Journey to the Center of the Self  begins by inviting you to mindfully, persistently attend to your own experience as you listen.

Because that's where the journey is ultimately going to take you: right back to now, back to the truth of your own direct experience.

In certain ancient myths, the hero goes on a long quest for a mysterious magical artifact, only to discover that what they were seeking was always there within them, right from the start.

In the same way, what has been called the Big Self, Presence, or the Tao, is always here, always now. It's just a case of awakening to what has always been present within you.

This guided meditation gives you a way to experience the truth of this for yourself. Not as a concept, but as an embodied reality.

3 Key Meditation Principles of the Journey to the Center of the Self [03:42]

Here is an overview of the process:

During the meditation, you'll be guided into a profoundly deep state of relaxation, so that the conceptual mind quiets down and settles itself.

You'll then be invited to open your heart, and to allow yourself to be exactly as you are, in this moment.

Next, you'll begin to gently open to the void: to who you are beneath all thoughts, and beyond all concepts.

Finally, you'll be shown a way to release all mental representations that you may have of yourself as the Big Self, so that you can let go... completely... into the great flow.

From the developer, Joseph Kao:

Journey to the Center of the Self  originally came out of a conversation I had with John Dupuy.

John was enthusing about the first guided meditation I created for iAwake, called Profound Releasing, saying that it was still a product he listened to regularly.

He said he'd been wondering if there was some way I could create a similar meditation - one that was just a really thorough, deep dive into presence and beingness.

John suggested that we call it Journey to the Center of the Self  - a name I immediately loved. I wasn't sure what shape it was going to take yet, but I knew that I had to bring this title into being!

In my work as a hypnotherapist, I have always been much more interested in teaching people skills and giving them direct experiences, rather than presenting them with abstract ideas and theories.  

So in creating this meditation, my aim was for people to have a direct, tangible sense of their true nature.

And this isn’t something that's hidden in another realm. It's right here and now. It's beneath, behind and within every aspect of your experience.

So I drew upon all of my personal experience in meditation, hypnosis, and brainwave entrainment to create a process that guides you to become aware of that which is beyond all words and representations... and yet is always right here, right now.   

After many months of work, what began as a brief conversation with John, has now become a fully-fledged guided meditation, ready to take you deep-diving into the very essence of who you are.

01 Journey to the Center of the Self - Guided Meditation (30 minutes)
Track 1 is a thirty minute guided meditation, with advanced brainwave entrainment technology.

02 Journey to the Center of the Self - Music Only (30 minutes)
Track 2 is thirty minutes of music and embedded brainwave frequencies, without any vocal guidance. You can listen to this after track one, for a longer meditation session, or you can use it as a stand-alone track for doing self-guided work.

Available in MP3 and optional WAV formats for digital download, as well as an optional CD.

Technology Design of Journey to the Center of the Self - iAwake's Joseph Kao [5:59]

The soundtrack to Journey to the Center of the Self  is a deeply immersive, consciousness-altering sonic massage.

It contains time-stretched drone sounds, 3D Sound-Processing, and cutting-edge brainwave entrainment technology.

As you allow yourself to become absorbed in this rich, resonant, multi-layered soundscape, you'll find yourself spontaneously experiencing profound states of peace, stillness, and complete inner clarity.

The psychoacoustic principles used in the soundtrack include:

• Harmonically-layered binaural beats
• Amplitude modulated frequency bands - creating rhythmic vibrations in the music itself
• Phase-modulated pink noise
• Rhythmic panning techniques

The embedded brainwave frequencies will guide you all the way down to the theta-delta border (4 Hz), a brainwave band strongly associated with shamanic trance states, and other non-ordinary states of consciousness.

This is combined with repeated bursts of 40 Hz gamma waves - associated with epiphanies, heightened mental clarity, and spiritual awakenings.

John Dupuy introducing Journey to the Center of the Self [01:30]

I recently introduced a friend to meditation who has an analytical mind, and the particular track I shared with them they found confusing. My intuition suggested that they would benefit from listening to Journey to the Centre of the Self instead. Their response was unequivocal: when Joseph Kao's calming voice repeated "let go...let go..." they became aware of a suppressed emotion and became tearful, and yet reported feeling safe. Thanks to Kao, another of the human family has become open to the power of practise!

Meanwhile, as Kao said "let go...let go...." I became aware of tension I was holding in my body that I was not aware of before, and instantly released it and went deeper into the experience. As ever, I dropped into a deep stillness, peace, and awareness of peace. As an experienced meditator of 35 years who is accustomed to experiencing this on a daily basis with little effort, I was nonetheless surprised to be guided by his wise words into realising that I'd only touched surface of infinite space, and found the universe to open up deeper within than ever before!

Joseph Kao has surpassed himself with Journey to the Centre of the Self. For new and old practitioner's alike, these tracks have the ability to bring you to a place of greater peace. I have found that by diving to the deepest depth of my self, with Kao's wise guidance, this peacefulness and detachment has also translated into my everyday experience, improving my relationships and performance during often challenging work. Thank you! ~ Jamie Vasilyan, ADHD Life Coach www.addvantagehypnotherapy.co.uk

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I loved using these tracks.  One of my favorites from iAwake.  My meditation was deeper, more focused and was a completely different experience each time.  They helped me stay grounded throughout the day even in the midst of some stressful times. Much gratitude. ~ Lorrie

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"These two tracks were really effective into shifting me into a deep meditative state quickly and easily." ~ Ann Chatterton, RN, BSN, NTP  Pacific Neurofeedback, LLC www.lensrn.com

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"There are moments in the meditation when it feels like it would take great effort to move my arms. My body feels very heavy. But I am not asleep or groggy or fogged over. I have a deep stillness inside and a sense that my "small self" is dissolving into the infinite." ~ Gregory Hopkins

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Great job, Joseph! I have frequently shunned use of guided meditations because of my difficulty in following instructions or executing one instruction before the guide moved on. Your timing and pace were perfect for me. ~ Anonymous

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It’s one the measures of a good meditation when stillness happens. I achieved that during this journeying... Joy can be a steady stream for me, only to be interrupted by my choosing to grab onto many or any of the disturbing  social justice issues the world is unable to resolve. Mediation with iAwake tracks has significantly lengthened the flow of that river of joy for me. ~ Christopher Griffin

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I can be the queen of procrastination sometimes but I've been powering through my to-do list in the last couple of weeks. So much so that I've had big blocks of free time. I'll continue listening to this regularly... I'll be using it to stop procrastination - it's the best thing I've found yet. ~ Allyson

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When using this program I felt like I'm diving deeply into myself. At every session I felt extreme gratitude for all life experiences, also euphoric feelings in heart area. Extremely potent program, especially if you want to expand consciousness and understanding about life. ~ Domas Kucinskas

Joseph Kao, creator of Profound Releasing, Profound Renewal, Sound Asleep, and now Journey to the Center of the Self, is a hypnotherapist and a solution-focused therapist with a private practice in London and Cambridge, UK.

He works as a teacher and a course-developer of psychotherapy training courses, and has been the head scriptwriter for over 800 professional hypnotherapy recordings.

Joseph has been fascinated by philosophy, meditation, and brainwave entrainment technology since he was a teenager, and he’s had a daily meditation practice since 1998.