A Wearable for Deep Sleep, Mental Strength & Cognitive Health with Ariel Garten

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This is Crappy to Happy and I am your host, Cass Dunn.

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I'm a clinical and coaching psychologist, a mindfulness meditation teacher and of course

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author of the Crappy to Happy Books.

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In this show, I bring you conversations with interesting, inspiring, intelligent people

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who are experts in their field and who have something of value to share that will help

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you feel less crappy and more happy.

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Welcome back to Crappie the Happy.

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I am your host, Cass Dunn.

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Today I am bringing back to the show Ariel Garten.

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Ariel was a guest back in 2019.

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She's the co-founder of Muse, the brain sensing headband.

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If you remember that one.

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I had just discovered Muse when I first spoke to Ariel and I was absolutely fascinated by

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the idea of being able to see what my brain was doing in real time while I meditated

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and how this could help me to deepen my own meditation practice.

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I'm still a fan of Muse.

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There have been a few iterations of the Muse headband since then.

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The Muse S was launched which is a soft headband style designed for sleep tracking but most

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recently it is the Muse Athena which is where things get really interesting.

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This is a whole new category of brain sensor technology that tracks your actual blood flow

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and oxygen delivery to your prefrontal cortex.

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It's got deep sleep boost features that track your brain waves and introduce pink noise

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pulses that drop you into a deep sleep.

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If you're somebody who struggles with insomnia, you struggle with sleep.

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This is so incredible and there is loads of research to back up its benefits.

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There's also a mental focus feature in the app that you get with the Muse headband which

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I was really interested in as somebody who's been diagnosed with ADHD and it turned out

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Ariel has also been diagnosed with ADHD.

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We had a conversation about all of this, about meditation, neurofeedback and how this

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kind of brain training can really shift things.

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If this is of interest to you and you're interested in trying out the Muse, I became an affiliate

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really early on.

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I don't talk about it very often but if you're interested to get one for yourself, make

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sure that you use my referral code because you will get 15% off.

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I'll put that link in the show notes.

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But right now here is my conversation with Ariel Garten.

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Ariel welcome back to the Crap It A Happy Podcast.

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I am so happy to be here today on a day in Toronto that's pretty crappy.

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It is snowing and sleeting and raining all at the same time and I am in my house honestly

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feeling very happy.

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Yeah, these are the pleasures now living in London.

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I was just saying it's so freezing cold outside but the houses are built to keep the warm

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in.

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You've become very appreciative of the indoors and the warm and the shelter.

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I was really thinking about this knowing that I was going to be on the Crap It A Happy

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Podcast today.

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I was thinking about this as I was dropping my daughter off at school and I was walking back

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wearing snow pants, a snow jacket and a rain jacket over top of it and just being like,

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what on earth am I doing?

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The hail pelting down.

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I'm fine, God, I can hear the drop, drop, drop, drop, drop.

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And I was like, I could see this as incredibly crappy and miserable or I could stand back and

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look at the big beautiful white clumps of snow coming down between the raindrops and I was

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thinking people paint these things when you go into a museum and you see beautiful art

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of that gloomy day and you just get into the mood of it and you see the beauty of it.

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It's like I can stand here and see the beauty in this.

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I can be thrilled that I'm alive right now.

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I love the happy podcast that for me today.

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Ah, I love that.

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I love that.

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Just a little shift in perspective can change everything.

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Yeah, and a shift that's available at every moment.

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Right, right.

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So you and I have got straight back into talking about the mindfulness six, seven years

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ago when you were first a guest on Crappierta Happy.

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I can't believe I was thinking earlier, wow, and you're still doing news and I'm still

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doing Crappierta Happy all these years later.

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Yes.

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Still loving it.

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But we were talking about mindfulness and meditation and in relation to the news headband,

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the brain sensing headband, which I had just discovered and was massively a fan of because

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it was enabling me to track, I was by teach mindfulness meditation, you know, tracking

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what was happening in my brain and giving me real-time feedback so that I could adjust accordingly.

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And I have since reshared that episode because I love the music.

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Anybody who's interested in mindfulness and meditation, I recommend that they look into

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it.

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But Ariel, we have come a long way.

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And so we've come up with the news headband.

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So after we spoke, just to catch people up kind of quickly, after we spoke, the news S came

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out, which was the soft headband, which started tracking sleep.

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So that was a new thing as opposed to just meditation.

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And obviously it's coming leaps and bounds since then.

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So from your perspective, when you first developed this technology and the news headband to

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where you are now, like how has your own understanding of what your building shifted over

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time?

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Oh, that's a beautiful question.

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Okay.

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So going into the way back machine into 2019 when we last spoke, at that point, we knew that

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we could track people's brains and give them real-time feedback while they meditated and

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that that was really meaningful.

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So at that point, the device had been out for five years.

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So we had several hundred thousand people around the world using it to meditate.

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And we went to them and we were trying to figure out what is the real value that this is giving

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you?

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How is this meditation helping your life?

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What are you using it?

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How are you using it?

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And we heard stories from people who had tried to meditate before, but couldn't in the

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news was really getting them on their practice and really showing them what their brain was doing

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and telling them the meditation was actually real in doing something in their brain and

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like enabling them to continue going.

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And some people were using it for sleep.

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So it turned out the two most popular times when people were using it were six o'clock in

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the morning, early birds that were not me.

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Go to bed, me.

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And nine at 10 p.m. at night because people were meditating before they went to bed in order

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to help them sleep better and they were reporting it was working so they kept doing it.

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And so we actually said, okay, well, with that information, we can make something that's

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really going to work very effectively for sleep.

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And so we took our clinical grade EEG and built it into a soft form factor that wrapped around

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the forehead in the ears, made it super comfy so that you could lie down on a pillow and

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fall asleep with it on initially to build experiences to help people fall asleep, but then

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to track their sleep and then give them real time feedback through the night to improve sleep.

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So since then we've worked with dozens and dozens of sleep research labs around the

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world who actually now use Mews as a sleep research tool.

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So we're studying autism, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, etc.

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They send Mews as home with participants.

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They sleep with them through the night and they use them to track their sleep instead of

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having them come into a sleep lab.

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And now they're using our sleep intervention technologies.

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So we built technologies that help you fall asleep, that change the audio so that you

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fall asleep faster.

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And we have a new thing called deep sleep boost that deepens your deep sleep.

