#background noise

[respectthepetty]

Rati and Thee going back and forth about erasing Désolé (French for "sorry") from the board which rests between them as Thee continues to apologize to Rati for not telling him who he is while standing in front of the Thai word for "sorry" (ขอโทษ) which is also written on the board to reinforce that they are not representatives of their nations but simply two friends (who love each other).

That was the visual equivalent of a five-course meal at a Michelin-starred restaurant.

[mywitchydarkness]

"𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕨𝕖𝕣𝕖 𝕟𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕣 𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕡𝕖𝕥𝕚𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟. 𝕁𝕦𝕤𝕥 𝕓𝕒𝕔𝕜𝕘𝕣𝕠𝕦𝕟𝕕 𝕟𝕠𝕚𝕤𝕖."

☽◯☾

[kittypajamas]

Need some background ambiance?

I found this YouTube channel, Sabi's Nook, that does fantasy themes and they have a ton of Arcane ones! Vi at Kiramman's manor is my current fave for reading fanfic to.

[taxi-davis]

80's ads

[samwinchestersgirl83]

So I’m not doing a re-watch per-sé….but I do have the capability to set the entire series on shuffle. That’s right, all 15 seasons. Lemme just say, game changer. My Autistic ass needs to see Sam and Dean in different eras all the time and this changed my life. Now when I want background noise, I can just shuffle the entire series to random episodes at anytime. I can’t deal with not having Supernatural on alot of times but if it’s just going episode by episode, season by season, I don’t like it only because I miss the era of random show episodes on cable TV. Like, I just watched an episode from season 2, and now the next episode is from season 10 lol I just wanted to talk about it randomly.

My shuffle must have channelled Wincest heavy episodes lately though, and I am in no way complaining.

[navybrat817]

Background noise. 😌

[tryslora]

Blog: It's the thing I can't ignore

I just turned my music down.

Why is this important? Well, at the same time, I also pulled up a reminder that I wanted to talk about different kinds of background noise when it comes to being neurodivergent and trying to create an environment for focus.

So. Timing.

The most important thing to state here is that this is what works for me; it is not a recipe for perfection for everyone with some form of neurodivergence.

I have often been asked “Why don’t you put on headphones?” as a way to resolve issues with noise in a space. The answer is: I can’t. It doesn’t work for me.

I saw a video recently where it was a skit between two people (one ND, one NT) discussing how they parsed the conversation flowing around them in a crowded room.

For the neurotypical person, they focused in on the person they were speaking with, tuning out everything in the background.

For the neurodivergent person, they pointed out that every single conversation in the room was equally audible. It became a mashup in their head, making it nearly impossible to focus on the conversation with the person near them, because their brain gave equal weight to the conversation going on at the next table over.

I saw this and screamed “YES” because that’s it. Exactly.

Add in random background noise, which my brain also cheerfully elevates to high importance level, and hearing becomes difficult. I have to look at someone and see their lips moving. I don’t read lips. But I have to be able to put the two things together to get my brain to remember that THAT is the particular sound to pay attention to and parse.

I do not do well in crowded or loud environments.

This also means that when I’m in my office, and there are sudden noises coming out of the arts studio down the hall, my brain is constantly picking up on them as Important Must Pay Attention things rather than relegating them to background.

The reason why putting on noise cancelling headphones to pipe music into my ears does not work is because putting it CLOSER to me makes it WORSE. Headphones scream “most important” to my brain, and thus, that becomes the focus thing. Not the words on my screen. Not the task at hand. Certainly not writing.

I suspect this may be a similar problem with notifications on my phone or Discord or whatever… brain promptly elevates their status, and I can’t function until I look at them. Side point, letting it go.

Anyway.

Right now I’m listening to a playlist made up of songs from anime I’ve watched—opening credits, endings, insert songs. And I just turned it down, because even having it be very familiar music in a language not my own was too much today. I needed it to be even more distance from. (Yes, it’s playing on speakers—no headphones here).

Does this affect me only when I’m trying to write or work? Nope.

I wear earplugs when I sleep, because if there is noise, it will wake me up. My brain is very insistent on that importance level of the things it hears.

Husband loves white noise, and I hate it. I find the chirping of night bugs, or running of water, or rumbling thunder all very distracting, yes, even when I’m sleeping. I tune in rather than tune out.

And the funny thing is, yes, he’s ADHD too. And I know so many people who have ADHD who find white noise to be something that saves them. Without it, they can’t focus. And I do get that.

Hell, as a teenager, I studied to top 40 hits on my radio, then replayed songs in my head to remember what I was reading at the time when the song played (and then would reread the page in my head, man I wish my memory worked that well now!).

