The Mind Spa

Spas

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Spas

2002 UPDATE: This spa is no longer in business.

The Mind Spa in Norcross, Georgia (just outside of Atlanta) is not your typical spa. With the exception of massage, you won't find the array of service offerings that you have come to expect at a spa. There are no facials, body wraps, hydrotherapy, or fitness classes - fitness for the body, that is. What The Mind Spa does offer is fitness for the mind - a state of being in which your mental awareness and emotional health work together to help you experience life at optimum levels. In this state, you move through life with ease, harmony and peace.

The Mind Spa is a human performance clinic that can help you learn how to use and enhance the powers of your mind to improve the quality of your life. The Mind Spa offers self improvement programs in the following areas:

Stress management
Perfect body & weight
Stop smoking
Building confidence
Improved/accelerated learning
Improving golf, tennis, or other sports performance
Consciousness exploration
Improved self-confidence
Accelerated healing
Improved relationships
Enhancing creativity
Team building

If you can imagine improving some aspect of your life, The Mind Spa can develop a plan especially for you if it doesn't already exist. Programs at are available in introductory and longer term formats. Full programs last six to ten sessions over the period of a few weeks.

The Mind Spa's professional staff of counselors, biofeedback therapists and hypnotherapists work with clients to design personal growth programs, much like personal trainers work with you to design an exercise program. But at The Mind Spa, you learn new ways to use your mind to solve problems and improve your performance. The sessions are one-on-one and each person is free to progress at his or her own rate.

The Mind Spa uses some of the most advanced mind technologies and neurotechnology products available in the world today. Through light, sound, and motion, these tools take you to deep states of mind, allowing critical filters to fall away and new scripts, ideas, mental programming, and attitudes to take root quickly. They also challenge the mind with new experiences which stimulates growth of new synapses in the brain.

On a recent visit, Robert Dallas, Ph.D., director and co-founder of The Mind Spa, gave a tour of the facilities and demonstrated some of the equipment to my husband, Jeff, my son, Dean, and myself. Pictures of a few of the many pieces of equipment at The Mind Spa can be found on the right side of this page. Descriptions follow:

The "SO" Dome
This unique 20-foot geodesic structure is the most visually striking feature of The Mind Spa. It was created by R. Barry Oser, national award-winning concert pianist, computer musician, and composer to express music and the sounds of nature in a way that cannot be duplicated with conventional sound equipment. Seated in a reclining chair equipped with sound transducers, dimensional music pours directly into your body. It plays through an eight-channel sound system and fills you with deep relaxation and allows you to be mentally quiet. By the way, the name "SO" comes from the fifth note of the scale.

Neuromuscular Reduction Machine
The NMR 2000 is used to train the body/mind in relaxed, smooth movement and perfect rhythm. Among other things, it is used for golfers to improve their game. Dean was used to demonstrate this. His arms and legs were gently strapped to the robot-like arms and legs of the device and headphones were used to provide music that encouraged relaxation.

Dry Floatation Chamber
Like many other establishments that offer floatation, The Mind Spa has replaced the claustrophobic enclosed tank with an open, dry floatation "bed". There is a membrane that separates you from several hundred gallons of high density salt water. You float on the bed of water without getting wet, almost losing all sense of gravity. The room is dark and quiet. You become mentally quiet and profoundly relaxed. You can enter a deep theta brain state that enables enhanced mental performance. In conjunction with floatation, you can use professionally crafted video and audio tape programs to help stick with a weight reduction plan, solve difficult problems, reduce pain from an injury, illness or chronic causes, develop more self-assurance, more charisma, control a habit, etc..

Vibrasound Wave Table
It looks like a waterbed or the floatation bed, but that's where the similarity ends. Underneath the Vibrasound Wave Table are two patented 1000-watt fluid transducers that provide powerful musical and tonal vibration through a proprietary liquid crystal mattress that matches the resonant characteristics of the human body. I tried this and the experience is unique. The music was arranged such that it manipulated my body. For instance, I could feel (as well as hear) the low tones started at the base of the spine and gradually moved to the head in slow, repetitive waves. It felt almost like a massage and was very relaxing.