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So now the same research laboratories are using it to see if they can improve cognitive

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function and older adults by using these as tool to enhance sleep.

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So we've moved from meditation into sleep and then really more broadly into the idea of

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brain health, that how can these tools improve our brain and our ability to function both

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today and 20, 30 years from now?

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Yeah, that is amazing.

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Sleep, we know, is so foundational to sleep.

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Quality sleep is so important to every aspect of our health and wellbeing physically, mentally.

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So getting that information about how we're sleeping, the quality of our sleep, so obviously

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provides really useful data to then be able to know where we can improve, right?

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Yes.

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So quality sleep is one of the main pillars for not only brain health, mental health, but

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also physical health.

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So we all know we need to exercise, eat right, sleep well, meditate.

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You know, these are like the basic non-negotiables of good of a good life.

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But most people don't really know how to improve their sleep.

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They don't know where their sleep is broken or why it's broken.

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And particularly deep sleep is critically important.

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And there's not good ways to know how much deep sleep you're getting or how to improve

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your deep sleep.

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Research shows us that deep sleep is really where your body repairs, where your brain consolidates

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the information that you learned throughout the day to improve your memory the next day.

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Some of it happens in REM sleep as well, but deep sleep is critically important.

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And in deep sleep, that's where you flush toxins out of your brain and potentially reduce

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the load of amyloid beta in your brain.

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Hopefully, you know, reducing your chances of Alzheimer's, etc. in the future.

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So deep sleep is incredibly key to your brain health.

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And sleep overall is incredibly key to our functioning.

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I mean, we all know how unpleasant it feels if we haven't slept well.

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Yeah, exactly.

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I want to ask you, what is the difference in the information that you will get from something

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like a muse headband versus something like an ororing or what Apple Watch or whatever

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of people are kind of using to track sleep?

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Yeah.

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So an ororing Fitbit Apple Watch, all of these things are getting the proxy information

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based on your movement in your heart rate.

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So they're seeing as your heart rate moves up and down throughout the night, it suggests

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that you're in different stages of sleep.

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But the only way to actually know what stage sleep you are is to track the brain.

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So when you go into a sleep lab and you get a, you know, sleep lab test, they're putting

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electrodes on your head and they're seeing your shift in alpha way of activity, delta way

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of activity, your sleep spindles, your cake complexes.

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This is the macron micro architecture of sleep.

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So something that's on your wrist is only kind of guessing how your sleep is.

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And it's particularly notoriously bad at knowing deep sleep because it's just guessing,

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okay, well, you're lying there and your heart rate is slower.

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That could be lots of things that are happening.

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It doesn't necessarily mean you're in deep sleep.

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So whereas or ring, or ring is pretty good at sleep.

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It's 76% accuracy compared to PSG.

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Muse is incredibly good at sleep.

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So Muse is at deep sleep, 94% accurate compared to PSG.

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So it's incredibly precise.

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And then the thing is, when you say, yeah, polysum biography systems, that's a sleep lab.

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Right.

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Okay.

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I'm sorry about that.

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I'll stop you.

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What do you say?

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Something really technical.

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I don't know what you're talking about.

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So the delusional is going to be.

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Yeah.

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So I know.

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And then the things that sit on your wrist and fingers are not helping you actually sleep

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better by intervening.

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So tracking sleep is one thing.

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You know, it's good to know.

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But the most important thing is actually doing the intervention.

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So Muse has several different sleep interventions.

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One is go to sleep experiences.

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We call it our digital sleeping pill.

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As you are falling asleep, Muse is tracking your brain wave activity and guessing when you're

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moving into light sleep.

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And when you've dropped out of consciousness into light sleep, and it adjusts the audio

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that you're listening to in such a way that it just encourages your brain into sleep.

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And it's incredibly effective.

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It's been demonstrated to improve latency to sleep onset.

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So that's how fast you fall asleep.

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It's been demonstrated to improve it by 55%.

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So that's a really big deal.

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And then if you wear the device throughout the night and you wake up in the night, the

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Muse wakes up with you.

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And then JetLeap brings back the same guidance that helped you fall asleep the first time

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to help you fall back asleep.

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Interesting.

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Interesting.

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Now, even when I have won my Muse to bed to measure my sleep, I haven't necessarily

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used the listening interventions.

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Maybe because I don't want to put ear buds in and my husband's next to me.

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How does that work on a practical level with the listening?

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If you're sleeping next to somebody else.

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You can either use ear buds and lots of people do fall asleep with ear buds in, or you can

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just listen on your phone speaker.

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So our deep sleep boost, that's a different feature that we have in sleep.

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Deep sleep boost enhances your delta wave activity.

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So that's the thing that deepens your deep sleep.

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And that's delivered with tiny little audio pink noise pulses.

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So they're barely audible.

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And you can actually just play it on the speaker of your phone.

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Your bed partner won't hear it.

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We've done lots of testing.

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And just by playing little pink noises that are synchronized to your own delta waves,

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then you are able to deepen your delta activity and reorganize your delta activity so that

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you have more deep sleep and more glenphatic action in your brain.

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It's amazing.

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And your brain picks up the sound.

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So it's at a level that is audible to your brain, but not so loud that it wakes you up.

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And the system actually automatically adjusts if it sees that you're awakening.

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It adjusts the sound volume.

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And it's not a sound that's loud enough for your bed partner to hear.

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And perhaps if they do, maybe it's deepening their deep sleep as well, but it's really tuned

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to you and tuned to your brain and exactly what it needs at the right moment.

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That's incredible.

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Thank you.

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It really is amazing.

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Yeah, it really is.

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Yeah, so we built that feature with our partner labs in Toronto, in Montreal, in Boston, and

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in Spain.

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So there was a consortium of researchers that came to us and said, "We would like you to

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build the steep sleep stimulation function that's well proven out in the literature because

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we'd like to be able to use it with older adults with cognitive decline because they hypothesized

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that when you boost deep sleep in this way, it's going to improve their cognitive function."

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And so we built it for the researchers and along the way, we're actually able to release it

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to our entire population of people using news.

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So you're able to get true, true research grade technology to use in your own bed every

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night.

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Yeah, it's incredible.

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I think that's really important to understand, too, because I think a lot of these kind of

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wearables, they're big gimmicky.

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I mean, they serve their purpose, but this is really high quality.

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Like I said, not just the information, but the intervention.

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Yes.

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So Mews has been published over 200 studies.

