Tingle Tuesday: All the Bells and Whistles

     One of the challenges ASMRtists face is to come up with new and creative ways of presenting ASMR triggers without sounding like they are on repeat. I have heard several ASMRtists say that their fans write to say they want something exactly like the previous video…but completely different.

While viewers may want another ear examination, tapping or scratching videos, ASMRtists strive to offer something more. The more experience they have in making ASMR content, the more they want to do something new and fresh. As I am sure many of you have seen, some of them have really gone to the outer limits ad have pushed the boundaries of what ASMR content is and what it can be. I applaud these efforts and I can’t help being impressed by the filmmaking skills of these people whose original videos began with nothing more than a camera phone.

Unfortunately all of the bells and whistles don’t work for me. A few months ago, one of my favorite ASMRtists created an amazingly unique video that I watched from start to finish but could not be triggered by. I consider this person an acquaintance so I mean no disrespect to their work when I say this. (And before you ask, no, it wasn’t Violet…I used her pic because it WASN’T her.) I actually wrote them and congratulated them on the video saying “I was so impressed I kept watching to see what you would do next and couldn’t succumb to the included suggestions.” (I am pleased to say that they took that comment as the compliment I intended it to be.)

           I suppose this is why Bob Ross does not trigger me. I know, I know…I have just dissed the unofficial patron saint of ASMR. But honestly, I have to try so hard to be triggered by him! I totally get why he triggers people. He certainly has a soothing voice, but I typically get so into the painting that I become mesmerized by what he is doing and the triggers come secondary.

I have discovered that in addition to people having a wide variety of triggers, there is also a difference in the way they prefer to receive those triggers. For some, it is all of the bells and whistles and special effects. For others, it’s the unintentional ASMR effect. For me, I am a middle of the road kind of person who, if I had to try and make a laundry list of what works for me, I’d sound like a nut job. Generally speaking, I like organic triggers, not something overly fanciful. Whispering works for me, but not random whispering…one has to be actually talking about something or walking me through a process. I love some special effects, but I prefer they be an unexpected surprise in the video rather than a full hour of them. See what I mean? I sound weird!

I suppose this is why I don’t make requests of ASMRtists. I feel that they have to be true to their art and do what they want to do. If it’s the big productions, that’s fine with me. I’m sure they work for a lot of people and who am I to complain. If they do something small scale that works for me and not others; that’s great too. I think it is important to always remember that these amazing artists provide free content for our enjoyment and I for one will not look a gift horse in the mouth!

Untile next time, tingle on!

J-

Follow Julie Young on Twitter: @JulieYoung14

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Join INDY ASMR: https://www.facebook.com/IndyASMR

Read this blog post at: www.thewaterwhispers.com

Read The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR: http://www.amazon.com/Idiots-Guides-ASMR-Julie-Young/dp/1615648186/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1432674500&sr=8-1&keywords=Idiots+guides%3A+ASMR

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Tingle Tuesday: ASMR Dependency and Immunity

      Is ASMR harmful in anyway? Can you become addicted to it? What happens when it stops working? These are all questions we have seen on various message boards so allow me to put a few concerns to rest. When the whisper community/ASMR community began, it was all about helping people relax and get to sleep at night. This remains the primary goal of ASMRtists everywhere; therefore ASMR is not intentionally harmful in any way.

That being said, safety is always the key word when indulging in any practice that operates on a subliminal level or has the ability to put you to sleep or in a hypnotic trance for a period of time. If you are knew to the ASMR phenomenon, here are some top tips and rules to keep in mind:

1. Do not try and trigger your tingles while operating a car or heavy machinery.
2. Screen all videos/audio content prior to using them for ASMR purposes.
3. Use foreign language content judiciously. (Hey, I am triggered by it myself and most ASMRtists are just offering something different, but keep in mind although YOU may not know what is being said, the subconscious might and I am aware that there was one ASMRtist who was being very derogatory in their FL content. So, just be aware. )
4. Screen content prior to allowing your children to watch it. This seems fairly obvious, but it bears mentioning.
5. Discuss any concerns you have with your personal physician.

As far as we know, it is not possible to become “addicted” to ASMR however; it is possible to develop an unhealthy reliance on it. Allow me to explain. If your love of ASMR content is preventing you from enjoying a full life outside of a computer screen, then you may want to do something about that. Any psychologist will tell you that substituting a real life for a virtual one is not healthy, but be assured it’s your behavior not the content doing that to you. I am of the opinion that although ASMR can help you get through the rough times when you are in need of a good night’s rest, it is often most effective when you are doing everything you can to have a normal, happy, healthy life. Remember, it is a supplement, not a way of life and you lesson the chances of ASMR immunity when it does not become an everyday occurrence.

