This week I was listening to a podcast in which it was mentioned that “no regrets” was a daft philosophy. The phrase “no regrets” chimed for me and then I remembered it was the name of a song:
and so, in the way that one does, I looked up the song and found out far too much about it.
It did leave in me a question about the effects of relationship breakup on sleep. I have noticed that things like relationship failure are not often taken seriously. Presumably the phrase “man up” would be employed here. I certainly never hear of any time off being awarded because one’s beloved decided that Geoffrey (or Gemma) from Accounts was a better fit.
It would seem that my suspicion that it would have a significant impact is supported with studies demonstrating shorter duration sleep, depression (which also impacted sleep) and fragmented sleep when one finally gets any at all.
Sadly, The Procrastination Pen is not going to try to stir the crocodile-infested waters of relationships. I have no great solutions to offer you. My favourite AI tells me that 22.8% of couples are divorced by their 25th anniversary, which means a colossal number of people are suffering relationship breakup in their lives. I would be prepared to guess that those people do not get used to breakup even when they have been through one previously. The effects on sleep must be quite staggering.
The Procrastination Pen is however designed to try to alleviate some of those insomnia symptoms. The sole way that it attempts to do this is via distraction. Whilst the disciplined have trained their brain to switch off moments after the light is extinguished, the remainder of us would like something to keep the mind distracted whilst sleep slowly takes over.
The method I have chosen is to listen to something whilst trying to sleep. Personally, I find a calming, caring, dare I say it, empathetic, voice is quite effective in these circumstances. I therefore try to find resources that demonstrate that (rare) facility and evaluate them. Quite a lot of the time I wind up on YouTube but I do try to mine the alternative resources that I can find.
This week I thought I would stay on the subject of relationships and the stuff that goes wrong with them and pick on a podcast that I have often listened to, and rarely for the quality of the voice I have to admit: Limerence The Psychology of Romantic Obsession Brandy Wyant, Being Well. The actual site lists the resource as being on YouTube but the podcast is widely available including Apple. I have often thought that Dr Rick Hanson has an excellent voice, Forrest also has a pretty good voice. I’m not quite so convinced by Brandy’s voice here. However, there are any number of episodes with just Forrest and Dr Rick in them, so it should give you an opportunity to determine if you like them.
The Calm track this week is this:
https://www.calm.com/app/player/zOO7Lqwcg_
Daily Jay
When to Quit
NARRATOR
Jay Shetty
Quitting is not a sign of failure, although it is never wise to make a snap decision. I rather like that. I’m none too keen on the term failure especially as I read often of people who under one metric were terrible failures and by another great successes. Failure sounds to me like one of those rather too convenient labels you can give to others whose lifestyle you dislike.
Calm requires a subscription; I haven’t come across free Calm content yet. If I do, I’ll be sure to let you know. However, if you do have a subscription, why not try that out.
Some months ago now, I decided that some professional ASMR content should appear in the blog by way of contrast to the inadvertent ASMR which is most definitely still the core theme of this blog.
I’m beginning to realise that I actually prefer videos that were posted a little while ago and I see that on YouTube videos posted prior to the pandemic are now being referred to as “old school” videos. Given that is a scant six years ago now, how young are these ASMR artists on YouTube now?
There seems no reliable way to find really older YouTube videos with most searches on the site indicating that the majority of YouTube viewers preferring new, really new, or exceptionally new, videos and all the filters being optimised to take those preferences into account. I take some kind of perverse pride in exploring pre-pandemic videos where I come across them.
Todays for example, states that it was posted nine years ago and is by an artist that my ASMR index tells me I have not reviewed before (let us pray that is not for a fundamentally good reason). The site is Latte ASMR this site has 2.15m subscribers, three hundred and sixteen videos three playlists, I think that is nearly seven thousand subscribers for every video ever posted by this artist which seems a fairly good return to me.
The online translation service tells me that the three playlists are Japanese Videos, All Korean Videos and All English Videos, so no playlist dedicated to medical videos I’m afraid.
The notes against the channel are magnificently sparse: “Latte ASMR
More info
http://www.youtube.com/@LatteASMR
Joined 4 Jan 2016
2.15m subscribers
316 videos
667,479,881 views”
I would guess with that kind of patronage there would be very little need to advertise.