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Mayo Clinic uses it widely for, there's a study with Mayo in cancer care and demonstrating

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that Mews improves breast cancer functioning.

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They just published a long COVID study demonstrating that using Mews' meditation and sleep interventions

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improve long COVID symptoms significantly.

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There's been another study in Cushing syndrome, so undercrundis function, fibromyalgia, all

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of these are Mayo studies.

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They even use it with their own doctors.

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So there is a study published a few years ago that demonstrated that doctors using Mews

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at the Mayo Clinic reduced burnout by 54%.

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Holy.

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Wow.

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And improved cognitive function, stress and resilience.

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Really, really good outcomes.

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That's incredible.

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Now you talked about the Delta waves with the sleep and you've just inspired me to use the

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sleep technology.

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The audio, not just tracking my brain.

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I also obviously use the meditation.

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And for anybody who doesn't know, I mean, you can listen to the previous episode with Ariel

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from 2019, but essentially you put the thing on your head.

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It's like a headband.

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Connect to your app and as you are meditating, it's giving you real time feedback by way of

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the soundscape.

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So my favorite personally, there's plenty to choose from, but my favorite is the rainforest.

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And so I sit in the rainforest and I meditate and hear the sounds of the rainforest.

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And I know when my brain is active because the wind and the rain gets very loud and then

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as my brain calms down, that sort of gives me feedback to, you know, come back and then

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it slows down and gets quiet.

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So that's essentially how that technology works.

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And then you hear a little bird chirping when you have had a, what is the bird?

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It's when you're, it calm that the bird chirps.

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And then when you're able to remain and calm focus detention for five seconds or more

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than the bird chirps.

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So it's a subtle reinforcement.

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It's a conditioning that indicates to your brain that yes, this is the right state.

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Stay there, stay there, stay there.

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So you end up learning much faster your brain and two of you learned much faster, had

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to jump into that state because it's been reinforced for being there.

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Yeah.

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And for people who, like I just can't meditate or it's, you know, they give up on it because

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they think they're not doing it right or they're not getting anything out of it.

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It gives, it's a tool really that can help you to really track your progress and give you

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in the moment some feedback about what's happening with your brain so that you can come

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back.

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But what I noticed with my most recent muse, the Athena, which is the most recent evolution

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of the muse headband, there is so much more in there that was not in previous iterations.

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And one thing that was, there's lots that I want to talk to you about.

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One thing I noticed was first and foremost, this alpha peak score.

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Can you explain what the alpha peak score is and why it's important and what that's telling

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me?

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Sure.

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So the muse Athena, which is our latest device, has a host of different brain health features

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inside of it.

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One is the ability to track your cognitive function and it does that with your alpha peak

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frequency.

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So people's alpha peak is generally between 7 to 12 hertz.

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We say 8 to 12 hertz.

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In reality, I don't think I've ever seen anyone higher than 11.5.

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And as you age, it can drop considerably below 8.

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So we did a study with McMaster University looking at our big brain database and we were

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able to identify that as time goes on, people's alpha peak frequency decreases.

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That decreases quite obvious decade by decade.

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So we offer your own alpha peak frequency as a metric that you can use to track your brain's

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cognitive function.

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And actually the reinforcement that we give, the neurofeedback with muse's meditation,

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is something that can help to reinforce and maintain your alpha wave frequency and potentially

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can help to reduce the future effects of cognitive decline.

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So the alpha peak is very key.

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Alpha is a state that you're in when you are both very calm and a state that you're in

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when you're very focused.

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So if you're able to maintain sort of this internal single-pointed focus, you are up

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regulating your prefrontal cortex activity, your down-regulating kind of meaningless internal

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chatter.

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You're in a brain state that your brain is working really effectively in the state of

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calm focus.

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You're feeling really good because you're in calm focus.

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And it's actually a very healthy state for your brain and your body.

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In that state, you're more relaxed.

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Your physiology is more relaxed.

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Your blood vessels are dilated.

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You're in a really, really healthy state.

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And your alpha peak frequency is something that you can use to check how it's changing at

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different times of day, how it's changing over the course of time to give you a window

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into the kinds of things that help your body and brain be in its best state.

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And the alpha score that you get, essentially after a certain number of periods of meditation,

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the device collects enough data from you to be able to give you your personal alpha peak

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score.

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That's right, isn't it?

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And then over time, the more that you use it, the more it's kind of keeping a track and

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showing you how that's improving or not, right?

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Exactly.

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And how that shifts throughout the course of your day and throughout the course of your

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months.

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So it can be a really interesting metric for you to have insight into your own brain activity.

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And the cognitive stuff as well while we're talking alpha peak, I noticed with the Athena

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that it had a feature which was like mental, I forget what it's called, but it's like mental

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training, right?

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It's mental strength, mental strength, mental strength.

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And I thought, oh, this is interesting.

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Let me have a look.

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And there is an exercise where you look at this like a eagle, basically.

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Is it an eagle?

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And it's flying.

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And I've just got to keep, you just got to keep focused on the bird.

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And the more that you focus on the bird, the bird flies towards the horizon.

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And then at the end, it gives you a score for your mental strength.

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So how effectively you were able to just calmly focus and keep your attention on the bird.

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So this is a whole other technology.

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So the previous muse generations, muse two and muse S used EEG technologies.

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They were measuring the electrical activity of your brain and PPG where we're measuring the

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blood flow just in the vessels at the surface of your forehead from which we could drive

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your heart rate.

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So we were getting electrical activity and heart rate.

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In the Athena, we have a whole new technology called F-nears, functional near infrared spectroscopy.

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And that is measuring the blood flow not on your forehead, but actually the blood brain

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barrier.

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So that's literally measuring the blood flow that's coming from and going to your brain in

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order to look at the level of oxygen that your brain is using.

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And so this is a whole new kind of insight into the oxygen levels inside of your brain.

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And it gives you the Athena strength session you mentioned, which is training your brain

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to demand more oxygen.

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So yeah, it's wild.

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All of this is in a slim, slim little form factor.

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So for you guys, yes, I've got mine here too.

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I was going to show it.

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Yes.

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Yes.

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So for anybody who's watching the video, so these are EEG sensors on the forehead here,

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gray lines, and behind the ears.

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And then these little windows here, these are five optodes.

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So these are optical sensors that are sending light to your blood brain barrier and receiving

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the light back into the device and then able to determine your oxygenation levels.

