Category: Advice

Sleeping With ASMR

I discovered this week that supplementing magnesium may not just help with sleep but may also assist with attention during the waking moments of the day. From the same source I discovered that supplementing zinc intake could assist in the same way. I have not yet put this to the test (to be honest in search of a benign sleep cure I am getting to the stage of taking so many supplements that I rattle). However, I am going to try this next and will report back as to whether it makes any noticeable difference.

This week a Calm selection which illustrates the reason that I so frequently listen to Jay Shetty, even though he very probably does not have my favourite voice on Calm. This one I found inspirational:

https://www.calm.com/app/player/iViiLizTTt

Daily Jay

Soul Grow

NARRATOR

Jay Shetty

It is about becoming a more extraordinary version of yourself. As part of which Jay explores this letter: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/kurt-vonnegut-xavier-letter_n_4964532.

Today’s professional ASMR offering comes from an artist that I used to listen to all the time. Indeed, the video itself is an oldie but goodie.

The channel is Isabel imagination ASMR this has six hundred and thirty four videos, 379K subscribers thirty three playlists of which the following seems to be on theme for this blog so far:

The video is this one:

ASMR Doctor’s Visit Memory test (soft spoken/whisper/personal attention)

It has notes, and oh, what notes: “428,480 views 28 Sept 2016

Hello! My name is Isabel and I’m Dutch. I’ve been crazy about ASMR for about 4 years now and I am finally posting my very own ASMR videos since the 20th of June 2016! This is video #28. I hope you like it!

I’ve recorded this video with a JVC camera and an audio recorder. Here are the links:

Cam: http://www.videocamerashop.nl/product…

And it’s recorded on to an audio recorder called: Roland R26 portable recorder

Editing program: http://www.magix.com (I used Magix video deluxe 2016)

In this ASMR video Dr. Clarck will examine you because you are forgetting lots of things lately. You will answer some questions, and Dr. Clarck will perform a few memory tests on you and you will have a smelling test and a listen and memorise test. So, lots of personal attention and soft spoken and whispers included! Sleep tight and enjoy the tingles!!!

Instagram (to stay updated on new ASMR projects of mine):

  / isabel_asmr 

This video is meant for relaxation and can also help relieve anxiety, depression or stress, however I am not a psychiatrist, so if you are dealing with severe anxiety, depression or stress I suggest you go to a professional. “

It would not be a professional ASMR artist if they did not feel the need to write a novel with each and every video. Comments are permitted and seem to major in the “odd” feedback rather than sycophantic, which is not unusual for YouTube, but is unusual for a professional ASMR artist. This usually does not bode well, to be honest.

The video is thirty and a half minutes and so is reasonably substantial for videos that we have reviewed of late. It starts with a strange crackling background noise as if it was played on a badly stored vinyl record and straight away it gets into whispering. We’re on fairly well-established ground then. The voice is excellent and indeed the setting of the video itself looks rather professional (not that I expect any readers of this blog will be doing much in the way of watching given that you’re using this material to fall asleep to).

It occasionally gets a bit on the breathy side. It also seems to be falling prey to the “how many triggers can I get into this video” approach to sound recording. There is the stroking of paper, that mouth clicking sound that ASMR artists seem to love so much, nails clicking on a glass jar, but that said we have heard videos where the artist tries to feed in every squelch, tap, and scratching noise that they have heard some ASMR afficionado would rather like. By comparison I’d say that this was a much more measured approach to inserting spurious ASMR triggers and I did not find it obtrusive. However, as I have related before, I am only interested in the quality of the voice personally and additional noises are, for me anyway, merely a distraction.

That said the enunciation is spot on. Quite amazing that a Dutch person speaks English much better than a number of English ASMR artists that I have heard. As some commentators relate, it is interesting that a person from the Netherlands speaks American rather than English but it does mean that Isabel has an interesting accent to listen to in this video. I think I will be coming back to Isabel in the future for any further medical-orientated ASMR videos that come up.

For the ASMR offering which does not involve YouTube, I thought I would try the Internet Archive and see if they had anything for today’s professional ASMR artist. And they do:

Isabel Imagination ASMR 2020 06 12 ASMR For When You Feel Down [ Hugs, Cuddles, Kisses & Positive Affirmation ] JVu4gmugEPk 497MB [CD99985A]

https://archive.org/details/isabel-imagination-asmr-2020-06-12-asmr-for-when-you-feel-down-hugs-cuddles-kisses

Just like professional ASMR videos on YouTube, the person has gone mad with the notes in connection with this one:

“Publication date

    2020-06-12

Topics

    ASMR, female, hugs, kisses, positiveaffirmation, personalattention

Language

    English

Item Size

    618.3M

video_url – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVu4gmugEPk

channel_url – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGfbWCJjPwcAlBNkHT3gQ6w

In this triggering ASMR video, you can sit back and relax with headphones on!

In this relaxing ASMR cuddle & positive affirmation video, you can relax to the sound of my close-up ear to ear breathy whispers and get tingles from the warm hugs. Hopefully this calming video will comfort you for sleep!!

Triggers are: scratching, tracing, brushing, wet mouth sounds, whispering, ramble, mouth sounds, hair sounds, visual triggers, hand movements, tapping, shiny objects, crinkle, deep ear whispers, soft spoken, mouth sounds, tapping, finger flutter, whispering ear to ear, breathy whispers, binaural sounds, personal attention, close up tingles.

What is ASMR? Check out this short explanation video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uc-SCxXdI0Y

All my info:

Webshop: https://www.isabelimagination.com/nl/

Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/isabel_imagination

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/isabel.imagination/

My email address for questions or business deals: info@isabelimagination.com

Patreon (if you’d like to support me, get early access and see patreon exclusive videos) : https://www.patreon.com/Isabelimaginationasmr

Tingles (to avoid advertisement and support me at the same time): https://www.gettingles.com/

The Tingles app is available on IOS and Android!!

For a look behind the scenes visit my other youtube channel “isabel backstage”!! This is the link to my 2nd channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_R9MQkCOSew6FswsZtHOEw

I’m always trying to improve the quality of my video’s, if you’d like to contribute to this purpose, than that’s possible via donations on PayPal. My email is: isabelimaginationasmr@gmail.com

Who am I :

My name is Isabel and I’m Dutch. My approach to ASMR video’s is combining entertainment in a form of imagination and fantasy (almost movie like) with relaxation. All wrapped into one video for you. This way you can enjoy my videos either before you go to bed to drift off easier, or you can just take a moment of relaxation during the day to calm down and relieve stress.

I’ve been posting ASMR video’s since the 20th of June 2016! I hope you like it!”

I’ve edited them a bit as they are really long.

Sadly, it is not on theme for the medical series I have been pursuing, so I’ll leave you to try it out if you so wish.

For the inadvertent ASMR video which really is what this blog has been about since the ASMR reviews began, I am looking this week at this one:

The Dermatology Exam

I have reviewed a number of videos from this channel previously it is Top Hat Tutorials with 67k subscribers, one hundred forty one videos and all three of the playlists are on theme for the material that I have been covering in this blog:

and

and

the notes on the channel convey what it is all about:

“Top Hat Tutorials

Description

Clinical skills videos for medical professionals and students

More info

            http://www.youtube.com/@tophattutorials9113

            Joined 3 Sept 2015

            67k subscribers

            141 videos

            10,408,946 views “

There are also notes with the video although, thankfully, they are not excessively long: “296,857 views 22 Jan 2016

A video of the main points of the Dermatology Exam.

The video was created as part of the Top Hat Tutorials app, a new doctor and student designed guide to the clinical examinations in medicine and surgery.

‘TOP HAT TUTORIALS’ is available in the Apple, Google and Windows app stores today.

Reached number 1 medical app in its first week of launch!

A must have for medical students no matter where they are studying.

Download using the following links:

Apple: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/top-h…

Google: https://play.google.com/store/apps/de…

Windows: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store… “

The video permits comments and as with the previous video I find that the comments are more strange than sycophantic. This may not be a great omen of what is to come.

It is another brief video at just over four and a half minutes so it isn’t going to keep us long. It begins with my personal bugbear: startup music which seems even more sacrilege given we have such scant video real estate to begin with. However, once Dr Tom Branigan introduces himself, we realise we have a safe pair of hands. Tom has a great voice. The patient is Dermot (or assuming this examination is located in Ireland more probably Diarmuid). There is some background noise, probably air conditioning. It is very calm and measured, just the kind of thing I like to hear (music excepting). Sadly, we get the music once again at the close of the video.

So, it is a reasonable one but also a rather brief one this week.

On that basis, just one, video this time.

That’s it on this occasion, more next time.

See you again next week.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

I notice that to add to the pressure one might otherwise feel about getting a good night’s sleep, there is now direct scientific evidence that digestion is also impacted. With that impact comes the potential for obesity, diabetes and some of the longer-term effects that you might expect. If ever there was a need to fight tooth and nail for every spare minute in the bedroom it would sound like that is where we have arrived at.

In which case I think we can be unapologetic about being revolutionary about things and suggesting that other things in life should be allowed to wane in order to get the level of sleep that your body needs.

To that end, for a very long time, the Procrastination Pen has been reviewing material for its helpfulness in gentling you off to sleep. Sadly, frequently finding it as much assistance as bright light and a brass band backing track but just occasionally there is a gem that makes it all worthwhile. I’m not certain that there are any gems of that quality this week. However, I will continue the reviewing in the hopes of turning up the odd one.

As I promised some weeks ago, some relaxing material that does not involve annoying adverts. I’ve been listening to Susan Piver for a while now and besides being a highly famous meditation guru, I also think that she has a very good voice. A great deal of her material is also educational which is an added bonus.

Of course there is a wealth of material on YouTube, for example:

Indeed, Susan has her own YouTube channel. But given I am trying to avoid adverts that is hardly a good start.

I did find that Susan now has a podcast which is available on Apple podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/buddhism-beyond-belief-with-susan-piver/id1798818779 

At the time I am looking at it there are fifty-two episodes available which should give you enough of a taster to determine if this is going to be a voice that you like.