The video is right on theme for us (in that it is a medical examination role play):
Cranial Nerve Exam ASMR
It is a little less than thirty-eight minutes and so moderately substantial. There are notes, of course:”2,570,932 views 10 Nov 2016
Hello! This is Latte 🙂
In this video today, I will do the cranial nerve exam!
Actually, it was a bit challenging to make this video in English.
I don’t know the words that used in medical situation and it was difficult but many of you guys asked me to make more English videos and I took courage from your comments and made this video. So, I had to speak very slowly not to lose my mind. I don’t like the outcome of this video that much but I just did my best!
I know most of you guys are very open-minded and sweet-heart so I believe that you can understand me 🙂 I will not give up anyway. I will make lots of English videos again and again to make better videos!
Thank you for taking your time to watch this video and love you all! ♥
☆If you want to support me ♥:
https://www.patreon.com/user?u=4170402
★My second channel!
/ @latte5017
★Instagram
/ latte_asmr “
Which regular readers will recognise are startlingly short for a professional ASMR artist (who habitually can write biblical notes with every video).
Comments are permitted. There are a lot of them, and most seem to be of the off-the-wall variety. That does not bode well. ASMR afficionados tend to wax-lyrical about the videos that they really like, sometimes to quite a nauseating degree. However, that is usually a fair sign that the video is a good one for us.
The video starts without music but there is a kind of background noise. (A hiss, but quite unlike the air conditioning noise that I am used to. It is more probably some kind of artifact from the recording mechanism used). The voice is quite high pitched but it is not whispery so that is quite rare. It sounds to me like the voice I would expect from a child, but the person starring in the video does not look that young. The pace is excellent, very measured. There are additional noises: nails clicking, the rustling of clothing, the odd clunk, paper rustling, the sound of pen scratching against paper, glove-related noises (I’m not a fan of these), the sound of the chinking of a glass vessel, clicking of pen light, what sounds like a small wooden drawer being opened and closed (it is off screen).
There is an amount of whispering during the examination, so that is fairly typical for a professional ASMR artist. There is that mouth clucking/clicking sound so beloved of ASMR professionals. The enunciation of some of the words is properly excellent and not that common in ASMR videos I have found.
There is the occasional oddity; “the liquid of taste” was one that stood out for me. But I thought that added to its charm rather than took away from it. You can probably tell that I very much liked this one. Why not give it a review yourself.
The inadvertent ASMR video this week is, in fact, drawn from a time when I was speculating about the treatment of youngsters and did this mean that people employed a gentler voice, a calmer demeanour, a more measured approach. In fact, did the very fact that a medical professional is dealing with a child mean that they are more likely to produce ASMR material.
I came across not a video but a playlist. It contains six videos however the blog post is already of a reasonable size so I think that I will evaluate the first video and file the other five for a return visit. The playlist is this:
It comes from a channel that I have visited again and again, primarily because it seems to have many suitable videos. It is, of course, Stanford Medicine 25, the playlist on the Procrastination Pen has a fair number of videos drawn from this channel in it.
The first video in this playlist is this one:
Abdominal Examination of the Newborn – Stanford Medicine
It is a little less than four and a half minutes so is another in a long line of brief videos that I have reviewed of late (the content is often great but short videos do maximise the inter video advert breaks).
The notes are sparse in the extreme: “411,093 views 5 Apr 2022
Dr. Bill Benitz demonstrates the abdominal examination of a newborn including identification of the liver edge and palpation of the spleen, kidneys, and a distended bladder.”
Dr Bill appears to be a very prestigious guy so we’re probably honoured to have him (if I did but know enough about medicine to understand it).
The video starts without music, but, in comparison to the professional ASMR artist I just reviewed, Dr. Bill is quite a lot louder. Another situation where the volume button needs to be thumbed down a bit. The speed is nicely slow, however. There is no background noise. The other good thing is that this, in common with all medical professional videos I have reviewed thus far, does not involve any whispering whatsoever. The baby involved is remarkably calm. It does not object in any way, quite surprising. For our purposes it makes for a more restful video though.
Just one, video this time.
That’s it on this occasion, more next time.
See you again next week.
The Stanford Medicine 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 Deep.ai
The Procrastination Pen 