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And so this is a technology that's used in research labs to be able to track blood flow

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to the brain and to see which areas of the brain are working.

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It's kind of like a little mini FMRI.

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And then in the Muse app, what we're doing is we're also giving you neurofeedback to teach

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your prefrontal cortex to up-regulate its blood flow and up-regulate its oxygen delivery.

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And when you look at the things that cause cognitive decline, you look at things like vascular

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dementia, these are all dysregulations in part.

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These contain dysregulations of the blood flow to the brain and a decrease in oxygen delivery

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to the brain.

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So when you're able to train your brain to maintain great vascular function, good blood flow

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to the brain, good blood flow to the prefrontal cortex, you're able to potentially stave off

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some of these potential effects of poor oxygen flow.

402
00:24:27,360 --> 00:24:28,680
I did not know that.

403
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I thought I was training myself to focus a little bit like we do with the meditation.

404
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I didn't realize I was actually kind of training my brain to intake more oxygen.

405
00:24:41,120 --> 00:24:42,120
Yep.

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00:24:42,120 --> 00:24:47,040
And so the sensors are specifically over the prefrontal cortex left and right separately.

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And so what you're doing is you're training your prefrontal cortex, which is the part of

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your brain that's responsible for maintaining your focus, as well as our executive function,

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our planning, our prefrontal cortex have so many roles.

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And you're training them to really maintain their function and demand more nutrients and

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be able to bang themselves in more nutrients, more oxygen throughout the activity.

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Amazing.

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It really is amazing.

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Yeah, I know it really is.

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00:25:17,440 --> 00:25:22,520
But on that too, like in that same sort of section on the app where you can see your blood flow

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to your brain.

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00:25:23,520 --> 00:25:27,760
And I have looked at it and I've looked at it and watched it and thought, that's so interesting.

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But not really understood what to do with it, but just like it will show you in real time

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when you've got the headband on what the oxygen levels are in the left and right side of your

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brain.

421
00:25:38,080 --> 00:25:39,080
Yes.

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So it's looking, you're looking at your oxy and deoxyribose.

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So there's two different aspects to oxygen in the brain.

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One is the amount of oxygen that your brain is consuming.

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So when you're doing a task, it's going to be consuming oxygen.

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And the other is the amount of oxygen that it's demanding.

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So we're able to look both at the used up oxygens of the deoxyribose and we're able to look

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at the oxyribose, the oxygenated blood that's coming in.

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And so we're able to look at this ratio of how well your brain is working, by is it demanding

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oxygen at the right times, is it using up oxygen, meaning it's actually functioning and doing

431
00:26:17,040 --> 00:26:20,080
its thing, and is that balance appropriate?

432
00:26:20,080 --> 00:26:21,680
Right.

433
00:26:21,680 --> 00:26:22,680
That is interesting.

434
00:26:22,680 --> 00:26:28,560
Now, ADHD, I was diagnosed with ADHD and have trouble with attention and focus.

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00:26:28,560 --> 00:26:33,320
When you talk about some of these cognitive training functions that the muse assists

436
00:26:33,320 --> 00:26:40,920
with, is there any research there you mentioned Alzheimer's before, but is it useful for that?

437
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:45,880
The muse is not a medical device and it's not intended to diagnose or treat any medical

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condition.

439
00:26:47,400 --> 00:26:54,720
That said that focused attention training can be incredibly useful for ADHD.

440
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There's lots of research that demonstrates the positive effects of neurofeedback and being

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able to overcome some of the difficulties associated with ADHD and the ability to train

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00:27:06,960 --> 00:27:12,840
your peripheral corduces is really key because it's your peripheral cortex that is both

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your attention control center and the place that allows us to inhibit our activities.

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So in ADHD, we're often dealing both with an inability to attend and an inability to

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inhibit.

446
00:27:27,120 --> 00:27:28,120
Yes.

447
00:27:28,120 --> 00:27:32,160
You want to just jump up and do something and other brains might say, "Don't jump up

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now, that's not a good idea."

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Or you might want to like, flirt out in the middle of a sentence and other brains would

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say, "That's not correct now, that's not a good idea," but an ADHD is harder to inhibit.

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So when you strengthen your peripheral cortex, you know, you're working on multiple aspects

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of the condition that are really, really helpful.

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00:27:50,320 --> 00:27:54,480
And then just meditation in general is also extremely helpful for ADHD because you're

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learning to stay in one activity.

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You're learning to sit there and attend and then to observe and monitor your own mind,

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00:28:03,120 --> 00:28:08,240
observe and monitor your distractions and then choose not to follow your distractions.

457
00:28:08,240 --> 00:28:10,400
Like that is so key.

458
00:28:10,400 --> 00:28:14,720
I myself have had ADD-80-HD.

459
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I see all of the ways in which my brain wants to work inherently where there's a thought

460
00:28:21,320 --> 00:28:22,640
I want to be distracted.

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00:28:22,640 --> 00:28:26,200
I'm doing something for five seconds and then I just want to get up and do something

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else where somebody else is able to stay on task.

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But since I'm able to see those things, I'm able to see what my brain is doing, I can

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bring in my attentional control centers and make a different choice and say, "Oh, I see

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that urge to get up, but I'm not going to.

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I'm going to choose to stay here and I'm going to choose to stick with this."

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00:28:45,040 --> 00:28:51,240
And through training with meditation and F-nears and neurofeedback and all of these tools,

468
00:28:51,240 --> 00:28:58,440
it's really fundamentally shifted my ability to overcome the ADD-80-HD challenges.

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And you know, there's so many of them.

470
00:29:00,400 --> 00:29:04,720
You know, the classic ones that you talk about, like the intention or really the intention

471
00:29:04,720 --> 00:29:05,720
is the main one.

472
00:29:05,720 --> 00:29:08,280
But also things like unfinished tasks.

473
00:29:08,280 --> 00:29:13,200
So in the past, I would have like all of these half-finished projects.

474
00:29:13,200 --> 00:29:16,520
And now I can see like, "Oh, I'm getting to the point where the project's halfway and I

475
00:29:16,520 --> 00:29:20,120
want to just get up and abandon it and I'm not going to.

476
00:29:20,120 --> 00:29:21,800
I'm going to make a different choice.

477
00:29:21,800 --> 00:29:25,720
I'm going to see what my brain body previously would have wanted me to do and I'm going

478
00:29:25,720 --> 00:29:27,720
to say, "Nope, I'm an adult.