Turning to the Calm recommendation this week, I have:

https://www.calm.com/app/player/wicRCqVcjB

Daily Jay

Gossip

NARRATOR

Jay Shetty

Jay is perhaps not my favourite voice on Calm; I think that might be Tamara Levitt, but I find his Calm Daily to be one I drift back to again and again because of the importance of the material that he covers.

This one is about the prevalence of gossip and how harmful it can be. How you should avoid gossip, how gossip spreads, and how it is impossible to take back.

Moving onto the professional ASMR artist, I notice that there is quite a lot of criticism of older ASMR videos, as if everything completed some time ago is necessarily worse than anything completed today. No doubt persons of a certain age believe this to be the case. Going with that trend I am covering this week a video posted only recently. However, I can feel my stubbornness tendency coming on and I suspect I’m going to try to feature some older videos more frequently in future.

ASMR Doctor Physician Complete Medical Exam – Whispering RolePlay

It is from the channel Tingles Maker ASMR. This has 13.1k subscribers, one hundred and thirty six videos, eight playlists. One of these playlists seems relevant to the medical theme I have been covering:

The channel has notes: “Tingles Maker ASMR

Description

Hello and Welcome to Role-Play ASMR Channel – Tingles Maker

My name is Renat (or just Tingles “Maker) and I do ASMR, probably with some accent)

I am learning English and this Channel is my homework.  Welcome aboard! 

Links

Donatedonationalerts.com/r/asmrclub

More info

            Sign in to see email address

            http://www.youtube.com/@TinglesMaker

            Kazakhstan

            Joined 9 Mar 2022

            13.1k subscribers

            136 videos

            1,369,709 views”

The video also has notes: “5 Apr 2026 #ASMRROLEPLAY #ASMR

ASMR Doctor Physician Complete Gentle and sleepy Medical Exam – Whispering Role Play for tingles and sleep

Welcome to Tingles Maker ASMR.

   • Role-Plays ASMR 

   • ASMR Whispering 

   • ASMR Medical Exams 

   • ASMR no talking 

#ASMR #ASMRROLEPLAY”

By now we are used to a healthy number of notes whenever we are looking at a professional ASMR artist. My guess would be in the cut and thrust world of ASMR; some self-promotion can only help.

Comments are permitted. There are not a huge number but those that there are – are the normal level of ASMR sycophancy that we know and love. This bodes well for this video.

The video is a little over eighteen minutes long it starts at the level of a whisper and straight away we are on familiar territory ASMR wise. The voice is excellent. The presentation occasionally becomes breathy and there is the odd mouth-clicking sound that some ASMR fans seem to be positively transported by. There are, though, as expected, extraneous noises; clicking noises, rustling noises, the odd clatter from equipment being moved, the sound of a tuning fork is actually quite loud, the odd tapping noise, hands rubbing together, paper-related noises. None of which did I find excessively distracting.

I found this quite restful. It seemed very well done actually and, even with the extraneous noises I think this is well worth reviewing.

You may recall a previous post in which I mentioned a URL which linked to thirty two videos. The URL is this one:

Medical Training Videos

Last time we managed to review just four of these videos, so there is a fair few left to look at…

The next one in the series is this:

Nose Examination (Inspection) – ENT

This is less than a minute long so perhaps we are on the home straight and picking up speed now

The notes are: “83,932 views 17 Feb 2012 Clinical Examinations

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the ENT faculty – demonstrates how to perform an examination of the nose. This part covers inspection only.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

It is a continuation of the nasoendoscope one and the same people participate. The comments made for that video still apply, including the initially quiet and subsequently slightly louder presentation.

Neck Examination – ENT

This is just less than four minutes so a little more substantial (but that just goes to prove how short some of the other videos have been). The notes are: “248,747 views 17 Feb 2012 Clinical Examinations

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the ENT faculty – demonstrates how to perform an examination of the neck. It also demonstrates the lymph node regions of the neck.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

We go back to the format in which there is a narrator for the video. The narrator has a reasonable voice for us. However, the video has some nasty interference which affects the sound as well and will be off-putting to anyone listening. This one does not belong in the Procrastination Pen playlist.

Mouth Examination – ENT

Just under one- and three-quarter minutes so not overstaying its welcome. The notes are “242,014 views 17 Feb 2012 Clinical Examinations

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the ENT faculty – demonstrates how to perform an examination of the mouth.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

This is also narrated. The person narrating has an ok voice but not amazing; the medical professional participating in the video itself has a better voice for us.

Hearing Test (Rinne and Weber Examinations) – ENT

Less than one and a half minutes, the notes are: “1,233,808 views 17 Feb 2012 Clinical Examinations

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the ENT faculty – demonstrates how to perform tuning fork examinations for hearing loss.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

This is narrated again and the narrator has a good voice, if a little loud here. The tuning fork nises are non-too off-putting – your mileage may vary. It might be one that is weeded on subsequent review.

The medical professional in the video, meantime, has a great voice.

And last, but by no means least:

Otoscopy (Ear Examination) – ENT

Less than three and a quarter-minutes, the notes are: “1,603,425 views 17 Feb 2012 Clinical Examinations

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the ENT faculty – demonstrates how to perform an examination of the ear using an otoscope. It also demonstrates the anatomy of the tympanic membrane.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

Again, this is narrated, and here the narration seems to be quieter. The medical professional in the video itself has a good voice for us.

That’s it on this occasion, more next time.

The Oxford Medical Education Hospitals playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

This week I get age verification in my operating system. As if to reinforce it, age verification on YouTube became even more strident, indeed, positively insistent. I wouldn’t mind but I do not wish to be reviewing material that is unsuitable for a three-year-old. I would think, therefore, that no age verification should be necessary.

I suspect there is more involved to this age verification business than is being stated and so I am not in a hurry to comply. My mission to find resources for ASMR outside of YouTube just got a boost and that can only be to the good.

To which end: Elisha Goldstein has to be about as famous a meditator as it is feasible to get. Are there any resources for Elisha that do not involve my straying into YouTube territory (we can be assured there are many, many videos on YouTube featuring Elisha). Fortunately, a number of meditations are available here: https://www.mindfullivingla.org/elisha-goldstein/. These stretch from five minutes to thirty minutes and as such should act as a reasonable distraction in your snoozing moments. Not a single age verification challenge did I receive (which I hope means that not one item of age-inappropriate content is therein contained).

This week’s ASMR from an ASMR professional. It is a true blast from the past. I used to listen to this one some years ago now. Before I really started listening to inadvertent ASMR material in any quantity.

It is this one:

🌿 Relaxing Naturopath Visit 🌿 ASMR 🌿 Doctor RP

And it comes from one of the titans of professional ASMR artists. Often justifiably so I have found as she has a great voice.

The URL of the video is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmhmKEhnIpA

The channel is Gentle Whispering ASMR and anyone who listens to ASMR must surely have come across this artist. To give you an idea, the channel has 2.42m subscribers, eight hundred and forty-three videos. With statistics like that it makes me wish I’d paid more attention in school and grown up to be a successful ASMR artist.

Surprisingly, there are only fourteen playlists with only the one playlist on theme for the medical ASMR material which I have been featuring on this blog of late:

Today’s video has notes – of course it does. However, surprisingly, these are moderately on the succinct side for a professional ASMR artist: “8,082,246 views 16 Jan 2018

Hello sweetheart! 🙂 Today I welcome you to my naturopathic medicine practice 🌿 I will shortly give you an overview of your visit then at 03:00 I will perform a check-up of your hair, your ears 06:30 , I’ll put on my gloves and examine your skin 08:50 , your sinuses 11:25 , your lymph nodes 13:03 , neck muscles check 14:10 , I’ll gently test your eyes reflexes with a flashlight 16:56 , I’ll tell you about Eyeology 19:29 and check your eyes 22:26 , then I will perform a check of your tongue 29:55 after I explain how you can read your health by your tongue 27:47 ,  I’ll tell you a bit about tension headache that you’ve been experiencing and how to deal with it 32:32 ,  I’ll recommend you some essential oils 34:34 , and herbal supplements 36:16 that even sound good and at the end I will relax you deeper with gentle hand movements to help you doze off 38:29 . Enjoy ♥ Thank you for watching! 🙂 “

Still, the notes are on the long side though you notice (ASMR professionals do so love their notes). I have edited them a little or you’d never have time to read it all.

There are comments and, sheesh, people do so love to comment. Lots and lots of appreciative comments and a fair few off-the-wall ones as well. No surprises there then.

The video is forty one and a half minutes long and so it is lengthy compared to those we have listened to of late. It starts without music and straight away we realise that the focus is going to be at the whispering level of delivery. Not a bad thing, but also a fairly common approach to ASMR. I do like it when I find a non-whispery one.

Some of the words I could not make out, but I think the overall delivery may not be intended to deliver meaning so much as a relaxing effect on the audience. In which case I would say that the video is a good one. The voice really is that good.

It is calm, quiet, and the intonation is well-nigh perfect. Presumably over two million people would agree. There is that strange clucking come mouth-clicking sound beloved of ASMR artists. This is not something I am trying to find in a video (a lot of people must disagree).

Of course, there are some non-vocal related noises but not too many I notice, mainly clicks and rustles. There is also the tendency for the delivery to vie towards the breathy side. I am not really into breathy personally, but it would appear that a great many ASMR fans are. There is also some clicking from a plastic valerian tablet bottle which did not appeal to me (but must appeal to someone). There is also the grinding sound of a pestle on mortar which is not unpleasant or distracting in my opinion. All told an excellent video and I can remember why I used to listen to it.

Today’s Calm offering came via a recommendation (from Calm). It is this one:

Daily Calm

Tiny Choices

https://www.calm.com/player/-82hIZWhE5

NARRATOR

Tamara Levitt

AUTHOR

Tamara Levitt

A person with possibly my favourite voice on Calm but who I only encounter on the Calm dailies. These daily offerings are around ten minutes in length (as here) and so probably not long enough for you to drop off to in themselves. The other disadvantage to the majority of readers of this blog is that Calm access is not free; you will have to pay a subscription if you want access.

