwaves of more than 6,000 people with sleep difficulties, we have found that the brain states of balance and harmony are necessary but not sufficient. Synchrony must also be achieved before restful sleep can be experienced. This function seems to have a number of moving parts — working, perhaps, like a Slinky toy crawling down steps. Frequency groups in corresponding brain areas seem to require symmetry of motion to complete the dance of sleep. This may be why rocking a baby is quieting and restful — rocking may facilitate a transition to synchrony.
Figure 4: An example of brainwaves associated with “good” sleep onset. The left temporal lobe (yellow line) and the right temporal lobe (red line) are relatively synchronized. The brainwaves are balanced, harmonized and firing in a coordinated manner. This is a brainwave sleep-dance that is likely to lead this person into restful sleep.
Figure 5: The left and right temporal lobes are not well synchronized. Peaks and valleys are not in alignment. This is the brainwave pattern of a person who does not sleep well at all and does not wake rested. What might cause a brain to be unsynchronized? The answer is trauma.
Trauma As The Cause Of Brainwave Disruption
We have assessed brainwave patterns of nearly 30,000 people from around the world. One of our major conclusions is that trauma — both physical and emotional — is the root cause of brainwave disturbances. Trauma can leave an imprint on the brain that causes brainwave functioning to become dissonant. Trauma creates an interference with normal brain physiology at a fundamental level. A variety of therapeutic techniques may mitigate the downstream consequences of the interference, but they are unlikely to reconfigure the primary traumatic imprint.
To our knowledge, the only way to reconfigure the trauma imprint is to create a space for the brain to balance, harmonize, and synchronize itself. In our case, our company has created a technology — and others are surely on the way — that helps the brain to reach the state of balance, harmony and synchrony in a straightforward, self-directed and noninvasive way. When this process occurs, the results can be life-changing, like being released from shackles.
During extreme trauma — which can either occur intensely during a moment of time, or can build up over an extended period, such as when one is in a verbally abusive relationship — the brain shifts to protect the person and may become stuck in a trauma-shift pattern. The trauma-shift pattern then dominates the brain’s function, and the brain is no longer in a state of balance.
Brainwave Optimization responds to the brain in near-real-time by mirroring the dominant frequency of the balanced-brain area and directing that frequency to the areas that are imbalanced. (The scientific term for this process is “high-resolution, relational, resonance-based electroencephalic mirroring”; essentially, it is a noninvasive technology for neuro-oscillatory calibration.) This process assists the brain in gaining balanced-brain dominance due to the resonance with this real-time sound. The result is a functionally balanced brain.
As science comes to understand the role of trauma on brainwaves and the role of brainwave functioning on sleep, a new tide of questions will appear. We believe we are all going to start paying a lot more attention to the importance and quality of our sleep. We will better appreciate that poor sleep is not just an indicator of problems but also quite possibly the source of problems. We will undoubtedly need to keep finding better ways to free our brains from trauma patterns. Better sleep and a healthier and more balanced life are birthrights for us all, and the way to arrive there will be through harnessing the primal and primary power of the brain itself.
Lee Gerdes is the author of “Limitless You: The Infinite Possibilities of a Balanced Brain,” and the founder and CEO of Brain State Technologies. Sung Lee, M.D. is research coordinator for Brain State Technologies.
This article was originally published in the Spring 2011 issue of Brain World Magazine.