479
00:29:27,720 --> 00:29:29,240
I can choose something else.

480
00:29:29,240 --> 00:29:32,800
I have the power to like stick with this and get to the end."

481
00:29:32,800 --> 00:29:35,840
And then you know, I get to the end and give myself checkbox, little reward.

482
00:29:35,840 --> 00:29:38,200
It's like, "Yep, stuck with it."

483
00:29:38,200 --> 00:29:39,760
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

484
00:29:39,760 --> 00:29:46,160
And on that too, I think when you have something like ADD-HD and your to-do list is chaotic

485
00:29:46,160 --> 00:29:50,520
and cluttered and the more that you're reacting, the more you're just exacerbating those issues,

486
00:29:50,520 --> 00:29:55,800
whereas meditation and mindfulness and just practicing those tools of just being still

487
00:29:55,800 --> 00:30:01,120
and cultivating calm and regulating your own nervous system with the breath work, which

488
00:30:01,120 --> 00:30:05,440
is all built into the app as well, then all of that is going to help as well.

489
00:30:05,440 --> 00:30:07,400
It's just the calm environment, isn't it?

490
00:30:07,400 --> 00:30:09,120
Like internally and externally.

491
00:30:09,120 --> 00:30:15,920
Yeah, the calm environment, the ability to see your brain's activity and to see the choices

492
00:30:15,920 --> 00:30:21,840
you would have made and then have the cognitive capacity to make a different choice.

493
00:30:21,840 --> 00:30:26,720
And these are the skills that you're training and building and meditation and that you train

494
00:30:26,720 --> 00:30:29,040
and build when you use tools like Muse.

495
00:30:29,040 --> 00:30:34,920
And it has been so life-changing, so absolutely life-changing.

496
00:30:34,920 --> 00:30:40,720
And the more I observe myself and you have the power to like just sit there and observe

497
00:30:40,720 --> 00:30:45,680
and see what my own mind is doing, the more I find all of the funny little things that

498
00:30:45,680 --> 00:30:48,000
I now realize actually were ADD.

499
00:30:48,000 --> 00:30:53,880
It's like my husband would always goad me about like boxes that I shove into the corner.

500
00:30:53,880 --> 00:30:58,880
It's like, oh, you made a pile of things in the corner because you didn't want to deal

501
00:30:58,880 --> 00:30:59,880
with it.

502
00:30:59,880 --> 00:31:00,880
Relatable.

503
00:31:00,880 --> 00:31:01,880
Relatable.

504
00:31:01,880 --> 00:31:07,680
I didn't realize it was an ADD symptom until I was reading a forum and somebody was complaining

505
00:31:07,680 --> 00:31:11,320
about like the black boxes of death, the piles in the corner from their husband.

506
00:31:11,320 --> 00:31:13,280
I'm like, oh, I'm the husband.

507
00:31:13,280 --> 00:31:15,520
Those are my piles, right?

508
00:31:15,520 --> 00:31:20,400
And what I realized was I didn't have the like prefrontal executive functionality to know

509
00:31:20,400 --> 00:31:24,120
what to do with them, to know how to organize them.

510
00:31:24,120 --> 00:31:29,680
And as I strengthened like work to my prefrontal cortex, worked with strategies, worked with

511
00:31:29,680 --> 00:31:33,600
my own abilities, I could see you like, right, I felt helpless.

512
00:31:33,600 --> 00:31:36,440
I didn't know what to do, so I shoved it in the corner.

513
00:31:36,440 --> 00:31:37,840
I don't have to be helpless.

514
00:31:37,840 --> 00:31:39,600
I can figure out what to do.

515
00:31:39,600 --> 00:31:41,320
It might take me longer.

516
00:31:41,320 --> 00:31:42,920
But this thing has a place.

517
00:31:42,920 --> 00:31:45,720
We're going to find the place and we're going to put it there.

518
00:31:45,720 --> 00:31:46,960
This other thing has a place too.

519
00:31:46,960 --> 00:31:49,760
I know it creates anxiety because I don't know what the place is and I don't know how to

520
00:31:49,760 --> 00:31:50,760
solve this.

521
00:31:50,760 --> 00:31:55,200
But I'm going to just sit with that, ask my husband where it goes if I need to and start

522
00:31:55,200 --> 00:31:58,240
to unpack it, literally unpack it.

523
00:31:58,240 --> 00:32:01,080
Yeah, so really helpful.

524
00:32:01,080 --> 00:32:04,320
So there's the meditation and as I just mentioned too.

525
00:32:04,320 --> 00:32:11,000
So beyond just the soundscapes and the meditation, now there's a whole range of different meditation

526
00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:12,720
practices in there.

527
00:32:12,720 --> 00:32:15,800
Can you talk about what is available in there?

528
00:32:15,800 --> 00:32:17,120
Sure.

529
00:32:17,120 --> 00:32:19,320
So we have different styles of meditation.

530
00:32:19,320 --> 00:32:26,280
So mind meditation is the classic focus detention meditation that really helps you to train

531
00:32:26,280 --> 00:32:31,480
your brain to observe your own thinking and maintain that beautiful state of calm focus

532
00:32:31,480 --> 00:32:32,480
detention.

533
00:32:32,480 --> 00:32:35,680
So that's really like the core anchor of the meditation practice.

534
00:32:35,680 --> 00:32:37,240
Then we have heart meditation.

535
00:32:37,240 --> 00:32:41,480
We're actually listening to the beating of your heart, like the beating of a drum.

536
00:32:41,480 --> 00:32:44,440
And that teaches you to be aware of your sinusoidal arrhythmia.

537
00:32:44,440 --> 00:32:47,920
So when you breathe in your heart rate increases, as you breathe out your heart rate decreases.

538
00:32:47,920 --> 00:32:52,840
And it tunes something called your interception, which is your ability to sensitively understand

539
00:32:52,840 --> 00:32:54,160
your state.

540
00:32:54,160 --> 00:32:58,080
So as you understand the state that you're in, you can then make better choices.

541
00:32:58,080 --> 00:32:59,880
When you notice like, oh, my heart is racing.

542
00:32:59,880 --> 00:33:00,880
I'm feeling ramped.

543
00:33:00,880 --> 00:33:02,760
It's like, right, that's time to stop.

544
00:33:02,760 --> 00:33:03,760
Take a deep breath.

