playing the CD.

In the main soundtrack, the actual human voice that talks to you does so at so low decibel levels, that try as you might, you are not able to hear them. Yet, the same voice rides on the music waves dancing at two different pitches, and pings on your subconscious precisely when the beats get created on your auditory cortex.

In a sixty-minute recording, the first third of the soundtrack is usually pure subliminal messages, beamed at you sequentially and cyclically.

Reverse Messages
Remember the Beatles' song - "Rain" - that was released in 1966? One of the reasons it hogged the limelight was its last verse, which was sung in reverse; that is, the words made sense when the recording was played backwards. That was the first time interest in backward messaging, or "backmasking" as it came to be known as, developed.

Credit goes to Australian researcher David John Oates for th

Our Thoughts, Our Subconscious, Our Life
In the past few years, subliminal messaging has entrenched itself as an effective technique to address issues pertaining to one's mental makeup. Whether it is our anxiety about our performance in bed, our wilting away at the slightest criticism, our indecisiveness in those life-defining moments, our consistent failures in business, the butterflies that flutter in our stomach when appearing in an interview ... it is now known that the root of our problems lie in the way our subconscious is programmed. It is through subliminal messaging that we can rewire our subconscious, in order to feel in total control during sex, be immune to criticism, be decisive in those life-defining moments, taste success after success in business, hold our own during that interview ... (Readers interested in my articles on the virtues of subliminal messaging may browse through my blog.)

As the concept of subliminal messaging gains both depth and acceptability with people, the demand for deploying the technique in different avatars has grown. For instance, there are softwares that flash positive subliminal messages on the screen while you work on the computer. Then there are subliminal-message-CDs that you can relax with, while sitting on the patio or waiting for your turn at the doctor's clinic. These CDs have subliminal messages embedded in soft, soothing music. The messages are grouped under specific categories: so you can buy a CD that focuses on self-confidence thoughts, there's another on summoning enough courage to face the exams, yet another on quitting smoking, and so on. The earlier versions of these CDs were a stream of nice music, laced with messages spoken by a human voice in low volume, and that was that. But in recent years, researchers have come up with different techniques with which to deliver the same message but more effectively.

Some of the widely respected CDs have the following four components incorporated in their soundtrack.

Binaural Beats
As every high-school student of physics knows, a "beat" is a sound that emerges when two different sounds that have slightly different pitch are produced simultaneously. This beat is produced by the interference of these sound waves vibrating in the air. Human ears are geared to pick up this nuance in the sound waves quite naturally. There is a special; auditory nerve (known in science as the vestibulocochlear nerve - quite a mouthful, isn't it?) that carries encoded sound from each cochlea right through the thalamus to the auditory cortex of the brain. Now there are specific cells in the cortex that vibrate at exactly the frequency that the corresponding ear is hearing. Another part of the cortex integrates the two frequencies. The result? The same interference that happens in the air happens in the brain, too, and the overall listening cognition is that of a beat!

Now how is this binaural beat thingy relevant to subliminal messaging, you might ask. The low frequency of the beat in the auditory cortex stimulates, through an as-yet-unknown process, the basal forebrain to generate theta waveforms. And this is exactly the state the brain acquires when a person meditates. The brain, in this state, is now ready to process incoming signals that the beats are carrying - which are the recording of subliminal messages in a human voice.

Fascinating, isn't it?

The Subliminal Messages, themselves
As mentioned earlier, CDs are available on specific, focused categories. When you buy a CD, it usually has an accompanying MP3 file containing messages spoken in audible human voice, too; so you know exactly what is entering your subconscious when you are playing the CD.

In the main soundtrack, the actual human voice that talks to you does so at so low decibel levels, that try as you might, you are not able to hear them. Yet, the same voice rides on the music waves dancing at two different pitches, and pings on your subconscious precisely when the beats get created on your auditory cortex.

In a sixty-minute recording, the first third of the soundtrack is usually pure subliminal messages, beamed at you sequentially and cyclically.

Reverse Messages
Remember the Beatles' song - "Rain" - that was released in 1966? One of the reasons it hogged the limelight was its last verse, which was sung in reverse; that is, the words made sense when the recording was played backwards. That was the first time interest in backward messaging, or "backmasking" as it came to be known as, developed.

Credit goes to Australian researcher David John Oates for the

s the concept of subliminal messaging gains both depth and acceptability with people, the demand for deploying the technique in different avatars has grown. For instance, there are softwares that flash positive subliminal messages on the screen while you work on the computer. Then there are subliminal-message-CDs that you can relax with, while sitting on the patio or waiting for your turn at the doctor's clinic. These CDs have subliminal messages embedded in soft, soothing music. The messages are grouped under specific categories: so you can buy a CD that focuses on self-confidence thoughts, there's another on summoning enough courage to face the exams, yet another on quitting smoking, and so on. The earlier versions of these CDs were a stream of nice music, laced with messages spoken by a human voice in low volume, and that was that. But in recent years, researchers have come up with different techniques with which to deliver the same message but more effectively.

Some of the widely respected CDs have the following four components incorporated in their soundtrack.

Binaural Beats
As every high-school student of physics knows, a "beat" is a sound that emerges when two different sounds that have slightly different pitch are produced simultaneously. This beat is produced by the interference of these sound waves vibrating in the air. Human ears are geared to pick up this nuance in the sound waves quite naturally. There is a special; auditory nerve (known in science as the vestibulocochlear nerve - quite a mouthful, isn't it?) that carries encoded sound from each cochlea right through the thalamus to the auditory cortex of the brain. Now there are specific cells in the cortex that vibrate at exactly the frequency that the corresponding ear is hearing. Another part of the cortex integrates the two frequencies. The result? The same interference that happens in the air happens in the brain, too, and the overall listening cognition is that of a beat!

Now how is this binaural beat thingy relevant to subliminal messaging, you might ask. The low frequency of the beat in the auditory cortex stimulates, through an as-yet-unknown process, the basal forebrain to generate theta waveforms. And this is exactly the state the brain acquires when a person meditates. The brain, in this state, is now ready to process incoming signals that the beats are carrying - which are the recording of subliminal messages in a human voice.

Fascinating, isn't it?

The Subliminal Messages, themselves
As mentioned earlier, CDs are available on specific, focused categories. When you buy a CD, it usually has an accompanying MP3 file containing messages spoken in audible human voice, too; so you know exactly what is entering your subconscious when you are playing the CD.

In the main soundtrack, the actual human voice that talks to you does so at so low decibel levels, that try as you might, you are not able to hear them. Yet, the same voice rides on the music waves dancing at two different pitches, and pings on your subconscious precisely when the beats get created on your auditory cortex.

In a sixty-minute recording, the first third of the soundtrack is usually pure subliminal messages, beamed at you sequentially and cyclically.

Reverse Messages
Remember the Beatles' song - "Rain" - that was released in 1966? One of the reasons it hogged the limelight was its last verse, which was sung in reverse; that is, the words made sense when the recording was played backwards. That was the first time interest in backward messaging, or "backmasking" as it came to be known as, developed.

Credit goes to Australian researcher David John Oates for th

same message but more effectively.

Some of the widely respected CDs have the following four components incorporated in their soundtrack.

Binaural Beats
As every high-school student of physics knows, a "beat" is a sound that emerges when two different sounds that have slightly different pitch are produced simultaneously. This beat is produced by the interference of these sound waves vibrating in the air. Human ears are geared to pick up this nuance in the sound waves quite naturally. There is a special; auditory nerve (known in science as the vestibulocochlear nerve - quite a mouthful, isn't it?) that carries encoded sound from each cochlea right through the thalamus to the auditory cortex of the brain. Now there are specific cells in the cortex that vibrate at exactly the frequency that the corresponding ear is hearing. Another part of the cortex integrates the two frequencies. The result? The same interference that happens in the air happens in the brain, too, and the overall listening cognition is that of a beat!

Now how is this binaural beat thingy relevant to subliminal messaging, you might ask. The low frequency of the beat in the auditory cortex stimulates, through an as-yet-unknown process, the basal forebrain to generate theta waveforms. And this is exactly the state the brain acquires when a person meditates. The brain, in this state, is now ready to process incoming signals that the beats are carrying - which are the recording of subliminal messages in a human voice.

Fascinating, isn't it?

The Subliminal Messages, themselves
As mentioned earlier, CDs are available on specific, focused categories. When you buy a CD, it usually has an accompanying MP3 file containing messages spoken in audible human voice, too; so you know exactly what is entering your subconscious when you are playing the CD.

In the main soundtrack, the actual human voice that talks to you does so at so low decibel levels, that try as you might, you are not able to hear them. Yet, the same voice rides on the music waves dancing at two different pitches, and pings on your subconscious precisely when the beats get created on your auditory cortex.

In a sixty-minute recording, the first third of the soundtrack is usually pure subliminal messages, beamed at you sequentially and cyclically.

Reverse Messages
Remember the Beatles' song - "Rain" - that was released in 1966? One of the reasons it hogged the limelight was its last verse, which was sung in reverse; that is, the words made sense when the recording was played backwards. That was the first time interest in backward messaging, or "backmasking" as it came to be known as, developed.

