Listen up kids, I’m about to tell you about some ways to make your brain feel like it’s melting. COOL!
Let me throw some science shit at you before I get into my personal experiences with this crazy thing called ASMR.
ASMR stands for Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response and is defined by my good pal Wikipedia as “a euphoric experience characterized by a static-like or tingling sensation on the skin that typically begins on the scalp and moves down the back of the neck and upper spine, precipitating relaxation”. I call it motherfucking witchcraft.
Basically ASMR is the response your brain has to certain sounds. These are typically whispers, crinkling, tapping, etc. It’s kind of like that relaxed feeling you used to get as a child when somebody with a very soft voice read to you. Some people feel it on the surface of the skin; others, like myself, feel it near the front of their faces and in their ears.
The term ASMR was coined in 2010 but people have been trying to describe this feeling for years. Bob Ross is considered to be one of the first incidental “ASMR artists” due to his calming voice combined with the relaxing visuals of his painting. Because the widespread recognition of this feeling is relatively new, the actual mechanisms as to how this works are largely unstudied. In fact, some of the only scientific studies I found in my brief search were not very scientific at all. Many of them gave examples of ASMR triggers and the feelings of well being that it can create but not much was mentioned on how it works. One paper cited that it might be a form of frisson which is the joy we experience when we listen to music. Another suggests that certain sounds force a shut down in parts of the brain responsible for stress and anxiety. Regardless of how this stuff works, I suppose the important part is that it does, indeed, work. For most people, at least.
I came across ASMR about a year ago when somebody in the comments section of some website mentioned that it was an effective sleep aid. Let me warn you: ASMR videos are their own breed of weird and they take time to get used to. Having somebody stare intensely into the camera is awkward and listening to people whisper to you almost feels dirty. Not to mention laughable monstrosity of a microphone that many ASMR artists use.
Why the hell does it have to look like that!?
But once you find something that triggers the response, you tend to forget all that weird shit (although I’ll never get over the microphone thing). I remember laying down to check out what ASMR was all about and having a mixed response. Here were some of my initial thoughts during my first experience:
- This woman is too close to me.
- This woman is FAR too close to me.
- Please stop looking at me like that.
- Okay she’s about to talk.
- Oh my god.
- I think my brain is actually melting.
It was insane. I passed out 20 minutes into the video. The nice thing is that a lot of these videos are upwards of 30 minutes long which is plenty of time to put you to sleep or just relax the shit out of you. Sometimes I listen to them while I’m doing homework just to make the experience a little more enjoyable. I’m listening to one right now as I write this.
Some videos and sounds just don’t work for people. It took me a while to find my favorite ASMR artists on YouTube and it took me even longer to gather a collection of videos that worked enough to put me to sleep every night. Maria of Gentlewhispering (above), AccidentallyGraceful, and WhispersRed are some of the many people out there who have mastered this insane sorcery and I highly suggest you start there if you’re interested in the experience.
I do find that it not only helps me sleep but it gives me feelings of peace and comfort. You feel like somebody actually cares about your well being. Nobody talks about work or politics or celebrities. Of course you’ll sometimes find certain niches of “erotic ASMR” that play to the same effect but for very different purposes. For the most part, it’s just this really positive online community dedicated to making other people feel good. I don’t find a lot of those communities anymore and I’m happy to have stumbled upon this one.
Maybe ASMR is bullshit. Maybe we’ll eventually figure out that these crafty ASMR artists are actually parasitic reptilians trying to infiltrate the system through the brains of the human race. At this point, I don’t care. It feels way cool and it gives me a break from my own busy mind. I think we could all use something like that.
Ramona's Flowers 