Expanding Consciousness Experiencing Altered States Through Music

Expanding Consciousness and
Experiencing Altered States
through Music

Altered State: an experience through which one enters into the Separate Reality of the Mind or the Unlimited Resources of the Universe for the purposes of expanding consciousness, creativity, enlightenment, spiritual awareness or to just realize we are more than our physical body.

Hi, my name is Daniel, I am an Electronic Musician who likes to research the relationship between music and the mind, and I am a student of the metaphysical nature of the Universe.
Next to me is Cindy, my wife and one cool babe. For her altered states, she likes to ride and share her experiences with horses, and write articles confronting issues in society!

(Photo by Robert Pennington, circa 1986, my beard is totally gray now.)

I want to introduce you to a unique experience (some of you already know about this and have been doing it for years), listening to music while sitting quietly, relaxing or meditating. The results can be fun and different. You can enhance creativity, deepen meditation and relaxation, explore the vastness of the Mind or Universe, which may be one and the same, or just have some wonderful dreams.
The trick is learning to let your mind go with the music and having the right kind of music to attach the mind to. This is sort of a left brain/right brain experience in that you attach the left brain to the rhythm of the music and let the right brain (inner states area for creativity, connecting to the Universe or meditation, etc.) wander with the lead.

Imagine an 8-year old kid during summer vacation, going into his Grandmother's bedroom, closing heavy drapes to darken the room, turning on the AC, laying down and taking a nap while likening to the drone of the AC. It would put me into these amazing dream states. I would do this one on purpose once or twice a week that summer.

So my first deep, meditative experience was to use the drone of the AC to take me into these states.

When I was around 10-11 years old, I discovered that if I laid down and closed my eyes while listening to music, I went into these same wonderful dream states. I started out on long, evolving classical music. When I became a teenager, I found that jazz was an excellent source because of the beat and the extended play on themes, ie, jams. In my late teens, rock started having long jams and those took me very deep, too. I discovered that if I liked the music, whatever kind it was, it worked.

Then in the Spring of 1970, I found the ultimate music for enhancing my altered, deep meditative states. It was on a sampler vinyl album, ":The Wild Sounds of New Music," packaged with "Well Tempered Synthesizer" by Walter/Wendy Carlos on the Columbia Masterworks label. It contained samples of music by Terry Riley, A Rainbow in Curved Air, and Steve Reich, Violin Phase. Awesome!!!! I had found in those two pieces the ultimate music that inspired my future music work. A few years later I would also discover Philip Glass for my excursions into the Separate Reality. These people would become my early influencers for developing the type of music I would compose, perform and use for my meditations and music work.
I have spent my life learning about altered states and helping others discover the hidden Worlds of this great Universe. I am well versed in astrology, numerology, tarot and psychic channeling. I also had the opportunity to work for 10-years during the '70s with a very special trance psychic named Paul Solomon.

In a sense, altered states can be related to "getting high". Everyone likes to get high in some form. Unfortunately, most people relate getting high to using drugs. Actually anything you use to create a different awareness or feeling can be considered an altered state or "getting high". This is a good article on the web by Bruce Eisner about our natural need to get high.

There are many ways to achieve a "high" or "altered state", through watching or participating in sports, religion, tv, movies,dancing to music, food, sex and I could go on. In a way, anything that distracts us from our normal state of mind, in a sense, is an altered state.

Altered States are important and beneficial to our well-being. I find mine through music, Cindy through trail riding and writing.

So find one that is satisfying for you and enjoy . . .

If you would like some basic ideas on how to relax or meditate, go here..
If you would like to download a guided relaxation and/or meditation, go here.

This article that appeared about my work in the NEW TEXAS, a journal of positive lifestyles, in March, 1981.

I compose and perform electronic music that is designed to deepen or enhance altered states.
My work with music is featured in the book by Kate and Richard Mucci,
The Healing Sound of Music!

Expanding Consciousness and Experiencing Altered States through Music

Expanding Consciousness and
Experiencing Altered States
through Music