This is about the big effects that small choices can make. Regular repetition of habitual choices can have a big effect. It is important to have awareness of the choices that we unconsciously have made in the past, giving the facility to change such choices in the future.

This week’s inadvertent ASMR is this one:

02.01 General Assessment Physical assessment

and comes from the channel Nursing made easy with 2.68k subscribers and one hundred and seventy-two videos. There are six playlists all of which are in some way related to the medical theme I’ve been pursuing for a while (and given the title of the channel, unsurprisingly).

and

and

and

and

and

The video is just a little over two minutes, blink and it’s gone, it has no notes and no comments and sadly starts with quite loud startup music.

The narration is from a voice which is nicely calm. There is a medical examination which is featured visually but we cannot hear the participants. Thankfully there is no tail-end music. So, it is a reasonable one but also a rather brief one this week.

On that basis, just one, video this time.

That’s it on this occasion, more next time.

See you again next week.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

Urged on by my recent account about attempting to using magnesium supplements to assist with sleep, a friend recommended that I took ashwagandha. Not two minutes after that recommendation, I got a recommendation for the same supplement from an alternate person. It sounds like it is a supplement which I should give some attention to.

I do not know of ashwagandha, and I still don’t really know how to pronounce it, but it was available at Holland and Barrett and so I have been taking it. I’m about fifteen capsules into a thirty-capsule container and it purports to be five hundred milligrams (by the label).

There are several claims for the benefits of ashwagandha however, I notice that slipping off into nod-nod land is not one of them. So it has proven. I had variable results with the magnesium and I have had variable results with the ashwagandha.

It seems to have a small effect on wake-time calmness. Either that, or some recent training I am attending is having the desired effects.

However, it does not seem to have affected my annoyance at different aspects of life, nor the fact that I occasionally need the television to still my mind enough for sleep.

I continue with it and I welcome other recommendations for sleep, preferably those I can share on the blog. Any substances which are “controlled”, presumably, I am not going to be able to find and far less write about if I could.

(Although I’m sure some of the drug-related relaxants probably do work).

This week I saw mentioned a former monk by the name of Scott Tusa. I wondered if it would be possible to find any relaxing material outside of YouTube that I could direct you to. It appears some are available for download (if you also wish to sign up for a newsletter) on his website, here: https://scotttusa.com/.

I did find some resources in the Internet Archive though which are more readily accessible

https://archive.org/details/ggbc-2020-04-24-scott-tusa-mindfulness

https://archive.org/download/ggbc-2020-04-24-scott-tusa-mindfulness/GGBC 2020-04-24 Scott Tusa Mindfulness.mp3

https://archive.org/details/GGBC20180915ScottTusaMakingLifeMeaningful

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20180915ScottTusaMakingLifeMeaningful/GGBC 2018-09-15 Scott Tusa Making Life Meaningful 1-of-3.mp3

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20180915ScottTusaMakingLifeMeaningful/GGBC 2018-09-15 Scott Tusa Making Life Meaningful 2-of-3.mp3

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20180915ScottTusaMakingLifeMeaningful/GGBC 2018-09-15 Scott Tusa Making Life Meaningful 3-of-3.mp3

https://archive.org/details/GGBC20180914ScottTusaResilienceAndHappiness

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20180914ScottTusaResilienceAndHappiness/GGBC 2018-09-14 Scott Tusa Resilience and Happiness.mp3

https://archive.org/details/GGBC20190412ScottTusaCalmBodyClearMind

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20190412ScottTusaCalmBodyClearMind/GGBC 2019-04-12 Scott Tusa Calm Body Clear Mind.mp3

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20190412ScottTusaCalmBodyClearMind/GGBC 2019-04-13 Scott Tusa Calm Body Clear Mind 1 of 4.mp3

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20190412ScottTusaCalmBodyClearMind/GGBC 2019-04-13 Scott Tusa Calm Body Clear Mind 2 of 4.mp3

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20190412ScottTusaCalmBodyClearMind/GGBC 2019-04-13 Scott Tusa Calm Body Clear Mind 3 of 4.mp3

https://archive.org/download/GGBC20190412ScottTusaCalmBodyClearMind/GGBC 2019-04-13 Scott Tusa Calm Body Clear Mind 4 of 4.mp3

It looks like these are freely available to download, such that you can use them to build up a night-time listening playlist of your own, quite independent of YouTube adverts, and indeed this blog come to think of it (although I hope you will return for the next instalment).

This week’s Calm recommendation is from Jay Shetty, who often has something fascinating to say:

This one is about self confidence

https://www.calm.com/app/player/v-BzceA7Vs

Daily Jay

Sing Your Own Praises

NARRATOR

Jay Shetty

or how bigging yourself up can have some positive effects.

I try not to dwell on the Calm recommendation. It does take a Calm subscription and I recognise a number of those reading are never going to be interested in taking out such a subscription, no matter the cost.

So, moving swiftly on…

I tend at this stage of the article to look at a professional ASMR artist in the hope that I can find one that actually beats the inadvertent ASMR material into a cocked hat. Thus far it’s been something of a curate’s egg.

This week I am drawing on a memory in which I remember an ASMR artist I saw a single video of many years ago and I think I have located the same artist (although almost certainly not the same video).

It is this:

Arctic Secret Base ASMR Physical Therapy |#42

A video that comes from the channel ATMOSPHERE this has 768k subscribers, two hundred and sixty videos, a quick scan of which seems to indicate a heavy Sci-Fi theme to a number of them. I’ve been focused on medical style ASMR for a while, although there are fourteen playlists none of these are on a medical theme as such.

The video is just shy of twenty six minutes in length so not huge. It has notes which are the standard ASMR professional length, i.e. verbose in the extreme: “Arctic Secret Base ASMR Physical Therapy |#42

ATMOSPHERE

768k subscribers

740,803 views 22 Dec 2021 #asmr #relax

#asmr

#relax

ATMOSPHERE summary by TemplePhoenix: https://templephoenix.weebly.com

This is a part of a story. All the videos and characters are interconnected.

✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧

Arctic Base. Room #14

Previous episode:    • Pulling Spy Bugs out of Your Hair | ASMR S… 

Next episode:    • Relaxing Ambush ASMR |#45 

✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧

Created by Anastasia

My Gear (affiliate link):

My best friend Laptop: https://amzn.to/3vZY7sy

Camera: https://amzn.to/3Wd47sF

Two Microphones: https://amzn.to/3CJrpPW

Lighting: https://amzn.to/3w2Wuuf

✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧

If you wish to support me and get a behind-the-scenes access:

  / atmospherea 

More ASMR videos:    / @atmospherea 

✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧✧

Instagram:  / anastasia_atmos “

I’ve edited the notes down a bit, I do tend to find that ASMR professionals produce encyclopaedic notes.

Comments are permitted; there are a great number and the habitual fan worship of professional ASMR artists is well represented here. So far – so good.

The video starts with extensive background noise which, given the content of the video seems by design. The voice is great but so muted I could not really make out every word. One of those videos where you either need to relax and hear some of what is going on or turn the volume up. However, if you do the latter you are going to get a number of extraneous noises turned up to eleven.

This is a video aimed at creating an effect and there are glove noises, rustling noises, whirring noises, clothing-related noises, noises related to the weather (which appears snowy), there is the odd clunk, water dripping, scrunching noises, a robotic sounding voice making announcements, glass stirring noises, strange technical noises – various whirrs, boings, plinking and digital-style feedback noises, noises like a metal can being oscillated, a noise which sounded like a transformer hum, a sound like two plastic surfaces grating against one another, equipment noises including a kind of motorised hum, a sound like plastic beads being rolled over a surface, and plenty more besides.

All of this fits with Sci-Fi style of presentation but perhaps not the best for dozing off.

The presentation is on the whispery side of whispery. That is fine but I do prefer a non-whispery presentation personally. The noises are probably way more than I could tolerate when trying to get to sleep but I am betting that some ASMR fans love this one. Worth a review I would have thought.

The inadvertent ASMR this week is this one:

Quick neurological examination

it comes from the channel Khaled Farrah three hundred and fourteen subscribers, thirteen videos, twenty two playlists of which this one seems firmly on the medical theme:

The notes are fantastically brief: “69,678 views 26 Jul 2020

rapid neurological examination to be used in the setting of GP in under 3 minutes”

There are comments. Some are quite strange, and I notice some ASMR fans are here way before me, which hopefully is a good sign.

Despite the notes indicating three minutes the video is a little over eight minutes in fact. There is loud startup music which is thankfully brief. The medical professional is apparently Giles Elrington Consultant Neurologist Barts Health NHS Trust

His is not the quietest of voices, but on the upside, he isn’t whispering. The tone is good and is also level. No nasty surprises here (well, excepting that music anyway). There are silent intervals where text is displayed (after all this is supposed to be a teaching video). If anything, I felt this made the video more calming. As the video proceeds it seems to get more measured and quieter. I also notice that Dr Elrington is quieter during the examination proper (which I have noticed others do as well, there must be something about medical examinations).

One great thing is that it does not end with music.

I think this one was is worthy of a review.

On that basis, just one, video this time.

That’s it on this occasion, more next time.

See you again next week.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

This week I came across an article that indicates that I can eliminate startup music altogether (I have yet to formally test it). The article is https://www.wikihow.com/Link-to-a-Certain-Time-in-a-YouTube-Video and it indicates that I can start a video at a specific point in time. Theoretically those videos with intrusive music at commencement I can therefore simply start just after that intrusive music, such that the entire playlist will hang together in a much more consistent (not to mention) quiet fashion. I cannot wait to try it. I hope that it is as easy as the article makes out.

I have been editing the main Procrastination Pen playlist of late and most of those edits have been connected with removing excessively loud material. It is a shame after such a long period of reviewing videos that I am now finding some of them just do not stand the test of time (the Procrastination Pen archive list continues to grow). The only upside is that the pace of reviews cannot slow, if it did so then the playlist would very swiftly empty.

For a while now I have been looking for material outside of YouTube. It was a rash promise that I made on this blog some time back, and was predominantly connected with gaining access to material that did not require the prospective snoozer to accept loud and intrusive adverts as a fact of life. I have actually found the process filled with inconsistencies and disappointments. To be honest, in many cases, I feel it is probably better to buy a subscription from a reliable service. However, the hunt goes on.