ASMR immunity is something that comes up frequently and essentially refers to those moments when your go to videos stop working and no matter what you do, you cannot seem to get the ASMR tingles to occur. Rest assured this is very normal and typically comes from over exposure to the same video and ASMRtist. When we get used to their voice, their actions or if we have watch the video so much we have it memorized it can negate the effect. For some, the solution is to find a new ASMRtist while others take a break for a while and then come back to it. If you have experienced this yourself rest assured there is nothing wrong, and more importantly, the condition doesn’t last forever.

Untile next time, tingle on,

J-

Follow Julie Young on Twitter: @JulieYoung14

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Join INDY ASMR: https://www.facebook.com/IndyASMR

Read this blog post at: www.thewaterwhispers.com

Read The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR: http://www.amazon.com/Idiots-Guides-ASMR-Julie-Young/dp/1615648186/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1432674500&sr=8-1&keywords=Idiots+guides%3A+ASMR

 

Tingle Tuesday: Fission and ASMR

   This is another debate that comes up frequently on ASMR message boards and in social media. Is it the same thing as goose bumps or the feeling you get when you hear a really great song on the radio? I have a feeling I am going to tick a lot of people off with my assessment on this subject, but I’m just going to go for it: it’s all in the same family of feelings.

It distresses me that as a community, members frequently bash one another because of their goose bumps or fission feelings that “aren’t” technically the ASMR feelings we have accepted as our own criteria. If I may step on a soapbox for a minute, these feelings are very valid and can help folks discover their true ASMR triggers. Telling someone “no, it’s not the same thing” essentially shuts them off from that discovery and is a disservice to the continued understanding of this area of the mind.

We tend to accept on premise that ASMR probably has something to do with a release of dopamine and we know that the chills experienced during music illicit the same brain response. We also know that ASMR often feels like goose bumps without the raised skin effect so are we not shooting ourselves in the foot by alienating other conditions rather than learning from them?

When I began writing the ASMR book, I spent a lot of time reading about things that are seemingly unconnected to ASMR. For example: “Why do people watch things?” “Why are certain sounds more pleasant than others?” These queries did not always lead me to relaxation sites but often led me to education sites such as “How do people take in information? Sight, sound and touch” and audiology sites that explained head space, the inner workings of binaural sound and biological concepts that I should have memorized way back when.

Because we still know so little about ASMR, it is vital that we examine as much information as we can from a variety of fields of study without prejudice. Finding similarities as well as differences will lead us to better information that will help researchers develop more ways in which to study the phenomenon and give it widespread credence throughout the entire scientific community.

Until next time, Tingle On,

J-

Follow Julie Young on Twitter: @JulieYoung14

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Join INDY ASMR: https://www.facebook.com/IndyASMR

Read this blog post at: www.thewaterwhispers.com

Read The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR: http://www.amazon.com/Idiots-Guides-ASMR-Julie-Young/dp/1615648186/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1432674500&sr=8-1&keywords=Idiots+guides%3A+ASMR

 

Tingle Tuesday: Could there be an ASMR therapy center?

    This is a question I see asked online frequently and one that is often eluded to in ASMR role play videos: Could there ever come a day when there might be a real life ASMR center where people could go and get their tingles on through the services of an ASMRtist? (Note: I can only answer as someone who lives in the United States. I can’t vouch for the possibility in other countries.)

Technically speaking, we already do when we go to a spa or a salon and have our tingles triggered by a professional aesthetician, but if we are talking about a traditional branded storefront with a menu of ASMR services and a handful of ASMRtists ready to perform them…well, I think that is still a long way off. Don’t get me wrong. There are ASMRtists who offer personal consultations through Skype and I think in time, there may be more ASMRtists who will offer live ASMR demonstrations and book one-on-one appointments through a network of referrals in order to meet a demand for this kind of service, but an actual center? That could take a while. (In the meantime, we may have to contend ourselves with some online storefronts such as ASMR Angel’s “Penny’s Posh Picnics.”)

The primary reason I say this is because there is no way to regulate it and it will not take long for someone to shut it down, someone to get sued and a myriad of other problems to arise. I’m not trying to be a “Debbie Downer” about this, in fact…I think it’s a great idea, but from a practical standpoint, there are problems with the business model.

