Clarity
Clear, alert, working states
This map plots the frequency difference between Osc A and Osc B. For example, 147 Hz in one ear and 153 Hz in the other creates a 6 Hz binaural beat, shown in the Theta range.
The ranges are approximate orientation bands: Delta 0.5-4 Hz, Theta 4-8 Hz, Alpha 8-13 Hz, Beta 13-30 Hz, and Gamma 30-45 Hz. Headphones are needed for binaural left/right separation.
Carrier pitch, waveform, noise, and pulse change how the sound feels, but they do not move this marker unless they change the Osc A/B difference. The labels are a reference, not a guarantee that listening will produce a particular brain state.
Descent is a tool for sitting quietly with focused attention. That practice, on its own, has moderate and repeatable evidence for easing anxiety and low mood. The sound is here to help you settle and stay. It is not the active ingredient. You are.
Each stage plays a binaural beat: two slightly different tones, one per ear, create a third soft pulse you perceive inside your head. Some people find lower-frequency beats calming, and there is modest evidence for anxiety reduction, especially in the lower ranges.
The popular claim that these tones "retune your brainwaves" is not well supported. A 2023 systematic review found the evidence for brainwave entrainment inconsistent. So the honest framing is this: a stage targets a brainwave band that is associated with a state. It does not deliver the state, and it is not a shortcut around the practice itself.
The five stages move from Alpha down through Theta to Delta, the slower bands linked with relaxed and drowsy states. The names refer to those bands and nothing more.
No medical or health claims. No healing frequencies. No equivalence to any external system. Descent draws inspiration from descent-style contemplative traditions, including the Monroe Institute's Gateway framework, as inspiration only. The stage names refer to brainwave bands, not to any external system's states.
Sources to verify independently: Goyal et al., JAMA Internal Medicine, 2014 (meditation meta-analysis); Garcia-Argibay et al., Psychological Research, 2019 (binaural beats meta-analysis); Ingendoh et al., PLOS One, 2023 (brainwave entrainment review).