One of the heroes of all quiet voice fans has to be Thich Nhat Hanh who is, sadly, no longer with us. I can well remember listening on YouTube to one of the Plum Village videos and loving what I heard.

I have found that I am not alone in my starry-eyed fandom in this respect indeed now a whole archive of talks exists: https://tnhaudio.org/. There is so much material here that I will not provide you with a more in-depth review but leave you to select those you like.

I am also continuing to listen to material on Calm reasonably regularly. However, I may need a few lifetimes to become a consistent meditator. My mind is more like a roller-coaster of distracting thoughts. The material in the Calm dailies I find quite restful and not uncommonly instructive as well. However, you will need to buy a subscription if you want to listen to it.

Today’s Calm recommendation comes from Jeff Warren, who whilst not my favourite voice on Calm, is the person I most consistently feel a lot in common with, in that he relates experiences that I also feel.

https://www.calm.com/app/player/f8udqt_eR8

Daily Trip

Oh, That’s What’s Happening!

NARRATOR

Jeff Warren

AUTHOR

Jeff Warren

Those who read this blog a lot will realise that once I have done with a Calm recommendation, I need to find one, on YouTube, from a professional ASMR artist. This week another one that is flagged as “unintentional”, so is a bit of a cheat. Although the channel may be professionally curating the videos (and no doubt adjusting them to present them in the best light) it does not feature a professional ASMR artist as such.

Unintentional ASMR. Medical Assessments Part 35

This is from Warm Heart ASMR, a channel with 14.3K subscribers, one hundred and thirty videos, and just two playlists, one of which looks as if it might be on theme for this blog (at least of late): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBj8XBG9cyM&list=PLi4mE_stpCRA1dZU2wS-8rA1WIDbWIoNW&pp=0gcJCbQEOCosWNin

Today’s video has notes which are thankfully brief:

“126,358 views 30 Jul 2021

Relax and enjoy unintentional ASMR. 3 medical assessments for you. New uploads every Friday. Thanks for watching! Please subscribe! Peace to all

Original links –

Assessment 1:    • Toy ANeuroExam 

Assessment 2:    • Streifert_T:NeuroExam 

Assessment 3:    • Splinting EMT 21-58  “

The original links given there are:

and

and

I think I will find a moment in the future to review each of those videos and hear for myself.

So, the clue is that these have been glued together into one video, this is not a favourite for me. Most often videos wedged together like this perform less well than each of the videos would have done separately, but I have started so I’ll finish.

The assembled video is a little less than thirty-three minutes long. It starts in silence but as soon as the sound initiates it has the echoing effect of something recorded in a large room. The medical professional seems, to me, to be a tad on the loud side. The examination itself, though, is quite well paced and the tone, whilst the exam is being performed, is far better than when the medical professional presents to camera. Many students make this mistake. There is a microphone, it is not necessary to project in the manner of an opera singer, not in the twenty first century in any case. Actually, some lecturers seem to make the same error.

I would say it is a little too loud for me, and I am not convinced that the moments of quiet appropriately compensate. However, your mileage may vary. The people feeding back in the comments, associated with this video, are not showing the normal level of ASMR sycophancy. This makes me think it may not be a favourite for ASMR fans either. (Not that I often agree with ASMR fans as I seem to set more demanding requirements in a number of cases). I just want a quiet voice. Whilst I am not averse to a whispered voice, a voice that stays away from whispering is often more interesting. This voice is one step away from a shout, I would say, and I do not think volume adjustment is going to help here.

The video is no doubt a student demonstrating their learning in a specific area and for this purpose it seems adequate. Probably not a great sleep aid though, sadly.

At fifteen minutes the second of the videos commences and, as expected, the sound level is completely different. The echoing is much more pronounced. The medical professional is not yelling to camera but is still loud. Not the calm quiet voice I was hoping for. Here the patient is considerably easier on the ear (at least they seem to be talking and not projecting into the room vocally). However, the sound is a bit off (probably the best that can be achieved when recording in a lecture theatre using a remote microphone). It is a better paced examination but for me just not quite quiet enough.

At thirty minutes the video changes over to the third in the series and this one seems way quieter. It shows that this video does not belong here. No echoey large halls but a small domestic setting. No projecting to a distant microphone. In fact, much more the kind of thing that I hope to find.

The medical professional has a good voice and has a measured delivery. In this case the “patient” has a good voice as well (not that common to find both participants have good voices for our purposes). There is background noise (possibly air conditioning) which is not excessively obtrusive. It is nicely paced and talking is not excessive in it either. My gut feel is that if I were reviewing the videos separately that only the last one would stand a chance in the Procrastination Pen playlist.

You may recall a previous post in which I mentioned a URL which linked to thirty two videos. The URL is this one:

Medical Training Videos

It has thirty-two videos (discounting the introductory one). Last time we managed to review just four of these, so there is a fair few left to look at…

The next one in the series is this:

Guedel Airway Insertion

Just over a minute so don’t blink, notes are: “192,205 views  17 Feb 2012  Trauma Surgery

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to size and insert a Geudel Airway. It is part of a series of videos on the Initial Assessment of a Trauma Patient.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

It is presented by the medical professional and is reasonably quiet.

C-Spine Immobilisation in Trauma

just over two minutes so again it is not hanging about, the notes are: “146,839 views 17 Feb 2012 Trauma Surgery

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to immobilise a patient’s C-spine using collar, bags and tape. It is part of a series of videos on the Initial Assessment of a Trauma Patient.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

Again, it is announced by the medical professional participating rather than a narrator. It is not quite as quiet but it is still not excessively loud for our purposes. For some reason part way through the volume becomes very distant as if the microphone was transported way down a corridor.

C-Spine Collar Application in Trauma

Less than one and a half minutes, so none of these latter videos will keep you waiting for long.

The notes are: “93,033 views 17 Feb 2012 Trauma Surgery

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to size and fit a C-spine collar. It is part of a series of videos on the Initial Assessment of a Trauma Patient.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

This is announced by the same medical professional and has some quite similar content to the previous one.

Nasoendoscopy (Nose Examination) – ENT

Just less than three minutes, the notes are “598,759 views 17 Feb 2012 ENT (Ear, Nose and Throat) Examinations

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the ENT faculty – demonstrates how to perform an examination of the nose, including use of a nasoendoscope.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

The medical professional is narrating and has a good voice for us initially, but later becomes slightly louder.

I think that I will conclude the blog post at this one and continue in another post. Failing that this blog post would become really large indeed, to the point of boredom, I imagine.

That’s it on this occasion, more next time.

The Oxford Medical Education Hospitals playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

I recently came across a question that seems straightforward, but, in the manner of such questions, swiftly becomes a rabbit hole for the mind. I mention it only on the reflection that the things that affect your sleep may not be as intrinsically you as at first sight.

The question was how much of you is actually you and how much comes from others. Initially, on thinking about this, I concluded that actually I am all me. But on breaking it down further, I understand the influence over time of parents, teachers, lecturers, employers, work colleagues, friends, famous figures, intellectuals and so on.

Taking aside people for a while, I find the influence of the media, the television, the newspapers, social media, the Internet. Until, in the end, I reach the conclusion that nothing is really me at all. There is zero of me that is intrinsic.

That being the case, the aspects of life that have negative connotations one would think are optional. If one cannot sleep worrying over something or other. In fact, this is outside of one’s self. Socialising to ensure that behaviour was in line with society norms. Expectations of others. Influences absorbed over the years from all communication mechanisms to which one has been exposed.

Similarly, expectations about appropriate times to sleep. The manner in which one sleeps. The things that one wears for bed. The chemicals one should take to assist with sleep and those that one should avoid. Every single one of these (and more I have not thought of) have come from outside of oneself. They must, all, therefore, be optional.

On some level one can decide to reject each and every one of them (in some cases, it would require a lot of work admittedly). I believe that a thought exercise like this is highly valuable. If you are struggling to sleep, perhaps, one of the aspects that you regard as critical is, in fact, up for debate.

Do you actually need to sleep when other people say that you do? Do you actually need to eat, exercise, drink, behave in the fashions that have been laid out for you? Is it worthwhile experimenting to find something that works for you in a better way? Even where such experimentation takes you into areas that others would find peculiar or at the least “different”.

The process requires more work than I have given it, but perhaps expanding ones thinking to embrace options that normally one would disregard without thought, may contain the seeds of a practical solution.

I notice that it is now established (as I had already concluded on this blog) that sleep gets more difficult as we age. Whenever I read articles like this, I always find the explanation of the problem to be far more compelling than the solutions. In fact, after a while, if you spend time reading a number of sleep articles, the solutions seem to come down to the same things.

One would never tend to find any solutions that would require changes that affect the ability to make money. (In fact, solutions like that tend not to occur in any media-based article I notice). For example, if you found that you could get a great amount of sleep by getting up at 3AM and going back to bed again at 11AM this would not be recommended. It would require a restructure to the way that the day tends to operate in the current working world. As far as I can tell it would be feasible to reorientate a day to fit around how a person’s body clock actually works and get the same amount of work done.

However, it would be difficult. Difficult equates to costly, and costly is an option that will never be suggested. I am not suggesting it is the correct approach. However, when you are considering how much of you is you and how much is the influence of others take into account the solutions that are never mentioned. Some of them maybe as powerful as the ones that you consistently see. There will be very good reasons that you do not see them. Some of those reasons may not be a good fit for you.

Of course, if you have found your way to the Procrastination Pen, it is probably because you have got used to using sound to distract you from all the whirring, buzzing and grinding that happens between your temples whenever you try to lay down your head. I have tried for many-many months to lay out auditory solutions. Many of these have derived from publicly available sources. I review one, I determine if it is suitably relaxing, I put it up for you to consider. Some of these have been more successful than others.

Of late, I have looked for sources outside of YouTube and out of sheer laziness, no doubt, I have found that the Internet Archive delivers a resource to which I continue to return. However, it is variable to say the least and today’s offering is no different.