Years ago I was watching a segment on ABC’s 20/20 in which reporters were looking into “hair braiding” salons, which were being shut down left and right because the stylists were not licensed cosmetologists. Now these people were not cutting, straightening, or dying anyone’s hair. They were only braiding it and yet some entity wanted to shut them down or for the individuals to invest several thousands of dollars to get a license. While this rule varies from state to state and I am speaking in generalities here, I can only imagine what people in power could do to an ASMR center.

ASMR not only continues to be widely misunderstood by some, but as of this writing it has not been accepted by the clinical community as an official “alternative therapy.” With no research on it and the various practices used in the ASMR video segments, can you imagine anyone in power allowing this to go on as a legitimate business? Many ASMRtists fake real medical exams ands other services that require very real licenses in the real world. Sure, we could argue that people could sign a waiver and must acknowledge that the ASMRtist is not a medical doctor, but I just see too many people having BIG problems with this.

Of course there are those make up people at the mall who seem to be able to get away with helping clients apply products without a license and no one seems to mind them, but somehow I suspect that they would look at an ASMR center differently and have issues with it until someone creates some kind of training and certification program that can be offered, standardized and regulated. There may still be some raised eyebrows, but it would be a start toward creating the mainstream ASMR storefront in time.

Until Next Time, Tingle On!

J-

Follow Julie Young on Twitter: @JulieYoung14

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Join INDY ASMR: https://www.facebook.com/IndyASMR

Read this blog post at: www.thewaterwhispers.com

Read The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR: http://www.amazon.com/Idiots-Guides-ASMR-Julie-Young/dp/1615648186/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1432674500&sr=8-1&keywords=Idiots+guides%3A+ASMR

TingleTuesday: Studying the Sensation

      In the movie The Sound of Music, the nuns of the abbey contemplate what to do with a problematic postulate in the song, “How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?” The lyrics compare taming the young woman to a variety of impossible tasks such as trying to catch a cloud and pinning it down, or attempting to keep a wave upon the sand,. However, those same words could easily be used to describe what it was like to try and write about the ASMR phenomenon.

ASMR is a feeling. It is real, but intangible. It affects a diverse group of people all over the world through a wide variety of audio, visual and tactile triggers in real time and through suggestion. It has been described as brain tingles, a brain buzz, a braingasm (but we’ll hold off on that term for another post), sparks, shocks, etc.…but somehow, it has escaped scientific inquiry until recently and at the present time, any research which has been done has not been published.

The reason for this may confuse a lot of ASMR experiencers who wonder what is taking so long, so let me explain. When someone decides to conduct a scientific study, they must first seek permission from an academic board of some kind. The researcher outlines the problem that they have identified, shows past studies into the same field (or comparative fields) and shows the board the processes they plan to follow in their own work. The board may or may not ask for clarification on the proposal, but once their permission is obtained, the researcher can begin to call out participants for the actual study itself.

After the participants give their consent to be part of the study, the actual experiment commences. This can be a long process depending on the scope of the research – sometimes even years. Afterwards, the results are charted, the data is analyzed and the entire project from conception to conclusion is compiled into a large document that few people outside of the research community can understand. (This is why many published studies are “bottom-lined” in press releases.)

Once the full paper is written, the researcher submits it to an academic journal in hopes that it will be peer-reviewed and published. This is not as easy as it looks. When the editor of the journal receives a paper for possible publication, it is forwarded to experts in the field for examination. These experts are charged with evaluating the quality of the submitted manuscript, requesting revisions or outright rejecting it if they conclude that the findings are flawed or that the science is invalid.

As you may imagine, there are few people who qualify as experts in the field of ASMR and even less who have conducted traditional research into the subject. Naturally this means that any paper would be subjected to those in the fields that the study pertained to (e.g. neurology) and as a general rule, traditional medicine has always had difficulty accepting alternative techniques (though they are getting better) which is why it may be a while before we actually start to see some authoritative work published in the field of ASMR.

With little to go on outside of conjecture and accepted beliefs, no access to specialized equipment and a two-month deadline to write a 275-page book about it, I had no choice but to break ASMR down little by little in order to try and determine what it is, where it comes from, how it works, why we need it and whether or not the scientific community really does know about it.

No doubt, I was grasping at straws, but hey, it’s a whole lot easier than trying to hold a moonbeam in your hand!