"SO" Sound Chair
This is another creation of Barry Oser. It is a chair created from carbon fiber and uses the same proportions of a nautilus shell or pinecone. Like the "SO" Dome, the reclining chair is equipped with sound transducers so dimensional music can pour directly into your body. It fills you with deep relaxation and allows you to be mentally quiet. Dean enjoyed this while Jeff and I continued the tour.

Reclining Motion Chair
The Symmetron II Motion Chair and you rotate slowly in an orbital motion as music plays from inside the unit into your body. Psychoacoustic music and the gentle motion carry you into an expanded state of consciousness that’s ideal for re-scripting and re-programming your bio-computer. According to Robert, the motion and music makes your mind scramble around to try to understand what is happening and, in that way, creates new synapses in the brain. You can work on accomplishing a goal, improving concentration, becoming more assertive, improving your memory, etc.. The equipment helps you reach deep states that are conducive to learning, re-learning and enhancing your life. Jeff tried this piece of equipment and found it to be very relaxing. The Mind Spa also offers a motion bed.

Biofeedback
Biofeedback uses sensitive electrical pickups and a computer to display the signals your body is producing all the time. Biofeedback training teaches you to control the signals your body creates. When you learn to control them, you are also learning to create positive, beneficial changes in your body.
One of The Mind Spa's biofeedback training programs helps people see how they react to stress by showing how one’s body and brain states change when stressful events occur. When a person sees how he or she reacts, a training program can begin to teach new strategies for dealing with stress. It’s very objective, scientific and interactive. And best of all, according to Robert, people internalize this new learning. Once they learn it, they own it. They can carry it away and use it effectively throughout their lives. Other biofeedback programs focus on brainwave training. One can learn how to enter contemplative states of mind that open up creative thinking and allow you to solve problems more effectively. Others may pursue expanded states of consciousness or enhanced meditation. Yet other people may learn how to become more focused on tasks, more clear and in the moment.
This was the most moving demonstration we had at The Mind Spa. Dean volunteered to be connected to the biofeedback system. The results were astounding. From the results of neurofeedback, Robert was able to talk about Dean as if he knew him intimately. He touched on areas of Dean's interests and struggles. He was able to create a little exercise for Dean designed to increase his capability in a specific area. If we lived closer, it would be very interesting to pursue this. Perhaps we will anyway. Others have flown in and stayed at nearby hotels in order to work with The Mind Spa for a week or two.

As a collector of self-help books and tapes and an attendee of motivational lectures and workshops (with no permanent alterations or improvements in lifestyle that I can attribute to them), I found the following passage from one of The Mind Spa's press releases especially interesting. .."The U.S. market for personal growth products and services topped $2 billion in 1996, according to MarketData Research. It consists of products including pop psychology books, audio tape programs, motivational lectures, retreats, and workshops. But, says Allan Ramsay, co-founder and CEO of THE MIND SPA, "These products do not deliver lasting change to most people. For example, few people make permanent improvements in their lives by reading a self-help book; that takes a lot of motivation and will power. On the other hand, customers at THE MIND SPA take an active role in learning how to make changes. People can see brainwaves and other signals from their bodies reacting to life’s events. Then, after some period of training, people get excited when they find that the old triggers don’t set them off anymore. Biofeedback, dry floatation and other technologies available today help people make positive changes -- whether for fun, like golf and tennis, or in more serious areas like enhancing relationships, business skills or improving self-image. All of this technology, coupled with suitable training, is truly life-changing. We are excited to be at the forefront in bringing this to the public at a convenient retail location, and at prices people can afford."

Think you can? Think you can't? Either way...you're right!

The Mind Spa helps people learn to use their minds to learn new "can do" approaches that build confidence and the ability to successfully accept life’s challenges. The Mind Spa can teach you how to go to the deepest levels of your mind to discover new resources you didn’t know you had, to learn new ways of thinking and living, and to become more successful in the areas of life that are most important to you.