...and afterwards, you get to look at what your brain was doing throughout the session. After playing with these for years, the Muse has the best design and interface I've seen.
We were playing a game where you try to focus your attention single-pointedly, and it makes a disco ball float up into the air. The goal is to keep the ball floating for as long and as "high" into the air as you can. Our mom does yoga quite a bit and has been interested in mindfulness for years, but we were both surprised at how good she was at this game!
...trying out my new Neurosky headset. It's interested to watch your brain-waves in real-time, but sort of counter-productive because it keeps grabbing your attention.
I ended up moving the laptop behind me out of my line of site. The software allows you to "record" your brainwaves and review them after the session is complete.
The meter at the bottom shows you how "focused" your attention is. The more focused you can make it, the more quickly you can explode each barrel. The goal of the game is to explode barrels in as few seconds as possible. Fun!
After a few drinks, we headed upstairs to my apartment so we could try out my Neurosky headset and the games that you play by trying to focus your brainwaves! Here's Quinn focusing her attention to try to explode video-game barrels full of TNT.
...where it interprets your brainwaves and graphs them as they relate to "attention" and "relaxation", the two simultaneous poles of mindfulness meditation.
After you wear the device correctly, it begins to measure five different wavelengths of your brainwaves in real time and sends the data via bluetooth to your computer...
Every time I practice meditation I use the Neurosky to record my brainwaves and then you can chart how your brain is changing (if at all) over time! Pretty neato, right?
On Thursday evening, I finally managed to get the NeuroSky headset I ordered working with my computer! The headset is a BCI (brain-computer interface) that measures your brainwaves in real-time and sends a stream of data wirelessly to your computer where it can be used to interact with computer programs.
Here's a photo of my playing one of the simple games that comes installed where you try to make barrels on the screen explode by focusing your attention on them.
On Wednesday night I went to a party at the WiRED store and ended up totally getting sucked into playing two solid hours of MINDBALL. You put on a headband that measures your brainwaves and use it to move the ball towards your opponent. Whomever's able to relax the most wins! Sooo fun! If you've got $22,000 to spare, this would make a great gift!