545
00:33:03,760 --> 00:33:04,760
Calm your mind.

546
00:33:04,760 --> 00:33:05,760
Calm your body.

547
00:33:05,760 --> 00:33:07,800
Then we have breath work practices.

548
00:33:07,800 --> 00:33:11,840
Breath work can be really, really key to helping you shift your physiology.

549
00:33:11,840 --> 00:33:17,720
And then with the subscription, we have a library of over 500 different kinds of guided

550
00:33:17,720 --> 00:33:22,080
content in different styles and Zen and secular meditation.

551
00:33:22,080 --> 00:33:24,680
We have inspirational guidance.

552
00:33:24,680 --> 00:33:27,080
And we have collections for anything that comes up in your life.

553
00:33:27,080 --> 00:33:32,800
So we have a college collection for students who are struggling in college and with identity

554
00:33:32,800 --> 00:33:33,800
issues.

555
00:33:33,800 --> 00:33:36,720
We have birthday collections.

556
00:33:36,720 --> 00:33:39,640
We have work collections, relationship collections.

557
00:33:39,640 --> 00:33:43,440
So all the things that come up in your life, there really are meditations there that are

558
00:33:43,440 --> 00:33:48,720
able to meet you where you're at and help you shift your thinking and guide you to a better

559
00:33:48,720 --> 00:33:49,720
place.

560
00:33:49,720 --> 00:33:50,720
Yeah.

561
00:33:50,720 --> 00:33:51,720
Yeah.

562
00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:54,400
And when you meditate too, it's not just giving you the feedback in real time with the

563
00:33:54,400 --> 00:33:59,040
birds and the sound, but after each session, it's also giving you like almost like a little

564
00:33:59,040 --> 00:34:03,240
report on the movement of your body and the rate of your heart.

565
00:34:03,240 --> 00:34:07,320
So you're getting a whole lot of data each time you use it.

566
00:34:07,320 --> 00:34:08,320
Yeah.

567
00:34:08,320 --> 00:34:11,480
So through every single meditation that you do when you're wearing the headband, all of the

568
00:34:11,480 --> 00:34:13,040
sensors are active.

569
00:34:13,040 --> 00:34:17,000
So you're not just listening to the guidance, you're also at the end getting insight into

570
00:34:17,000 --> 00:34:19,960
your mind and body through every single session.

571
00:34:19,960 --> 00:34:24,480
I really mentioned before about your alpha pecan tracking at kind of different times of

572
00:34:24,480 --> 00:34:30,920
the day is wearing the muse outside of meditation, outside of sleep, wearing it during tasks

573
00:34:30,920 --> 00:34:32,400
where you're focusing your attention.

574
00:34:32,400 --> 00:34:35,120
Is that a useful thing to do?

575
00:34:35,120 --> 00:34:40,120
So we definitely have biohackers who know where at various points in the day to see what happens

576
00:34:40,120 --> 00:34:46,120
to my brain when the algorithm in it for the focus detention meditation was really built

577
00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:51,880
for calm versus focused within a focused attention on the breath practice.

578
00:34:51,880 --> 00:34:56,360
So the calm and focus algorithm, you know, is very specific and how it's built.

579
00:34:56,360 --> 00:34:59,320
But the rest of the data that you'll get on your brain waves and your heart rate, those

580
00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:01,400
are transferable from activity to activity.

581
00:35:01,400 --> 00:35:07,000
Yeah, but it's really built for that meditation kind of tracking and the sleep tracking.

582
00:35:07,000 --> 00:35:08,000
Yes.

583
00:35:08,000 --> 00:35:12,160
But again, people use it in all sorts of different ways to gain new insights.

584
00:35:12,160 --> 00:35:17,320
And then we have, you know, our researchers who use, so separate from the consumer app,

585
00:35:17,320 --> 00:35:21,680
there's a research backend that researchers use for the research studies where they get

586
00:35:21,680 --> 00:35:26,200
data through an IRB approved protocol and they get all of the raw data to be able to

587
00:35:26,200 --> 00:35:28,320
use in their analyses.

588
00:35:28,320 --> 00:35:32,040
And then we have clinicians who use it differently as well.

589
00:35:32,040 --> 00:35:36,920
So for clinicians, we have a whole row of specific clinical programs that you use with your

590
00:35:36,920 --> 00:35:40,680
patients for stress, sleep, focus, attention.

591
00:35:40,680 --> 00:35:44,040
So it really depends on the use case.

592
00:35:44,040 --> 00:35:48,400
So there's different use tools in the background that can be used for all these different uses,

593
00:35:48,400 --> 00:35:50,120
these cases.

594
00:35:50,120 --> 00:35:53,640
It has evolved so much and the technology is so incredible.

595
00:35:53,640 --> 00:36:00,720
And I'm curious now with all of the infiltration of AI into literally everything we do, is there

596
00:36:00,720 --> 00:36:03,200
any future of AI being built in?

597
00:36:03,200 --> 00:36:04,200
I'm just curious.

598
00:36:04,200 --> 00:36:05,200
Yeah.

599
00:36:05,200 --> 00:36:08,200
So there actually is an AI assistant in the app named ANSO.

600
00:36:08,200 --> 00:36:09,200
Oh, there is two.

601
00:36:09,200 --> 00:36:10,200
There is two.

602
00:36:10,200 --> 00:36:11,200
I just ignore him.

603
00:36:11,200 --> 00:36:12,520
I thought.

604
00:36:12,520 --> 00:36:13,880
And so it's actually really helpful.

605
00:36:13,880 --> 00:36:15,880
So ANSO can help you interpret your data.

606
00:36:15,880 --> 00:36:22,200
So ANSO is able to look at your immune session data and then interpret that data for you.

607
00:36:22,200 --> 00:36:27,400
And you can ask ANSO questions like how does this compare to a session I did a year ago or

608
00:36:27,400 --> 00:36:28,800
five days ago.

609
00:36:28,800 --> 00:36:32,760
So ANSO can look back across sessions, can help you look at trends.

610
00:36:32,760 --> 00:36:35,520
ANSO is really also evolving into a sleep coach.

611
00:36:35,520 --> 00:36:40,480
You can ask ANSO questions like, given this information, how can I sleep better?

612
00:36:40,480 --> 00:36:42,680
What are the things that I should do?

613
00:36:42,680 --> 00:36:45,280
And then as you've heard, our app is large.

614
00:36:45,280 --> 00:36:47,280
There's so many things that you can do with it.

615
00:36:47,280 --> 00:36:48,960
ANSO can also help guide you.

616
00:36:48,960 --> 00:36:54,480
It's like, great, I want this type of meditation and so what should I listen to?

617
00:36:54,480 --> 00:36:56,520
Or these are my goals.

618
00:36:56,520 --> 00:36:59,200
What do you suggest, suggest a training program for me?

619
00:36:59,200 --> 00:37:00,200
Yeah.

620
00:37:00,200 --> 00:37:01,720
Yeah, it's amazing.

621
00:37:01,720 --> 00:37:04,280
I've been a fan since I first discovered it.

622
00:37:04,280 --> 00:37:09,440
I've also put so many people onto the muse and I did become an affiliate and a muse ambassador.

623
00:37:09,440 --> 00:37:14,360
So I'll put a link to that because I think I got a jiggy 15% discount if you buy through

624
00:37:14,360 --> 00:37:15,360
me.

625
00:37:15,360 --> 00:37:18,640
I'm here to hard sell the muse, but I'm such a fan.

626
00:37:18,640 --> 00:37:20,600
I'm always recommending it to people.

627
00:37:20,600 --> 00:37:21,800
But is there anything I've missed?

628
00:37:21,800 --> 00:37:25,520
What else does it do that I haven't even touched on?

629
00:37:25,520 --> 00:37:28,800
I would actually love to know a little bit about your experience.

630
00:37:28,800 --> 00:37:31,160
What are some of the benefits you've experienced?

631
00:37:31,160 --> 00:37:34,520
Well, I don't know that I've been using it towards fullest potential.

632
00:37:34,520 --> 00:37:36,760
I have always been a meditator.

633
00:37:36,760 --> 00:37:41,040
So I really enjoy getting that feedback.

634
00:37:41,040 --> 00:37:48,440
It keeps me more consistent when I get the feedback and I can see the objective kind of data about

635
00:37:48,440 --> 00:37:50,800
what was happening while I was doing the meditation.

636
00:37:50,800 --> 00:37:56,080
I noticed, I really noticed that over time when I use it regularly that I can really see

637
00:37:56,080 --> 00:37:57,320
the improvement.

638
00:37:57,320 --> 00:38:03,720
I know when I go for periods of not meditating, I really notice how much more difficult it

639
00:38:03,720 --> 00:38:04,720
is.

640
00:38:04,720 --> 00:38:09,680
And not just feeling more difficult, but in the data, it shows me that like I was all over

641
00:38:09,680 --> 00:38:11,120
the place with it.

642
00:38:11,120 --> 00:38:16,840
But I'm really liking what's really happening with that brain training because that mental

643
00:38:16,840 --> 00:38:20,440
strength thing I think is incredible.

644
00:38:20,440 --> 00:38:21,840
And I went and actually pulled out.

645
00:38:21,840 --> 00:38:25,960
So just for listeners to, I went and got, I did it and I didn't do very well.

646
00:38:25,960 --> 00:38:27,840
I didn't know what I was really doing the very first time.

647
00:38:27,840 --> 00:38:29,520
I was saying, "Where am I doing here?"

648
00:38:29,520 --> 00:38:34,080
And then the bird will stop for a bit and I was like really trying to focus and I couldn't

649
00:38:34,080 --> 00:38:35,920
get the bird to fly again.

650
00:38:35,920 --> 00:38:38,760
And then I eventually figured it out and I got a really low score.

651
00:38:38,760 --> 00:38:41,240
And then I gave it to my husband and said, "You do this.

652
00:38:41,240 --> 00:38:42,240
Make the bird fly."

653
00:38:42,240 --> 00:38:44,440
And he got a really high score.

654
00:38:44,440 --> 00:38:46,240
First go.

655
00:38:46,240 --> 00:38:50,120
So tracking that over time has been interesting too.

656
00:38:50,120 --> 00:38:54,760
And what I have noticed is that it helps me to get into like you said that calm, focused

657
00:38:54,760 --> 00:39:01,480
state and developing that knowledge in myself, like in my own body of what that feels like.

658
00:39:01,480 --> 00:39:02,480
Yeah.

659
00:39:02,480 --> 00:39:07,480
And so the Athena session is so interesting because a lot of people struggle with it initially

660
00:39:07,480 --> 00:39:11,960
because you don't know what it feels like to increase the blood flow to your peripheral

661
00:39:11,960 --> 00:39:12,960
cortex.

662
00:39:12,960 --> 00:39:16,080
You know, none of us are ever aware of the blood flow to our brain.

663
00:39:16,080 --> 00:39:17,080
What?

664
00:39:17,080 --> 00:39:21,280
But it's such a key thing to be able to track and to train.

665
00:39:21,280 --> 00:39:28,000
And so when you're able to just do the thing that is increasing the blood flow, then the

666
00:39:28,000 --> 00:39:32,480
bird flies and that becomes this very intuitive reinforcement to your brain to be like, "Oh,

667
00:39:32,480 --> 00:39:33,480
right.

668
00:39:33,480 --> 00:39:34,480
Right.

669
00:39:34,480 --> 00:39:36,160
Increasing oxygen delivery to my brain.

670
00:39:36,160 --> 00:39:37,160
That's how I do it.

671
00:39:37,160 --> 00:39:38,920
And saying, "Yes, yes, delivery more oxygen.

672
00:39:38,920 --> 00:39:39,920
This is good.

673
00:39:39,920 --> 00:39:40,920
This is good."

674
00:39:40,920 --> 00:39:43,120
And it's a very, very positive feed forward.

675
00:39:43,120 --> 00:39:45,960
So your husband just got it.

676
00:39:45,960 --> 00:39:49,360
And once your brain gets it, it learns how to do it.

677
00:39:49,360 --> 00:39:54,280
And that's the beauty of all this kind of neurofeedback that you are showing your brain and body.

678
00:39:54,280 --> 00:39:55,680
This is the state to be in.

679
00:39:55,680 --> 00:39:59,040
And then your brain body goes, "Oh, I didn't realize that I needed to be here.

680
00:39:59,040 --> 00:40:00,480
That this was important."

681
00:40:00,480 --> 00:40:03,680
And then we give you some audio reinforcement and scores and things that say, "Yes, you

682
00:40:03,680 --> 00:40:04,680
did it.

683
00:40:04,680 --> 00:40:05,680
See?