So as I said at the start: not everyone who is neurodivergent processes things the same way. For me, I like having sound, but I need it be distant enough from me that I can put it aside, and it needs to be predictable in some way and not grate on my skin/eardrums.

(Just hit fast forward because that song had autotune which was absolutely distracting.)

Anyway. There are side points to this, like my discovery that I can process audiobooks, but had to figure out when and how they worked for me. And the knowledge that something that is background in one place might be distracting in another. And the fact that things change over time as our brains change (and in my case, apparently as my hormones change—did you know that menopause affects ADHD? SIGHS. Yeah, I know that too, now…).

Oh, and the different kinds of music that are required for different projects. Currently anime music works for me. Eventually I’ll go back to overly familiar pop punk. Or classical piano and guitar (wrote a whole book to that particular soundtrack).

But the short version is, figuring out what worked for me helped increase focus. And there are still days when I don’t know the answer, and wish I could tune everything out with earplugs in public spaces, but the flipside of everything is that when I’m not sleeping, I kind of freak out when I can’t hear the world around me. So.

Aren’t brains fun?

[dark-bear-productions]

It has come to my understanding that companies should post bad memes in an effort to seem relatable, so here's one from me.

In all honesty though, my sound designer's cat is so well-behaved.

We once recorded an entire From the Bay of Fangs episode without realising she was still in the room.

[captain-habit]

Because there's A Lot going on right now, sometimes its nice to have some adjustable noise of your choosing, resonating in the background.

Lately my favorite mixture over at myNoise generators have been Twin Black Lodges (news about David Lynch reminded me about the generator) and mixing it with White Rain and/or Fireplace, but they have a HUGE index of all sorts of atmospheric sounds you can tweak and layer~

[respectthepetty]

Even if it was an emerging Blinding Light of Love between them,

Jeongu backed off the moment he realized Jiwon was freaking out.

Because he learned before that whenever Jiwon panics,

He creates distance.

So it's nice to see that now when there are barriers between them,

Jeongu gently and carefully crosses them.

Which allows Jiwon to meet him in the middle.

But it doesn't mean the barriers just disappear since Jiwon is now using them to box both of them in.

A guy who is fine with the world seeing him for who he is as long as he is free, and another guy who would like the world to forget he exists even if that means being caged.

Interesting.

[d3zydration]

Some more rooms from my ambience/music mix channel! These are just two of my simpler ones - rain and fire sounds. Enjoy. <3

[seeyouonceinabluemoon]

everytime i want to study for something i think about what music to play or what to listen to. and everytime i think theres nothing BUT THERE IS ALWAYS SOMETHING

TAKE THIS GUIDE YOUNG ONE

animal crossing music with soft rain, the 10 hour ver (look it up on spotify pls besties)

kpop piano covers for studying (the 4 hour ones kick ass and have like no ads)

documentaries about something you like (love firefighters and ambulances and documentaries about people just living life personally)

background noise that you like (cafe, library, exam room, forest, beach, beach with rainstorm, forest and beach with rainstorm, the world is your oyster bby)

a good rnb playlist (spotify. find an artist or whatever and go ham. also look for calm driving, studying or whatever playlists there is something for everyone)

electric guitar covers of lady gaga songs (I SWEAR TRUST ME ON THIS when you have too much energy but not enough mind juice for comprehending language and context i smash my brain in with a sickass lady gaga judas e guitar cover and somehow i can study then. i am being fr)

choose based on:

a. your study materials. have to listen to a lecture or a recording? choose something without much spoken language (like documentaries) so you wont get distracted

b. your mental state. how much brain juice is there for spoken word? only enough for sung words? only enough for instruments? only enough for soft music and rain? only enough for rain?

c. how high energy are you? are we in a guitar solo mood or a ballad mood or a acnh bg mood or a beach wave noise mood

ORRRR IN OTHER WORDS

have something you like to listen to for as many mental states and energy levels and types of study materials. they might seriously help you get in the right mood for studying and give your brain just enough input in both a. energy and b. comprehension. balance the stimulation dont go over and under essentially. like in flappy bird. studying is flappy bird.

and then disregard everything and listen to whatever you want lmfao (pls dont this helps i swear i study like this and its like suddenly i can focus on what i want to study its magic!!! im talking to my therapist about more checks on my neurodivergence bingo card!!!)

[grand-zammy]

It's Raining Somewhere Else

~ Toby Fox

How's the weather where you're at?

(btw I don't know how to add audio to a video so I just have the song playing on my TV in the background so you could still hear the rain & thunder)

[taxi-davis]

80s ads

[michimonie]

If anyone wants to see the full Haunted Mansion x Ducks timelapses with Haunted Mansion: Swinging Wake background noise behind it: