mossyfawnron

How do you relax?

Here’s my routine as of late. I get home from a long day of work, change out of my work clothes into my oversized fall out boy t-shirt and pajama shorts. I smoke a a half gram joint. And melt into my bed listening to immersive audios.

My current obsession is the world of videos on YouTube that transport you to another place and/or time with the use of music and sound effects!

Of course there needs to be a good title. This sets the scene of what the audio is about and what story it’s about to tell. The more niche details and abstract ideas there are, the more I like it. For example Clockwork Plane sounded really interesting to me so I tapped it. Instantly it was like I was in different liminal dimension, with huge booming clanky clocks, wider than the eye can see, ticking away for eons.

I think the channel that made the clockwork plane video, Michael Ghelfi Studios, intended the use of their videos to be for playing Dungeons and Dragons sessions, which is a really interesting and fun idea. But I just use them to relax and destress. Being transported to another realm through audio and your imagination is an amazingly exciting experience. Also, it’s a great exercise for creativity. Some people use them as background noise for reading a book. Almost every commenter on the video Halfling Home say they’re reading Lord of the Rings while listening. This one features birds chirping, wood creaking, and something bubbling. I like to imagine a crock of chili simmering atop an old potbelly stove.

This also goes for video games- I like to listen to things like Elder Tree by Athena IV while I play my current game, Spiritfarer. In both, there are Japanese influences. The game is a community management RPG. You play as Stella, a new ship captain whose job it is to help souls through their last moments. House them, feed them, even hug them. Then, help them part the living world through the Everdoor, a moon door halfway submerged in maroon water. I’m not finished with the game yet but it’s beautiful so far and very moving in its story.

Some people use immersive audios to help spark ideas for writing, and I think that’s awesome. I want to write more, maybe something more like fictional storytelling. I think that would be fun. Maybe I’ll do it sometime!!

One of my favorite immersive audios I’ve found so far is Mysteries Below The Surface. To me, it sounds like I’m miles underground, walking in a dark tunnel made by huge drilling machines. The tunnel is about the size of Slanic Prahova salt mine in Romania. It gives me a feeling of being so incredibly small compared to everything else.

It feels like I’m sneaking through, as if something bad is about to happen. I feel like I’m looking over a ledge into a chasm at the end of one of the tunnels, as if the hulking machine descended even deeper into the earth.

I love these audios because they take me away from current life and events. I need to escape once in a while, damn it!