Martin & Ryan (unintentional ASMR)

https://archive.org/details/MartinRyan

Blink and you will miss it. The video is less than ten minutes in length and it starts off immediately with strong background noise, which could be air conditioning. The participants are so quiet that noises from adjacent cubicles can be equally clearly heard (this is a definite “turn the volume up” video).

I would say that the patient describes himself as “Ryan Parnell” but the sound track for vocals is so indistinct I cannot be certain (even with the volume turned up to eleven). Turning it up in this way made the drawing of curtains for privacy frankly deafening and I needed the modern version of a graphic equaliser to amplify the vocal track whilst muting everything else (I do not have such a device).

The extraneous noises are very distracting; I would make a guess that the recording equipment (such as it is) was really not up to the job.

At this volume the use of a blood pressure cuff is enough to cause you to tear off the headphones in self-defence. At one point, the sound of the person breathing is actually louder than the sound of the person talking. That is, to say the least, unusual. It is a shame because the pace of the examination is well measured and what I can hear of the participants’ voices sounds very calming. The sad thing is that the intrusive noises are louder than the voices here. Not a video I would review again, but as I constantly comment, there are so many varieties of ASMR fan out there. I’m pretty certain there is at least one who will rate this highly.

I tend to spend a little while each day listening to some content from Calm. Today I thought I would recommend one that I heard some time ago:

https://www.calm.com/app/player/ZG8utTdTSd

Daily Trip

The Unchanging I

NARRATOR

Jeff Warren

AUTHOR

Jeff Warren

Calm is not free. If you want to listen to this material you are going to need a subscription. I feel suitably guilty about mentioning a paid-for option that I linger for only the briefest moment on this section and move swiftly on – to the section where I review a professional ASMR artist.

Today I am looking at one which is something of a cheat, given that it is peripheral to the core medical theme that I have focused on for a great many months.

British Doctor Hand Examination | Real Medical ASMR for Sleep

Firstly, it is unintentional ASMR content so is not specifically from a professional ASMR artist, as such. Secondly, it is from a channel dedicated to Unintentional ASMR, the clue is in the name: Unintentional ASMR Sketches. This channel has one hundred and thirty six videos, five playlists, of which the odd one seems on theme for us:

and

and

Here, therefore, we have a video originally created for one purpose, now employed to kick off some ASMR triggers. (More or less the kind of thing I try to find but here curated into ready-to-wear easy to consume packages).

Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.

The video is in excess of thirty-three minutes and so not the shortest we have seen. It has notes: “136,639 views 19 Aug 2024

Welcome everybody! Everyone reading this will share a common love of ASMR, specifically Unintentional ASMR. So, this channel is dedicated to finding the best unintentional ASMR videos around, from medical exams, clinical demonstrations, soft spoken instructionals, psychics, spiritual healers and all other unintentional ASMR triggers to help give the tingles.

Simply put this channel is unintentional ASMR. Plain and simple.

Each video takes time; I do significantly edit these videos both the visual parts and audio in order to maximise their ASMR effects so if you enjoy this content then please give the video a like and consider subscribing for more unintentional ASMR content.

One of the best things about the ASMR community is the comments section, so please WRITE A COMMENT (especially if it’s humorous)

Hope you enjoy the ASMR!”

The notes indicate that comments will be permitted and, boy, are there a few of those. Mostly they appear to be ASMR afficionados trying to prove how in the know they are about ASMR. This is rather sad. Rather than a community of people loving calm voices, this is something more of a clique. No matter, we can ignore such things and draw conclusions about the quality of this video for sleep purposes.

It starts loud, with pronounced background noise. The professional’s title is across the screen: Mr Steve Turner, Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeon and College Examiner …

Although the video is loud, Steve has a great voice. He introduces the patient as John. John does not get to say anything. The video quality is poor, hazy in fact, and appearing out of focus. I assume it has been captured from somewhere and along the way some quality has been lost. Perhaps that also explains the hiss in the background.

I turned the volume down and everything was much more palatable (rather the opposite to the volume needed for that first video).

The pace is excellent, methodical, measured in approach. Just the sort of thing that we want to hear. There is relatively little extraneous noise. Such equipment as is employed is introduced without excessive noise. However, at 10:20, music commences. It is loud, louder than the vocal track; it is distracting. Given the person providing the channel purports to be editing the videos for palatability why is it included at all? Fortunately, it lasts for a mere moment and we are back to the voice again. At 20:13 we see a University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire banner in the video (possibly a clue as to where we might find the full version of this video). Fortunately, this is not an excuse to introduce yet more music. It is at this point that we recognise that very likely this video is an assemblage of many shorter videos punctuated by those banners.

I executed a search after reviewing this and found that the original video(s) have been taken down. So it is highly likely that this is the only version that you will ever see/hear. In which case it is well worthy of a review.

The inadvertent ASMR video this week is this one:

Cardiovascular examination demonstration

It has notes: ” 1,274,509 views 2 Feb 2019

MRCPCH Clinical Revision – more videos at http://mrcpch.paediatrics.co.uk

Demonstration of a paediatric cardiovascular examination by Professor Alastair Sutcliffe. Filmed and edited by James Diviney.

Revise for your MRCPCH Clinical exam, with videos and high-quality content created by the London Paediatrics Trainees Committee. “

Which are blissfully brief. Comments are denied – which might be for the best.

The channel is Pass MRCPCH – London Paediatrics Trainees Committee this has sixty-one videos, ten playlists (not surprisingly many of these look appropriate for the theme of this blog.

Todays’ video is a little less than seven minutes, so it will not keep us long. It will be interesting to see if it fits in with a theory I had some time back in this blog i.e. that adults speak much more quietly and empathetically when dealing with children than they do when dealing with adults. I wonder if that says something about the origins of ASMR itself.

This video, thankfully, starts without music. However, it commences quite loudly with a presentation towards camera (I’ll assume that it is a camera). There is quite substantial background noise – an ongoing hiss which probably speaks to the quality of the recording mechanism employed here. There is the odd thunk (presumably of equipment being moved off camera). After a brief introduction the young person (Molly) is introduced and as if by magic, the medical professional’s voice becomes more gentle and more measured.

The medical professional is humorous; the presentation is, dare I say it, kind and considerate. In fact, it is exactly the pace and volume which I have been looking for in a video. Despite the hiss, I would say this one is a good video. However, the length is perhaps a little shorter than is properly ideal. Not least because YouTube is going to slot in a bouncy advert straight afterwards.

For the patient she appears to be relaxed, even entertained, which must be quite a skill to create, I would imagine. I thought this one rather good, probably worth giving a review. In any case, I’ll trial it in the Procrastination Pen playlist for a while to see how it beds in.

On that basis, just one, video on this occasion.

That’s it on this occasion, more next time.

See you again next week.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this, in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

I came across a course by Tara Brach ” Mindfulness for Anxiety and Sleep: Learning Practices that Help Reduce Stress and Calm Fears”. I’ve subscribed (sadly it is not free) and as it is on theme for the material that we have been covering I thought I’d let you know about it as well. You’ll find it at the Radical Compassion Institute and it is $19.99. Of course, if that sort of sum is a long way from the amount that you wish to spend at the moment, that is completely understandable. However, I know that there are some people desperate for sleep out there and I rather like Tara Brach’s voice…

Of late, I have been trying to seek out material that is both free and not on YouTube, in the hope that I can direct people away from energetic adverts when they are trying to sleep.

This week I thought we’d go back to the Internet Archive again with this one:

PE: Shoulder Pain – OSCE Prep (Pulm, Cardiac, Pulses, Screening OSE, UE Neuro, MSK, Special Tests)

https://archive.org/details/youtube-EglDKnv5mLw

This has the look-feel of a YouTube video that was reviewed on the Procrastination Pen many months ago. It is eight minutes long. It has quite extensive notes:

“This particular video is intended as a demonstration of a physical exam that may be useful in evaluating a patient with shoulder pain.

It is not intended as a complete instructional video and should not be considered a source of complete physical examination instruction. It is also intended not as a perfect example of a physical exam that would be performed for a patient in clinical practice, but is designed to optimize function and efficiency for a OSCE testing setting.

Instead, it should be treated as a supplement to independent learning using primary Osteopathic Physical Examination instructional resources. Clinical skills are best learned and developed with support from faculty in the context of a complete Osteopathic Medical School Curriculum.

Osteopathic Clinical Skills is a channel dedicated to discussing and exploring Osteopathic Clinical Skills concepts for medical students, residents, and clinicians and presenting them in an easy-to-understand manner.

Attributions:

Many thanks to the University of North Texas Health Science Center Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine (UNTHSC – TCOM) for permitting use of the Medical Education Training (MET) facilities and equipment during the production of this video.

Additional thanks to the UNTHSC-TCOM learner and faculty volunteers who participated in this production and provided permission for the use of their image in this video.

Addeddate

    2023-08-09 12:29:33

Channel

    http://www.youtube.com/@OsteopathicClinicalSkills

Collection_added

    social-media-video

    additional_collections_video

Identifier

    youtube-EglDKnv5mLw

Originalurl

Scanner

    TubeUp Video Stream Mirroring Application 0.0.35

Year

    2023 “

There are no comments, but then that isn’t really exceptional for a video that we find on the Internet Archive rather than YouTube.

The video starts without startup music and actually has no discernible background noise. The medical professional does not have your classical ASMR voice and is definitely not someone given to whispering. However, his style is gentle and measured, even slow perhaps. Occasionally he speaks a little more loudly which might be distracting if you have just dozed off. There are none of the grinding, popping, clicking, noises that attend many YouTube osteopathy videos and which caused me to reject the entire category for this blog some time ago.

The patient does not have much to say but she also has quite a calming voice. That is not common with YouTube videos – at least one participant habitually sounding like they’re employed to engender wakefulness.

Of course, each week now I refer to something from Calm because I have a Calm subscription, but I am not in any way trying to rub that in. Merely indicating that other material is available outside of YouTube. This week we have:

https://www.calm.com/app/player/TdLlUcxXBY

Daily Jay

Context Switching

NARRATOR

Jay Shetty

which is about how changing rapidly between tasks is taxing on the mind and inefficient. A sentiment which I wholeheartedly endorse, given that I have a very single-tasking kind of mind which becomes progressively more insistent about that limitation the older that I become.