Follow Julie Young on Twitter: @JulieYoung14

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Join INDY ASMR: https://www.facebook.com/IndyASMR

Read this blog post at: www.thewaterwhispers.com

Read The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR: http://www.amazon.com/Idiots-Guides-ASMR-Julie-Young/dp/1615648186/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1432674500&sr=8-1&keywords=Idiots+guides%3A+ASMR

 

Tingle Tuesday: “What’s an ASMR?”

    The first time I saw the term, I had no clue what it meant, how to pronounce it or what to make of it. After months of watching my happy little tingle videos, seemingly overnight their titles all contained a four letter…something: ASMR. Now, I didn’t know what an ASMR was (read: azzmer) but I avoided the term like the plague. At first I wasn’t sure if the term was used to distinguish the type of video I had been watching with something completely different (like something more sexual in nature.) However when it became so prevalent, I eventually looked it up.

It was then that I learned that Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (ASMR) was a semi-scientific term to describe a perceptual phenomenon characterized by a tingly feeling that begins in the head or scalp and flows through the body causing it to relax. It was a term that was more or less made up in 2010 by healthcare IT worker Jenn Allen and promptly dismissed by the clinical community as nothing more than “pseudo science with a medical sounding name.”

While it was nice to have an “official” name connected with the sensation, I have to admit, I was a little confused by the lack of knowledge surrounding it. It wasn’t new. I knew that much having experienced it since I was seven, but if it wasn’t new then where was the research to back it up? If it was a type of biofeedback response that was elicited in medical practices as way to help people relax and cope with pain, why was the scientific community so keen to deny it or act like it wasn’t real?

As someone who had worked in the medical field for nearly a decade and continues to write about a variety of medical subjects, this made no sense to me. I couldn’t help wondering if the phenomenon that YouTubers were calling ASMR had another name at some point, one that was recognized by science but no one knew what it was. Was there some fundamental piece of the description missing that would cause some researcher somewhere to say, “Oh, you mean…” and fill in the blank with a well-thought out but obscure Latin term that no one had ever heard of before or was the real problem the fact that people were turning to YouTube to get a good night’s sleep?

I suspected it might be the latter and thus began my quest for answers. In September of 2013, I wrote my first article on ASMR, it was a local piece that simply introduced the phenomenon to those who may not have heard of it before. I began following the social media feeds of several ASMRtists and learned that several of my friends were already familiar with the sensation as well giving us permission to discuss it in the way that only “tingle heads” can.

In the months that followed it became obvious that the ASMR phenomenon was moving more into the mainstream, but I was still irritated by the fact that few reports I saw went beyond “tingle tales” or the connection between ASMR and Bob Ross. I watched well-regarded physicians offer possible explanations for the sensation with a shrug as if they really had no clue as to what was going on and commentators who acted like the whole thing was a big joke. Oh my Lord, people this can’t be that hard, I thought to myself. Someone is going to have to track this thing in and figure out what is going on.

Little did I know that I would become the “someone” who would do it.

Until next time, tingle on,

J-

Follow Julie Young on Twitter: @JulieYoung14

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Join INDY ASMR: https://www.facebook.com/IndyASMR

Read this blog post at: www.thewaterwhispers.com

Read The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR: http://www.amazon.com/Idiots-Guides-ASMR-Julie-Young/dp/1615648186/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1432674500&sr=8-1&keywords=Idiots+guides%3A+ASMR

 

 

Tingle Tuesday: Finding the “Whisper Community”

     Like a lot of ASMR experiencers, I stumbled onto the online whisper community and their trigger videos by accident although I was more or less “involved” from the very beginning. Ever since Connie gave me that biofeedback tape, I was on the lookout for material that could cause the same relaxation response inside of me. I would seek out relaxation tapes/CDs at my local bookstore and at the library, but the selection was often limited.

I can’t pinpoint when I first turned to YouTube in search of relaxation videos, but I can say that my search to find something to settle my brain intensified in 2008 with the passing of my mom. If you have never lost your last parent, then you cannot imagine the desperate feeling of loss that comes along with it. I felt alone in the world. I couldn’t sleep. My entire biological schedule was turned around and I struggled to get used to the new “normal” of being an orphan. As I suspected, there were a lot of videos to choose from including self-hypnosis, guided visualization, meditations, affirmations, etc. but many I sampled had music that distracted me, poor sound quality and vocals that grated on my nerves rather than soothed them.

