OCTOBER 21, 2024 – 141st Air Refueling Wing celebrated the grand opening of the first and only National Guard owned MindGym, a virtual mental fitness trainer, on October 18, 2024, at Fairchild Air Force Base, Washington.
How do we measure our ability to manage stress and how can we improve upon those skills? MindGym by Lumena is a sensory immersive cube that was created around neurofeedback, focused attention meditation, sensory deprivation and binaural beats.
Isolation, reflection, light, sound and feedback are the five components to the MindGym.
“The idea behind MindGym is as a preventative tool, somewhere our airmen can go to build mental fitness before the need for further assistance from the helping agencies arises,” said Col James McGovern 141st Air Refueling Wing Commander. “We needed the space for airmen to go to relax and destress.”
There are only 16 MindGyms across the Department of Defense. The gym’s interior surfaces are mirrored creating a reflective, immersive experience that creates a perception of infinite space.
A single chair sits in the middle to create isolation, and when the door is closed the space is in complete darkness. Each training session utilizes low light to help stimulate and relax the brain. Ambient noise, guided prompts and composed music are pumped in through noise cancelling headphones to help relax.
“The military and Air Force is used to physically training the body and skills for work, but we don’t dedicate much time towards training the mind,” said Brandon Murphy Lumena’s Head of Growth. “We came up with a tool that was designed to be comforting and familiar to our servicemembers. Somewhere they can go to expand the skills that harness their attention, train their brain and monitor their cognitive function to improve it over time.”
The core objective of MindGym, focused attention meditation, involves directing one’s attention to a specific point, object or thought; such as breathing patterns or a specific mantra to cultivate mindfulness and concentration.
Lumena states that when practiced regularly, meditation is shown to improve symptoms of anxiety, depression, inattentiveness and other forms of cognitive dysfunction.
According to Lumena, sensory deprivation during each session creates an environment with minimal or no sensory input. Within MindGym the individual is deprived of external stimuli to induce a transcendental state of deep relaxation, altered consciousness, and heightened introspection.
Through the headphones, binaural beats are an auditory illusion created when two slightly different frequencies mimic the frequency of brain waves are simultaneously presented separately to each ear.
The brain perceives a third tone, the binaural beat, which Lumena says can improve cognition, memory, and mood depending on the frequency of the generated beat. MindGym integrates binaural beats in training modules to engage the subconscious and promote healing.
To track progress that is made overtime, the headband sensor delivers biofeedback that measures brain wave activity. Data is captured real-time and delivered after session completion.
“Often, we let our intentions get hijacked by an emotion or something that you don’t like,” said Murphy. “If you practice the discipline in the MindGym so that you’re prepared to for those external factors that disrupt you, you can use that mental muscle to get your attention back to the thing you need it to—which is serving you.”
Story by Tech. Sgt. Kayleigh Phillips
141st Air Refueling Wing