This week’s professional ASMR offering comes to us from Cap Bailey ASMR. The channel has 375K subscribers six hundred and thirty seven videos and nine playlists of which this one would seem to be on theme for the medical examination subject we have pursued for this blog for some time now:

The video is this one:

Medical ASMR Friendly Field Exam (Whispered Sleep Roleplay)

The video has comments (of course it does) and, as usual, people are wetting themselves with joy over a new ASMR video. There are notes, which are refreshingly brief: ” 10,275 views 15 Feb 2026

(World War 2 Roleplay) Your friendly ASMR Medic treats your injuries to make you feel better (relaxed and sleep well) I hope ya love this video. I really enjoy doing these type of videos so if you enjoy this, leave a like and let me know in the comments. Much love and enjoy 🙂

Patreon –   / capbaileyasmr 

PayPal – @CapBaileyASMR

Instagram –   / cap_bailey 

Cap Bailey ASMR

375k subscribers”

It is a little over twenty-two and a half minutes in length, so not exceptionally long. It starts without music, but does have a kind of background noise as if the person presenting is standing in a storm. I think this is deliberate given the context of the video. It is definitely a whispery presentation but not your classical ASMR voice, I think. It is a bit esoteric for our normal fare in that it is not in a hospital, GP surgery, or even a nursing student’s bedroom.

The WWII aspect is unusual. However, we’re here to listen to how good the voice is. I’d say it is acceptable but I am not raving as much as the comments would have had me do.

The voice has an edge to it which makes it less than the calming I was expecting. I think it is that the person presenting is fighting to be quiet or, perhaps is trying both to be quiet and to project at the same time and it is an oddly jarring effect. That is not to say it isn’t well worth a review, of course.

There are, as usual for such things, other noises; tapping noises, stroking noises, slurping noises, some clicks, the odd thump, clunk and scraping noise. The person also makes that odd mouth clucking/clicking noise so beloved of ASMR artists but which does not do anything for me.

This may well be an example of something I have noticed before which is that some ASMR artists seem to try to get every ASMR trigger they can into each of their videos. I have said before that this is a mistake, as it does feel a bit like hammering at a trigger rather than it gently coming out of the presentation. In addition, if your trigger is mouth clucking, it probably isn’t whispering and vice versa. On that basis any ASMR fan is going to find part of the video unfulfilling, presumably.

Occasionally these extraneous noises get to be quite loud. I did find some of the noises to be distracting and personally I would not be using this one to try to fall asleep to, your mileage may vary. If you’re watching, the recreation of military artefacts and costume seems well done, but I think most people reading this blog will be using any of the videos to doze off to and hence will only be listening. I guarantee that there will be many-many people who absolutely lap this up, so why not have a review for yourself.

Today’s inadvertent ASMR video comes from the most minimal of channels. The channel is Lauren King and there is just one video on that channel. The subject of this week’s review.

HEENT Health Assessment Video 2_King

There are no notes and no comments. The channel has just two hundred and forty-nine subscribers but I notice the video has 123,950 views at the time I am looking at it (let’s hope that bodes well for us). It is a little less than twenty and a half minutes which is definitely not huge. It starts without music but with a reasonable level of background noise almost certainly air conditioning. Lauren seems to have a good voice and, indeed, the “patient” has a voice that is pretty good too. So far, so good.

There are equipment noises, noises from adjacent cubicles, some of which are quite loud (laughter even). The “patient” seems to be called “Tanner Wallace”, although there is every possibility of that being incorrect. Also, the date of birth verbally whisks by (possibly August 10 1993, not that the information is of very much use to us).

The bed motors (Lauren raises the bed) make a fearsome noise which is genuinely distracting. Fortunately, that particular noise does not last that long. The examination is well paced even gentle in places. Lauren occasionally seems to work hard on enunciation (there are a few technical terms).

In common with some presentations we have seen, Lauren sometimes spends moments struggling to work out what comes next. This is very standard student assessment video. By now, you and I have seen so many such videos we can almost work out what we expect to happen next. This one seems a small cut above, in that the style has the appearance of including some genuine empathy which is a fundamentally rare skill demonstrated in student assessment videos.

Part way through, the shoulder badge becomes visible and we see that it is Walla Walla University School of Nursing.

This has a channel but we have long established that university channels are there to promote the university rather than generate any ASMR-related content. (No doubt rightly so).

Sadly, my listening to the video was repeatedly interrupted by loud adverts (which more or less reiterates the point where we came in).

I rather liked this one, extraneous noises notwithstanding. Certainly, it is of reasonable quality for a student assessment video and I’m going to put it in the Procrastination Pen Playlist.

On that basis, just one, video on this occasion.

That’s it today, more next time.

See you again next week.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

I’m finding, again, that sleep experts are stating that their area of fascination is way more important than those that interest the diet and exercise specialists. I do not think anyone who is interested in their health is likely to disagree with this. Hopefully we are seeing an end of the “powering through”, “tiredness is no excuse,” kind of mantra that droned away in the background when I was still young enough to care.

People are now expected to take care of themselves and sleep is expected to be a key component. Excellent, save for one aspect, which are those of us that suffer for sleep. Those, like me, who once upon a time could sleep next to a rail line, on a pile of rocks, or inside a moving car, and now find that their night times are punctuated with wakefulness.

For a very long time now I have been preparing a playlist of relaxing material. The idea is that if you’re tired but the switch in your head which translates “tired” to “asleep” now seems to be broken, you can distract yourself with a relaxing video or three in the hope that eventually you will drift off.

If you have wandered onto the blog starting with this article, a brief summary is that each week I review some material for its restfulness, make recommendations and continue to populate the playlist which is behind it all.

For several months now I have been reviewing material on Calm, for no better reason than I have a Calm subscription and I can do so. It is mainly motivated by the desire to find an alternative to YouTube for relaxing material. Although many of the videos on YouTube can be suitable in this respect, the adverts that appear between them or sometimes whilst they are running are universally unsuitable and you may find your relaxed body lifting off the bed as some loud and funky advertising track pollutes your headphones.

This week, assuming you have a subscription, why not give this one a try:

https://www.calm.com/app/player/tI5knRkEQI

Daily Trip

The Same Fruit

NARRATOR

Jeff Warren

AUTHOR

Jeff Warren

This is about stopping looking for novelty. Because when we stop looking for novelty, we find it is already here in simple, normal things around us.

I have made a promise that I would also find some material outside of YouTube and I have found that just on occasion there is some ASMR material available on the Internet Archive. There is not a huge amount of it, however. I’ve also tended to focus on the area which has been the focus for the rest of the blog article (and back in time for this block for several months) which is medical-themed examinations. I tend to stick with these both from professional ASMR artists and (a little later on) from a medical professional who just happens to have a calm voice.

This week on the Internet Archive we have this.

https://archive.org/details/crinkle-luvin-asmrs-thanksgiving-livestream-2019/A+_Super+Normal_+Skin+Exam+at+the+Dermatologist’s+Office+_+CrinkleLuvin+ASMR+Archive.mp4.

It’s a little under thirty five minutes in length and it would appear that, if you so choose, you could download the file and assemble it into your own playlist using your media player of choice (VLC for example).

The notes for the entire archive are as follows: ” CrinkleLuvin Archive by CrinkleLuvin

Topics

    ASMR, Preservation, Deleted Channels, Deleted Videos, Archive, CrinkleLuvin

Language

    English

Item Size

    48.6G

A popular creator who did many different types of roleplays. Her Doctor/Nurse and Other Mother being among the most popular. However, she found herself in controversy for leaking the nudes of another creator, lying about it, and framing another as the one at fault. After a less then sincere apology she deleted her channel and all of her Videos.

However, as time passed a new channel by the name of “The Cozy Hospital ASMR” started to appear and doing Doctor ASMR in a similar style as Crinkle with one even including the Other Mother. While Cozy kept her face hidden, many had suspicions and were proven correct when it was revealed to be CrinkleLuvin behind the channel and continued making content despite her crimes. The New Channel continues to produce content as of March 2025.

Link to Former Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCjAcleI6O0o_gUx__B0pdQ

Link to the New Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCd4PeR0MBaR25Oa7xEUUDCg

Added date

    2023-09-02 06:11:46 “

Which just might be of interest, perhaps.

There is just the one review: “Reviewer: windonwater –

– June 6, 2024

Subject: The Best ASMR Channel of All Time

At first glance, CrinkleLuvin is a very talented lady who fully grasps the tingly sensation that is required for a fantastic ASMR session. Her ability to make you immersed in the sessions is unparalleled and legendary, with her bright, welcoming, sweet voice that comforts you in the darkest times. While her outside persona, where she has been caught in a scandal of harassing and leaking another internet video personality, is not as graceful as her on-screen chameleon talents, this is not new. She is just one of the many unpleasant people, whose primary career is an artist, entertainer, who are capable of making great art. It’s missing the legendary Kris Jenner ASMR video, but a good start. “

So, this sort of thing does not attract the hundreds of reviews that we see on YouTube. (In any case we often find that professional ASMR artists get sycophantic reviews from barely passable material).

(I’m not certain how much I would read into the purported misbehaviour of the ASMR artist. I find that believing what you find on the Internet is a little like believing what you read in the newspapers. Sometimes you get away with it…). However, I did find an apology video:

The comments more or less speak for themselves. I leave it to you whether you wish to persist with any of this artist’s material.

The video starts without music – hurrah. The tone of the ASMR professional is a good one. The enunciation is excellent (something which is often missing, I find). There are extra noises of course, mostly the rustling of clothing. There is the flicking of paper, the clicking of a pen, writing noises, the squirting of gel and the sound of it being rubbed into the hands, there are glove related noises (which I found distracting), plastic crackling noises (packaging) which is a bit loud, scraping noises, occasional taps, equipment noises, tape-related noises (which are also loud).

The video quality is not top notch – not that you’ll be watching. One side effect of which is that the medical professional appears to have the tiniest pupils I’ve seen on a video as if she is completely bored (but is no doubt an artefact of the loss of quality in re-recording it from an online source).