Frustrated, I noticed a strange looking video in my suggestion queue that promised a whispered hypnotic video for sleep. Is that what I think it is? I wondered

Morbid curiosity possessed me to click on it and before I knew what was happening, I was staring at a young woman who was sitting on her bed whispering at her camera. “What in the world?” I mumbled confused as to what I was watching.

Every molecule in my body told me to exit the video, but I couldn’t. There was something strangely compelling about it. Suddenly my queue was full of “whisper videos” as well as videos that promised clicks, taps, hair brushing and an assortment of other noises.

Though some people may have thought me crazy, I was like a kid in a candy store. I had no idea why these people had made these videos or exactly what the intended point of them was, but it was as though the person behind them knew instinctively what would work on me. Was it possible that they felt it too and actually made videos to create that feeling?

It appeared so. After several days of exploring this new medium, I found videos that actually mentioned the brain tingles I had felt over the years. It was wonderful to be validated by something I hadn’t talked about with anyone before. I mentioned what I had found to my husband and was surprised to learn that he had no clue what I was talking about. I mentioned the Alphabet Game, hair brushing and other activities that had put me to sleep in hopes that he could commiserate, but he said he’d never felt it.

“Oh come on,” I said, convinced he was pulling my leg. “You’ve never felt a weird tingly sensation in your scalp that’s kind of like goose bumps but…not?”

“Never,” he promised, shaking his head.

Later on I showed him one of the videos I had been watching. I can’t remember who made it now, but it was of an unseen person brushing their hair. He seemed a little perplexed by my new source of entertainment.

“Let me get this straight,” he said. “You watch this to get a funny feeling in the back of your head and then fall asleep to it.”

“Well….yeah,” I commented. “I don’t know, it’s as if when they do it to themselves, I can imagine what it would feel like if they were doing it to me.”

He took a deep breath. “Well, there’s nothing odd about watching someone on YouTube brush their hair, I guess. So, does this feeling have a name?”

“Not really. A lot of people just call it the ‘head tingles.’”

He stifled a laugh. “Well, here’s hoping that they come up with something more official than that in the future.”

Until next time, tingle on!

J-

Follow Julie Young on Twitter: @JulieYoung14

Follow Julie Young on Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/authorjulieyoung

Join INDY ASMR: https://www.facebook.com/IndyASMR

Read this blog post at: www.thewaterwhispers.com

Read The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR: http://www.amazon.com/Idiots-Guides-ASMR-Julie-Young/dp/1615648186/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1432674500&sr=8-1&keywords=Idiots+guides%3A+ASMR

Fabulous Fridays: WIN a SIGNED copy of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR

    TODAY’S THE DAY!!!!!…one lucky reader is going to win a SIGNED copy of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR. Will it be you? Ilse and I hope so!

So what do you have to do in order to have the best chance to win?

There are a number of things you can do to increase your entries and improve your chances, so be sure not to skip any steps! First of all, visit our Rafflecopter link below to find the official steps. Once you are at the page, you will discover the six ways in which you can be entered into the drawing. (Some steps are mandatory, some are worth more than others and some can be used more than once so be sure to do them all so that the odds will be “ever in your favor.”)

Some of the things you can do to win include:

1. Following me on Facebook. (Author Julie Young)

2. Referring five of your friends to my Facebook page

3. Following me on Twitter. (@JulieYoung14)

4. Following my blog.

5. Commenting on this blog post.

6. Posting the Amazon link to the book on Facebook.

I am so excited to share this book with you and to send it to you on the actual publication date of May 5! You can’t win if you don’t enter. Good luck and I will announce the winner next week!

Until next time, tingle on!

Julie

 

 

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Tingle Tuesday: The ASMR Games

     When I was little, there were several games I used to play with my friends on the school playground that resulted in an ASMR experience for me. One was the old “cracking an egg on your head” in which a friend would fold their hands together and gently tap on the top of your head until they “broke” their hands apart and let the “goo” from their “egg” ooze down your hair and neck onto your shoulders. Like the Alphabet Game (which I often talk about) it helps if the person you are partnered with is exceptionally good at this game and is neither too hard nor too soft with their actions. (If they give you a bonus ooze, it was even better!) There was also “Circle, circle, dot, dot, now you have your cootie shot” and “plowing the garden” (Again, requires a soft touch in order to achieve the right result)

I could also achieve ASMR tingles when playing “Heads Up, Seven Up.” Now, I don’t know why this effected me this way but it was the moment of anticipation that tended to lull me into a state of bliss. My head would be down, my eyes closed and I would hear footsteps coming toward me not knowing if the person would actually tap my head or not. If I was lucky, the “tapper” would be a girl who would do it so gently I would barely feel it. Boys tended to take the opportunity to smack you up side the head.