Credit goes to Australian researcher David John Oates for th

interference that happens in the air happens in the brain, too, and the overall listening cognition is that of a beat!

Now how is this binaural beat thingy relevant to subliminal messaging, you might ask. The low frequency of the beat in the auditory cortex stimulates, through an as-yet-unknown process, the basal forebrain to generate theta waveforms. And this is exactly the state the brain acquires when a person meditates. The brain, in this state, is now ready to process incoming signals that the beats are carrying - which are the recording of subliminal messages in a human voice.

Fascinating, isn't it?

The Subliminal Messages, themselves
As mentioned earlier, CDs are available on specific, focused categories. When you buy a CD, it usually has an accompanying MP3 file containing messages spoken in audible human voice, too; so you know exactly what is entering your subconscious when you are playing the CD.

In the main soundtrack, the actual human voice that talks to you does so at so low decibel levels, that try as you might, you are not able to hear them. Yet, the same voice rides on the music waves dancing at two different pitches, and pings on your subconscious precisely when the beats get created on your auditory cortex.

In a sixty-minute recording, the first third of the soundtrack is usually pure subliminal messages, beamed at you sequentially and cyclically.

Reverse Messages
Remember the Beatles' song - "Rain" - that was released in 1966? One of the reasons it hogged the limelight was its last verse, which was sung in reverse; that is, the words made sense when the recording was played backwards. That was the first time interest in backward messaging, or "backmasking" as it came to be known as, developed.

Credit goes to Australian researcher David John Oates for th

playing the CD.

In the main soundtrack, the actual human voice that talks to you does so at so low decibel levels, that try as you might, you are not able to hear them. Yet, the same voice rides on the music waves dancing at two different pitches, and pings on your subconscious precisely when the beats get created on your auditory cortex.

In a sixty-minute recording, the first third of the soundtrack is usually pure subliminal messages, beamed at you sequentially and cyclically.

Reverse Messages
Remember the Beatles' song - "Rain" - that was released in 1966? One of the reasons it hogged the limelight was its last verse, which was sung in reverse; that is, the words made sense when the recording was played backwards. That was the first time interest in backward messaging, or "backmasking" as it came to be known as, developed.

Credit goes to Australian researcher David John Oates for the pioneering work on "Reverse Speech" and to bring this concept to world attention. He observed that when any recorded human speech is played backwards, embedded in the nonsensical audio can be detected very clear and intelligible statements. David suggests that human communication takes place at two levels: the first is the surface-level, audible communication that we trap through our conscious ears; and the second is a deeper communication that is not audible to our conscious ears, but which our subconscious is very much attuned to. When a person is speaking outwardly, the tumult of thoughts and emotions which is taking place in their subconscious is revealed in the second level of their communication, but which can only become known when the voice is recorded and played in reverse. The point relevant to us here is that the subconscious does not require any reverse playing: it is well able to catch the underlying message on its own.

Some subliminal-message-CDs in the market have brilliantly captured this concept in their product. About one third of the CD is recorded with the same set of subliminal messages, but in the reverse direction.

Stereo Confusion
As all music aficionados know, stereo playback gives an illusion of the music band playing right in front of you - one instrument strumming on your left, another soft-thumping on your right... the works. On your headphone, music streams to your two ears riding on different "channels" that are encoded separately.

In Subliminal Messaging CDs, the sound-recordist uses these channels to stream two different messages to you _simultaneously_. This means that at the conscious level, you get to hear noise ("confusion"). But unbeknown to you, your subconscious is still able to sift through the two different messages (remember the different cells in your auditory cortex tap-dancing to the different frequencies?), and make sense of what is being said. Very importantly, since the conscious mind ignores these seemingly gibberish voices, it does not filter them at all, and the messages get a chance to reach the subconscious directly. And that is what we want, don't we? :)

Most respectable CDs worth their salt have the final one-third of their soundtrack filled with this stereo confusion.

Final Word
I have experimented with subliminal messaging ever since they emerged on the world market as a packaged product for self-development. In a very short period of time, this New Age concept has emerged from the recording room of audiophiles and bright psychoacoustics researchers to bloom into a million dollar industry in its own right. Experts in subliminal messaging keep their ear to the ground to tap into any new invention in sound engineering, or any new discovery about human psyche, and build the same into their product. In case you have not given your battered and bruised subconscious a chance to rejuvenate itself already, now is the time to do so. Go for the best subliminal messaging CD in the market, and watch your own transformation.