I like the slow and deliberate pace of this video. For me it was quite restful and that does seem to be a rare quality amongst ASMR videos that I find to review. Probably worth giving a review, see what you think.

There are other medical-related videos here including:

https://archive.org/details/crinkle-luvin-asmrs-thanksgiving-livestream-2019/ASMR+Examining+You%2C+Test+Subject+A182B+_+CrinkleLuvin+Archive.mp4.

and

https://archive.org/details/crinkle-luvin-asmrs-thanksgiving-livestream-2019/ASMR+Horror+Story_+Medical+Kidnapping+_+CrinkleLuvin+Archive.mp4 .

and

https://archive.org/details/crinkle-luvin-asmrs-thanksgiving-livestream-2019/ASMR+I’m+Giving+You+Botox!+(SUPER+Tingly+Esthetician)+_+CrinkleLuvin+Archive.mp4.

and

https://archive.org/details/crinkle-luvin-asmrs-thanksgiving-livestream-2019/ASMR+Medical+Post-Op+Role+Play+_+CrinkleLuvin+Archive.mp4 .

and

https://archive.org/details/crinkle-luvin-asmrs-thanksgiving-livestream-2019/ASMR+Patching+You+Up!+(Medical+Wound+Care)+_+CrinkleLuvin+Archive.mp4 .

and

https://archive.org/details/crinkle-luvin-asmrs-thanksgiving-livestream-2019/Fizzy+Ear+Cleaning+(Medical+ASMR)+_+CrinkleLuvin+Archive.mp4 .

Plenty for you to get some material for your sleep playlist. However, I do not think I’ll be reviewing CrinkleLuvin any further given the revelations about her behaviour (see above).

After the archive material I usually look at a professional ASMR artist

I’ve spent a while on the archive material this time so I’ve opted for a short one from an ASMR professional:

KayKay ASMR~ Eye Exam Roleplay

There is no description. Comments are not permitted. All of this is very unusual for a professional ASMR artist and does not bode well, to be honest.

The Channel is Up to Atom https://www.youtube.com/@uptoatom4433, there are only three videos but 4.53K subscribers. That sounds nigh impossible. I’ll assume that the presentation is something else then.

The video is a little less than twelve and a half minutes, the setting is domestic and the person is either a child or has a very childlike voice. Perhaps a little childlike for me, but there maybe ASMR fans who like a voice that sounds like this. There is no startup music. There is the odd extraneous noise of course: gloves-related noises, equipment-related noises, rubbing noises, the odd clunk, scribbling/writing noises, tapping noises, clicking noises, scraping sounds, in this one the extraneous noises are a tad on the distracting side. I think it is another of the ASMR professional videos where the participant knows there are triggers and attempts to insert a smorgasbord of every trigger they possibly can. For my purposes I would like one focused on a calm voice with minimal to no additional noises.

The ASMR artist makes that mouth-clucking noise so beloved of professional ASMR artists but which does not work for me. (I have to assume it is a “trigger” for someone). There is the odd error made during the presentation which I assume means it was not scripted in any way. The presentation occasionally descends into a whisper but otherwise is quite a good tone. The pace is quite good too. This would probably have made quite a good longer video.

I wish KayKay well. If she is as young as the voice would have me believe then she has a very long ASMR career ahead of her. It would be nice if, sometime during that time, there was a medical-themed video based entirely on just a calming, empathetic voice but they are sufficiently rare that I’m assuming there is little demand.

You may recall a previous post in which I mentioned a URL which linked to thirty two videos. The URL is this one:

Medical Training Videos

It has thirty-two videos (discounting the introductory one). Last time we managed to review just four of these, so there is a fair few left to look at…

The next one in the series is this:

Nasopharyngeal Airway (NPA) Insertion

Just under one and a quarter minutes so barely there at all really. The notes are: “97,655 views 17 Feb 2012 Trauma Surgery

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to size and insert a Nasopharyngeal Airway. It is part of a series of videos on the Initial Assessment of a Trauma Patient and is linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

There is no narration this time, the voice is that of the medical professional. He is not overly loud and there is no background noise. It is at a decently slow pace (despite the short length of the video overall).

Trauma Assessment – Teaching Scenario

I would assume that this belongs with the Trauma videos that we covered earlier. However, it appears at this position on the page so it is a bit marooned. Just less than fourteen and three quarter minutes the notes are: “413,276 views 17 Feb 2012 Trauma Surgery

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to perform the initial assessment of a patient with suspected traumatic injury. This scenario is of an uninjured patient.

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

It is not overly loud, and despite the fact it is about trauma it is not disturbing. It is measured in approach.

Trauma Assessment – Multiple Injuries (Part 1)

Just under eleven and three quarter minutes the notes are: “326,410 views 17 Feb 2012 Trauma Surgery

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to perform the initial assessment of a patient with suspected traumatic injury. This video is part 1 of a muti-system injury scenario (airway compromise, tension pneumothorax, bleeding and head injury).

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

The announcement is slightly loud at the beginning. However, the medical professional is reasonably quiet and is methodical in approach. A reasonable amount of the process involves minimal sound so that is great for us.

Trauma Assessment – Multiple Injuries (Part 2)

Five minutes long the notes are: “132,979 views 17 Feb 2012 Trauma Surgery

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to perform the initial assessment of a patient with suspected traumatic injury. This video is part 2 of a muti-system injury scenario (airway compromise, tension pneumothorax, bleeding and head injury).

All videos on this channel are linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk”

It looks to be the continuation of the earlier trauma video and so the findings there relate; the medical professional is methodical, quiet and has a relatively good voice for us.

I think that I will conclude the blog post at this one and continue in another post. Failing that this blog post would become really large indeed, to the point of boredom, I imagine.

That’s it on this occasion, more next time.

The Oxford Medical Education Hospitals playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

I am so happy that even professional journalistic accounts are now documenting distraction as a valid approach towards dealing with insomnia. Regular readers of the Procrastination Pen know that I have been banging this particular drum for over a year now. The distraction that I choose is sound.

I find that a particular kind of sound is restful. A low calm voice in an empathetic tone is absolutely ideal. It does not even matter to me, particularly, if the adopted tone is a whisper.

Regular listeners to ASMR artists will notice that the whisper is the go-to level in many of these videos and it does all get a bit samey. You will have noticed that I refer to videos and this is because I have been using YouTube as my source of ASMR material, for sleep, for much of the period in which I write about ASMR on this blog.

However, I have made the promise that I will also explore alternatives. This promise is also self-serving since YouTube is financed by advertising and much of that advertising is so noisy it undoes the good work done by the video itself. I lose count of the times I’ve spent forty-five minutes dozing to a relaxing track only to be shocked awake by an advertisement for some undesirable tat.

Unfortunately, money maketh the world go around, so this kind of thing is unavoidable where the website in use depends upon advertising for its revenue. I have therefore been looking at other sites. Of late I have had some success finding material in the Internet Archive. This week I am listening to this one:

https://archive.org/details/asmr-nurse-takes-care-of-you-roleplay/Lasmren/Asmr+nurse+takes+care+of+you+roleplay.mp4

It is from Lasmren ASMR Archive by Lasmren ASMR and straight away I can tell this video is extremely quiet. I had the volume up to eleven and it was still hard to hear it. (Advanced age and encroaching deafness notwithstanding.).

The video is a little over sixteen minutes and is dedicated to someone by the name of “Randy” – if you find the idea of a video dedicated to someone else distracting, I would avoid this one. On the upside there is no startup music. The tone does not involve whispering but on the downside, this is not what I would call my favourite voice.

There are some loud noises that occur in the background (neighbours, I think). There are other noises of course (apart from the loud ones). There are nail clicking noises, rattling noises, movement of a blanket, pill dispensing noises, plastic tapping noises, liquid noises, glove noises, objects being slammed down onto the desk surface, noises from the ASMR artist moving around. Some of these are unwelcome. There are various sounds where devices appear to be knocked against the microphone which, given the rest of the video is quiet, are quite disturbing to any relaxation. I would say that given this the recording level is probably off, and a bit more amplification to the voice was probably required.

Lasmren sounds quite bored; borderline fed up in this, perhaps it is just something in the vocal tone. The presentation seems a bit random, definitely not scripted. I am not certain that it hangs together that well. However, as I have mentioned before, there are as many ASMR preferences as there are ASMR fans, so I am guessing that someone out there will love this.

For a long time now, I have been recommending a track on Calm. I have a Calm subscription and the requirement to subscribe also ensures that you do not need to listen to noisy adverts. The requirement to subscribe also means, of course, that this is not for everyone. Today’s recommendation is this one:

https://www.calm.com/app/player/YnCzboCfYS

Daily Jay

When Fear Takes Over

NARRATOR

Jay Shetty

Which is about making decisions on the basis of fear and when this is not the correct approach. He suggests that the best approach is that will always enable us to grow. He points out that you need to be clear about why you are making decisions; could it be that the decisions you are making are because of fear.

If that doesn’t sound very sleep orientated, this is because I frequently find the Calm dailies more restful than the Calm material that is actually supposed to gentle me off to sleep. A lot of that material involves music or other noises that I do not find restful.

At this stage, and for a while now in this blog, I tend to review a professional ASMR artist. I have tried various techniques to avoid choosing just the latest video that pops up in the YouTube recommendations. Sometimes this has even been successful.

Today it is this one:

the ent exam you didn’t know you needed 🥼 (asmr doctor role play)

There are not many comments on the day I am looking at it but those that there are seem to be predominantly positive. The channel is ASMR Viella with 27.8k subscribers, three hundred and five videos and three playlists. The roleplay playlist has a number of medical videos in it but is not predominantly medical themed:

There are, of course, notes, and in this case, these are, thankfully, brief:

“9 Feb 2026 ✪ Members first on 6 February 2026 #asmrsounds #sleepaid #asmrroleplay

This ASMR role play includes medical personal attention, questions and note-taking, physical exam, tympanometry (yes that one), a hearing test, and ear massage / care. hope you enjoy~!

new upload every Sunday at 8PM ET~! ✨ thank you so much for liking and subscribing. ʚ♡ɞ

become a channel member here ❤️:

   / @asmrviella 

#asmrsounds #sleepaid #asmrroleplay”

Today’s video is a little over thirty-four minutes in length and so is reasonable compared to some we have looked at recently, but it should not over face you if you simply want to listen to just the one video whilst you drift off. There is no startup music (Heaven be praised) and straight away we are back to the predominantly whispering style of presentation. This means we are on familiar ground (a lot of professional ASMR artists seem to do this). The voice is not unpleasant, but I do like it when ASMR artists ring the changes, i.e. do not opt for a whispering style of presentation.

