Floorstanders vs Bookshelf

Here's a guess. When you talk about the Monitor Audio speakers and a headache, I notice that it has a metal (gold dome) tweeter. The Elac Carina has a ribbon tweeter and is more relaxing. I had similar issues and moved to an Ascend Acoustics ribbon based tower. It's much more relaxing.

In short, it may be a question of the kind of tweeter, and not monitor vs. tower.

Big space- Big speaker. Bookshelves cannot possibly move enough air for the volume of the room.

It depends on the speaker design.  If the drivers are too far apart they won’t have time to integrate properly at a distance of only 10 or 12’.  The best of both worlds may be a pair of monitors combined with two decent subs, and I’d guess your Lyngdorf might be a big help integrating them with its excellent room correction capabilities.  Hope this helps, and best of luck. 

I doubt this is a floorstanding versus book self issue. Given your space I think floorstand speakers are far more appropriate.

For an audio system ten feet is a long way. I have a very high end system and my triangle (typically the appropriate configuration) is 8 feet. Away from the wall is almost always better for speakers. 

As for the headaches. I would guess this is a combination of electronics and speakers. It is likely your source is noisy and full of high frequency hash… which is then amplified. You may not directly “hear” it… but this is the stuff of fatigue.

What are all your components.

I’ve had headaches with a couple speakers before. The Triangle Borea Br03 was the last one. I liked the sound but it just was debilitating headaches. The Monitor audio isn’t as bad but my ear drums feel like they are on fire, even at low level cymbals on these especially hurt. Anyways not sure I’ve had a bunch of concussions over the years so that might factor in.

my wife is more worried the floorstanders she is finding it too much compared to bookshelf when she wants to watch quietly from 10 feet away in the evening so I want to make sure that is ok.

My music isn’t great, it’s mostly iTunes purchases and cd rips from years ago in amp3 or loss less. My electronics are the Lyngdorf tdai-1120 amplifier, then to an LG c1 tv with an Apple TV if that matters. Speaker cables are svs cables also.