684
00:40:05,680 --> 00:40:06,680
You want to go there.

685
00:40:06,680 --> 00:40:11,200
And your brain body goes back there the next time and it becomes less and less effort each

686
00:40:11,200 --> 00:40:14,000
time because your body knows."

687
00:40:14,000 --> 00:40:19,200
And the idea is that you are using the tool to train so that throughout the day, you don't

688
00:40:19,200 --> 00:40:20,200
need the tool.

689
00:40:20,200 --> 00:40:23,840
Throughout the day, your brain body knows like, "Right, this is the state to be in.

690
00:40:23,840 --> 00:40:25,080
This is the state of focus.

691
00:40:25,080 --> 00:40:26,840
This is the state of calm."

692
00:40:26,840 --> 00:40:29,680
And then life throughout the day becomes so much easier.

693
00:40:29,680 --> 00:40:30,680
Yeah.

694
00:40:30,680 --> 00:40:33,720
I also really noticed like the difference between going from a shorter session to a longer

695
00:40:33,720 --> 00:40:37,400
session and how long before my brain started to fatigue.

696
00:40:37,400 --> 00:40:42,080
And so just things like that are really interesting to note and to pay attention to.

697
00:40:42,080 --> 00:40:45,800
It reminded me of when you first, do you remember those magic eye books where you have to

698
00:40:45,800 --> 00:40:50,640
get into a fuzzy focus to see the image pop out of all of the pixelated?

699
00:40:50,640 --> 00:40:51,640
That's what it was like.

700
00:40:51,640 --> 00:40:53,440
Like once you can see it, you can't unsee it, right?

701
00:40:53,440 --> 00:40:56,280
But it sometimes takes a while like you can staring at it going, "There's nothing here

702
00:40:56,280 --> 00:40:59,120
and then once you get into that, oh, there it is."

703
00:40:59,120 --> 00:41:00,120
That's how I felt with the boat.

704
00:41:00,120 --> 00:41:05,080
Oh, there it is. Like now I'm in the zone and so yeah, you're trying yourself to be able

705
00:41:05,080 --> 00:41:06,760
to get back there more quickly.

706
00:41:06,760 --> 00:41:07,880
I think it's fascinating.

707
00:41:07,880 --> 00:41:10,920
I think that's just brilliant.

708
00:41:10,920 --> 00:41:11,920
Thank you.

709
00:41:11,920 --> 00:41:12,920
Thank you.

710
00:41:12,920 --> 00:41:13,920
Yeah.

711
00:41:13,920 --> 00:41:17,720
I mean, we've worked really hard over the last decade to create kind of the most validated

712
00:41:17,720 --> 00:41:23,280
set of brain health tools that we could in one device and you know, try to approach it

713
00:41:23,280 --> 00:41:24,280
from every angle.

714
00:41:24,280 --> 00:41:28,120
We can help you meditate which we know improves your quality of life in your brain health.

715
00:41:28,120 --> 00:41:31,920
We help you sleep which we know improves your quality of life in your brain health.

716
00:41:31,920 --> 00:41:36,920
We help you train your brain, hear our metrics, hear what's going on in all of it.

717
00:41:36,920 --> 00:41:44,280
And from here we're continuing to build new interventions and new experiences constantly

718
00:41:44,280 --> 00:41:49,000
and as soon as you get a new device, the cool new things that we build get delivered to

719
00:41:49,000 --> 00:41:50,000
you through the app.

720
00:41:50,000 --> 00:41:52,400
So the ecosystem is always growing.

721
00:41:52,400 --> 00:41:53,400
Yeah, exactly.

722
00:41:53,400 --> 00:41:57,320
And so on that too, so I then said to my husband, "Oh, here you should take my old

723
00:41:57,320 --> 00:41:58,920
mouse S."

724
00:41:58,920 --> 00:42:02,040
So, and do the, because he loved the brain train and can't get him to meditate mind you, but

725
00:42:02,040 --> 00:42:03,600
he loves the brain train.

726
00:42:03,600 --> 00:42:06,560
But he couldn't because it's a different technology in that headband, right?

727
00:42:06,560 --> 00:42:10,360
You have to have the Athena to be able to use those particular functions.

728
00:42:10,360 --> 00:42:11,360
Yeah.

729
00:42:11,360 --> 00:42:16,720
So the Athena is the one that contains all the Fnearest functionality, but the S contains

730
00:42:16,720 --> 00:42:20,280
all of the other functionality except for the Fnearest.

731
00:42:20,280 --> 00:42:24,640
So like deep sleep boost, the go to sleep technologies, all of those are available in the S.

732
00:42:24,640 --> 00:42:25,640
Yeah.

733
00:42:25,640 --> 00:42:26,640
Yeah.

734
00:42:26,640 --> 00:42:30,800
So, you don't need the Athena unless you want those extra things, but if you do want those

735
00:42:30,800 --> 00:42:33,960
extra things, then you'd have to get the Athena.

736
00:42:33,960 --> 00:42:40,280
Ariel, this has been so great to catch up with you and to just to catch up on how far the

737
00:42:40,280 --> 00:42:45,000
views has come since those early days and I still love it, still a fan.

738
00:42:45,000 --> 00:42:47,200
I really appreciate you making the time to share.

739
00:42:47,200 --> 00:42:48,520
It's been fascinating for me.

740
00:42:48,520 --> 00:42:49,520
Thank you.

741
00:42:49,520 --> 00:42:50,520
Oh, my joy and pleasure.

742
00:42:50,520 --> 00:42:54,200
It's been so nice to see you again.

743
00:42:54,200 --> 00:42:57,240
Crabbit of Happy is created and produced by me, Castan.

744
00:42:57,240 --> 00:43:00,720
If you enjoy the show, please hit the follow button wherever you listen to ensure you never

745
00:43:00,720 --> 00:43:01,720
miss an episode.

746
00:43:01,720 --> 00:43:05,160
Share with a friend to get me into the ears of more lovely listeners and I would love

747
00:43:05,160 --> 00:43:07,120
you to leave a five-star rating and review.

748
00:43:07,120 --> 00:43:10,880
Thank you so much for being here and I cannot wait to catch you next week for another fabulous

749
00:43:10,880 --> 00:43:12,440
episode of Crabbit of Happy.

750
00:43:12,440 --> 00:43:22,440
[Music]

751
00:43:22,440 --> 00:43:32,440
[Music]