As we have heard before there are occasional mouth click/cluck noises (I suspect because they are an ASMR “trigger” for someone). Of course, the voice is not the only noise. We have pen clicking, scribbling/writing noises, fingernails clicking against a surface, there are noises which seem to be something dragged across the microphone (these are quite loud), plastic clicking noises, equipment noise including items being placed (quite loudly) on a desk surface, beeping noises, rattling noises, mobile phone alerts, liquid sloshing noises, even the distant sound of aircraft/traffic.

I get the sense, as I have before, that a number of professional ASMR artists try to cram every type of known ASMR trigger into the one video. I think this might not be the best approach. I, for example, like a calm voice, so I find nail clicking and liquid sloshing distracting. If you are the type of person that rather likes liquid sloshing, it might be that you’re not so keen on the whispering, for example.

This one certainly has quite an amount of nail clicking and so if this is not the trigger for you, I’m not sure I’d review it. If it is your thing though, this video should be a good fit (the occasional loud sound notwithstanding). It was not, I have to say, my favourite video to date so I do not think this will be a channel I’ll spend a great deal of extra time reviewing for alternative videos. Your mileage may vary.

Now the ultimate section of the blog article of late. At one time the only section in the article but things have expanded a little over the past few months. This is where I seek out a (normally medical) video and review it to determine if it is suitably relaxing. Given the video is designed for a purpose other than relaxation, these are inadvertent ASMR videos. Some of them turn out to be better than others.

The channel this time is Joy McLaughlin which has only seven videos and yet has 13.8K subscribers. Blimey. There are zero playlists so no point trying to evaluate any to see if they’re suitable for us.

The video is:

Pulmonary Exam

It is only a little over seven minutes so blink and it’ll be gone. Comments are permitted and a number are from ASMR fans, that is frequently a good sign (but sadly not always). The notes are: “598,514 views 6 Dec 2017

Lauren Daley is simply “breathtaking” in her latest short film, “The Pulmonary Exam”– audiences everywhere will be gasping to see how it all turns out.”

Checking the channel, all of the material on it is eight years old so watch this one while ye may before someone takes the whole thing down.

The video starts in silence and then is a little loud, including the voice of the medical professional. I would say that the “patient” here has a better voice. The medical professional introduces herself as “Lauren Daley” who states that she is a first-year medical student at “FAU”, at least that is how I heard it. Assuming I have heard it correctly it is conceivable that this is “Florida Atlantic University” this institution seems to have a nursing programme and it is possible this is where Lauren is attending in 2017.

There is reasonably strong air-conditioning noise, which might be why Lauren feels that she has to speak up here. There is occasional humour, which I did not find distracting. The examination is nicely calm, although never truly quiet. There is an interruption from a person off-camera, potentially the person doing the filming. However, it is not excessively loud.

I think I’ll try this in the Procrastination Pen playlist for a while but it may eventually get booted out. I am doing a great deal of weeding from the playlist into the archive list of late as I would swear, I am getting pickier. (Hopefully that will turn out to be a good thing in terms of the eventual overall quality of the playlist).

On that basis, just one video on this occasion.

That’s it for this review, more next time.

See you again next week.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI

Sleeping With ASMR

I recently read some recommendations around the use of magnesium to aid sleep. Personally, I was sceptical. I consider my diet has quite enough healthy attributes. So why would I need a supplement. I decided to go with cheap and minimal to give it a try. I located some 375mg magnesium and vitamin B6 from Tesco. I figured if the bargain basement variety was effective, then there was something in this magnesium supplement solution.

I also wanted the lowest mg I could find as I had been warned that strong supplements of magnesium can act as a laxative, and I was not too keen on that.

In any case, I now find it slightly easier initially to fall asleep. I have found that it has zero effect on the nights when I am already stressed – so far nothing available off prescription does. It also seems to have no, to negligible, effect on waking up during the night. Taking it, I find I still wake up around 4AM and it is still a struggle to get back off to sleep again.

Of course, this is anecdotal. A sample size of one could hardly be called a scientific sample size. There is also a strong possibility it is all placebo effect. However, if so, I’m all for the placebo effect. It might be worth giving magnesium a try if you haven’t already.

So, again, welcome to the Procrastination Pen, the home of restful material to aid in distraction of the sleepless and, on a good night, towards gentling them off to sleep.

Of late I have been trying to find material that is not on YouTube to give you the option of avoiding some pretty sleep-disturbing adverts. One of the people who is more famous than most is Jack Kornfield. Who, unsurprisingly, has a truly excellent voice and one, which, in the past, I listened to very frequently.

Surely meditation royalty like this would not have material out there in internet land that is free of charge?

Well in fact there is a whole site of it here, including, completely at random, this one: https://dharmaseed.org/talks/85881/20240902-Jack_Kornfield-SR-a_labor_of_love-85881.mp3

We also find the odd content in the Internet Archive including this one:

I’m beginning to understand that, with all this information available, one really does not have to put up with YouTube at all.

Following the structure that was established a few months ago, at this point I tend to recommend something from Calm. I have a Calm subscription and so I am in the fortunate position that I can listen to the content there. I recognise that only a subset of the people reading this will be in that position, so I will keep this section brief:

https://www.calm.com/app/player/iViiLizTTt

Daily Jay

Soul Grow

NARRATOR

Jay Shetty

This is about becoming a more extraordinary version of yourself. In it Jay explores this letter. I often find that Jay has some of the more interesting content on Calm, although not usually the most restful. I assume most people want to become the best possible version of themselves and so this may appeal.

Following on from the Calm recommendation, regular readers will know that at this point I now turn to YouTube and look for a professional ASMR artist. I am now not clear whether this is to recommend them. Many of my articles have found problems with content from professional ASMR artists. However, at the same time I have found the same artists with positive legion fans leaving sycophantic comments. I have to conclude therefore, that there are many different ears in the world and they all like to hear something different. For this reason, I persist, in the hope that at least one person who happens across this blog will like the content.

This one is unusual in that it has no notes and very few comments. That does not usually bode well, so my expectations are not high from commencement.

ASMR | Nurses Station 1: Nurse on Cranial Nerve Exam 🩺

It is from ALBERTSVOICE ASMR, which is a channel that has 16.8K subscribers, 3.4K videos, eleven playlists with some playlists quite obviously on theme for our medical – related ASMR reviews, such as:

and

and

and

This is such a huge number of videos I can only assume that the person is doing this as a full-time job. In which case all power to him.

Today’s video is a little over twenty-three minutes. It starts very loud for an ASMR video including a ringing tone, loud speech, and loud keyboard sounds. The phone gets a good clattering and the video continues in the same loud manner. This is certainly not your classical ASMR video. Although we have heard videos with excessively loud keyboards before, this is quite possibly the loudest yet.

There seem to be very loud equipment-related sounds every time a piece of equipment is selected. On the upside, there is no sign of whispering or breathy presentations. There are no mouth clucking sounds or any of those other sounds we have associated with a number of professional ASMR artists. In fact, it is so loud, I do wonder if it is in fact a parody of ASMR videos rather than an ASMR video as such. Although we have encountered videos with loud noises in them, I have rather assumed that this was a mistake rather than by conscious choice. Here it would appear that it is by design. I suspect that unless you give the volume control a healthy downwards turn you are not going to get much rest whilst listening to this one.

It is odd, when I started to review professional ASMR artists I was convinced that the content would be so good that very soon all the inadvertent material I had initially focused on would be shown to be excessively lacking. Actually, the more reviews I do, the more I find that much of this inadvertent material stands up rather well.

Perhaps I made the correct choice, quite by accident, when I started writing this review series of blog articles all those months ago.

As to that, this week’s inadvertent ASMR video is this one:

Neurological assessment video

It has no notes and comments are denied – so reassuringly quite unlike a professional ASMR artist then. It comes from the channel Lila Kalman, which has 1.08K subscribers. This is quite an achievement given there are only sixteen videos and no playlists.

The posts to this channel start three years ago, conclude two years ago and have all the appearance of student assessment videos. Today’s video is not going to break the bank timewise given it is less than eight minutes long. Other parts of the channel look worthy of investigation however, so I will most likely be returning for a further look in the future.

It starts with the typical student video pantomime knock. Usually this precedes attempts at privacy using thin air, which fortunately does not happen here. The medical professional introduces herself as Lila, so I am guessing the owner of this channel. The “patient” seems to be Lauren Hager (assuming I heard that correctly). There is no excessive background noise (somewhat of a miracle for videos of this nature). Lila seems to have an excellent voice. Lauren’s is almost as good. If I happen across Lauren’s channel in my travels I may give it a review. (Assuming that she was a nurse in the same year as Lila, which is by no means a given).

The video continues quiet, and the approach is methodical. Would that we had seen many more such videos. There are occasional equipment noises, none of which seem to me to be excessive. If anything, the recording seems a little on the muted side. One of the rare occasions in which you will be rolling over and turning the volume control up. (Whereas more usually you’ll be turning it down, often quite a long way down). There is occasional noise, which sounds like it might be traffic noise, outside of the building. In which case the building could probably do with some more insulation as it sounds unusually noisy.

There’s the odd pregnant pause, I assume while Lila attempts to recall what it is should come next in the process. So far, so typical student assessment video. There is occasional speech from an adjacent room, which is also the kind of thing that we have heard before.

All told I think a rather good video for us and it is going into the Procrastination Pen playlist.

On that basis, just one video on this occasion.

That’s it on this occasion, more next time.

See you again next week.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by DeepAI