I usually write on all-things-communications. Today’s topic is the extreme opposite – silence!
I go through this phase every winter (though winter, now in Bengaluru, just got over). What happens is this: in winter, we do not need to switch on the fan in our bedroom since the part of the city we are in (lots of trees and open space around) gets pretty cold (14-19 degrees in peak winter, on an average).
When the fan is off, I start to hear noises that I would have otherwise missed in the standard rhythmic sound the fan produces! This includes the trains moving in and out of the railway station nearby, the birds (in the early morning) in the trees near home, and most unfortunately, all the construction work going on in that area.
The last one is the most persistent and there is absolutely no stopping that noise. They work all through the clock and even though this is at a considerable distance from our home, the winter’s lack of fan and relative silence carries this sound far and wide… right into our bedroom!
Closing the glass window helps, but that affects the natural airflow in the room.
I’m the kind of person to whom sleep is very, very important, but I also fall asleep with great difficulty and get up at the slightest disturbance. I track sleep at a rudimentary level through my FitBit and get happy when I cross ’80’ and above on a night’s sleep.
So how else can I combat this construction noise affecting my sleep and sleep quality?
I started with the cheapest, easiest available solution: earplugs. The 3M earplugs are the easiest available, but they either do not fit me properly, or they do not stay during my sleep.
There are earplugs that are marked specifically as ‘for side-sleepers’ and ‘for stomach-sleepers’! I’m both, and yet, normal, cheap earplugs don’t work for me. They do not reduce the noise all that much either!
There are a few advanced versions of the same kind of earplugs from 3M (looks scary! Poor reviews too.), and there are some other variants where they are more blobs than plugs. But the reviews don’t seem exciting or motivating.
That’s when I started searching for more active tools or devices unlike passive ones like earplugs.
Are there noise-canceling earbuds meant only to shut the noise out and not for listening or talking? To my surprise, even Bose has this! Called Sleepbuds, the Bose website promises the moon and more in tantalizing detail. It’s not available online at this point (out of stock on Flipkart), but at Rs. 22,900, it’s incredibly expensive for me to even try it to see if this is what will work!
Interestingly, Bose mentions that the Sleepbuds do not use active noise-canceling technology for these buds, and instead use noise-masking techniques! The logic is quite elegant – “Cancellation creates quiet in our ear canals; masking—in the right conditions—creates quiet in our minds.”
There are a couple of other sleepbuds-equivalent products from other, smaller, lesser-known brands but almost all of them are USA-specific.
I then started looking online for the ‘smallest true wireless buds’ and assumed that a tiny one with reasonable noise-cancellation could serve my purpose if I use it exclusively for sleeping alone. I was trying to recreate a Bose Sleepbuds experience on my own 🙂
The Moto Vervebuds 110 or 400 seemed like a good option.
Incredibly tiny and from a known brand too. But availability is spotty and whatever is available is not returnable either (only replaceable)!
Plus, unlike the Bose buds that are made professionally and specifically for sleeping, I’m not sure how earbuds that are made for another purpose (listening and talking) may suit my narrow requirement of being able to sleep with it. The kind of materials used (between sleep-specific buds and non-sleep buds) are very different – for sleeping, long-term (8 to 10 hours) comfort, including side-sleeping is taken care of. Normal earbuds may really not suit that level of sharply defined need. Or I cannot find out since the ones available on Amazon do not allow me to return them should they not feel appropriate 🙂
So, I’m back to square one. I have searched, imagined, and considered many other possibilities. This includes having my phone near the pillow and letting it play a sleep app’s soothing music. But I do not sleep alone – so the external help I seek may affect others. And this is why I was searching for a private solution.
Given the pandemic and the resultant lack of sleep (among many other side-effects), I believe there is a fairly good play for device makers to create sleep-specific products or devices. Right now, the only category shouting about sleep is the mattress industry. But that’s a very different solution.
We live in a very, very noisy world, in every sense – more light, more sound, more content, everything is more. Imagine the wearable device brands innovating sideways, away from enabling hearing and speaking to masking all the noise away to give us peace, even if it means one more device to charge and care for! The use cases could be many, beyond sleep – concentration in crowded, noisy places, for starters… to promising total silence on-demand, though there may be legal implications in such promise given the possibility that people could block out all noise and move in public spaces harming themselves or others!
For instance, Amazfit has something called Zenbuds launched at CES 2020! But they are not yet available in India. The potential for Indian wearables makers could be significant given how noisy our country generally is and how creatively these can be marketed.
It’s a pity that we need to invent devices to shut us off from sounds, but that’s the kind of world we live in.
Think about it when you find some peace and quiet 🙂