However the one game that stands out to me the most, is the one I remember the least. Similar to the Alphabet Game, it involved a lot of back play and a rhyme that I have learned has a number of variations depending on where you lived or how you learned it. Some kids incorporated the egg cracking into this one but for my crew, that was a whole separate thing. The parts I remember the most involved drawing an X on the back, a question mark, maybe an exclamation point (but I can’t be sure), there was something about a knife in the back, during which your partner pretended to stab you gently and then raked their hands down your back saying “blood, blood” then they finished the whole thing by blowing on your back while saying “a cool breeze” and then pinching along your spine while intoning “to make you freeze.”

Now understand, I grew up thinking everyone experienced this wacky little feeling we now know as ASMR and its because of rhymes like this that I did. The person’s partner seems to know the reaction that the person will have when the rhyme is over, so it never occurred to me that it may work on some people and not on others. Our of idle curiosity, I googled the words I could remember just to see if anyone outside of my enclave had ever played this game before.

I was amazed.

I was led to an ASMR subreddit in which people typed their variations on the lyrics and the accompanying actions. Many of them said that this was one of their first ASMR experiences. Considering it had been 36 years since I had played this game, it brought to mind several questions:

1. Who wrote the original rhyme?

2. How did they know what the end result would be?

3. Is this even more of an indication that people have known about ASMR-like experiences for far longer than we think?

4. If so,  how did they explain it?

I would discover that finding the lyrics to the rhyme was far easier than finding the poet behind them, but I did learn that this finger play could be used to calm temper tantrums according to one educational website. It also brings up the long running debate between ASMR and Frisson. Personally, I don’t understand what all of the fuss is about. Both a shiver and the tingles associated with ASMR (and goosebumps for that matter) are biofeedback responses that occur in much the same way. As someone who experiences ASMR and frisson and goosebumps, I can attest to the fact that I can achieve all three at the same time, any of them by themselves or a combination thereof. I become very sad when I see people bash those who ask about shivers and tell them that it is not ASMR they experience. Well….how do they know that for sure? After all, our triggers vary, who is to say that the way in which we recognize it does not vary as well?

Many of my friends from “back in the day” will say that they do not experience ASMR, but if you bring up these various playground games, it’s amazing how they not only know what you are talking about, but also the feeling they experienced as well. Now, I’m not suggesting that we are all tingle heads, but I think kids are way more in tune with their ASMR than adults will ever be. Some of us just hang on to it longer than others.

Tingle Tuesday: Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR can be pre-ordered on Amazon NOW!

I’m telling you…it pays to Google yourself every once in a while! You never know what you may find. Today, I was looking to update my author page over at Amazon and lo and behold I not only found out that my latest release, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Catholicism has three 5-Star reviews (from people I don’t know, even!) but I saw the pre-order page for The Complete Idiot’s Guide to ASMR! As promised it is coming May 5th and I can’t tell you how excited I am about this! No doubt we will be putting together a launch party here in Indianapolis for the book and I hope all of my Indiana tingle heads will join me for what is sure to be a fun gathering of minds! It is possible that I will be having some ASMR demonstrations at the event as well!

     So…here is the description as written on the preview page: ASMR stands for Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, and it’s a relaxed, tingling feeling that many people report having as a response to particular stimuli, such as close personal attention, tapping, or whispering. Although its experiencers say they have been aware of the sensation all their lives, it has only recently come together as a public phenomenon thanks to YouTube, where ASMRtists now post thousands of videos that simulate the ASMR experience and help viewers fall asleep when no other remedies work. The ASMR community is generous and connected, and often viewers will become content producers themselves in an effort to give back to those who have helped them.

Pretty cool huh? I really like the cover as well. I was really partial to the swirly design because for me, the tingles do not feel like shocks but a warm fuzzy feeling that swirls around me and I like the fact that the swirls seem to start in the eye, based on what someone is watching and then move into the brain. I really hope you all like it as well!

So my question to you all is, if you could have a three-minute personal ASMR session, would you sign up for something visual like towel folding? Something audio-based such as whispering, tapping or scratching or something tactile such as hair brushing, a hand massage, makeup brushes on your face or a few rounds of the Alphabet Game?