Music, and the healing power of sound - When
the student is ready, the teacher appears...
A mother softly sings to her baby to calm it. Or the
baby is soothed by the mother’s beating heart, as it
waits in watery darkness of the womb. We listen to music
to uplift, to excite, to inspire us... I went to Exiles
club in Ubud recently. An astounding diaspora of slightly
inebriated ex-pats, cool Jakarta dudettes with low slung trousers
and sexy gold waist-chains, and young Balinese guys with the
constant ‘hi my name is Wayan!’ energy.
I love it because it’s a mad combination of people,
yet incredibly good humoured, and fun. It really works.
Anyway, I go there because they have a great female vocalist
and I want to ask her to be my singing teacher. Though
friendly, she declines, and instead, Dorset, an Englishman,
keeps chatting to me at the bar. I just want to listen
to the band, but he won’t take no for an answer and
is very charming. (Luckily he is adept at ‘NVC
or Non-Violent Communication and so doesn’t take it
personally when I rather rudely turn my back on him...!) And...
it turns out that HE is my new singing teacher! An incredible
break because the next day he leads me through a wonderful
mini-sound workshop, just for me, bringing all his twenty
years experience of playing and singing. One thing I
want to share that I learned from Dorset is... what makes
songs memorable. And what it is, is the emotion.
It must move you. You might say, ‘I like that
song because it resonates with me’. In other words,
takes my vibration, works with it, makes it better.
Or, changes or enhances my vibration. Or, creates a
vibration that reminds me of MY feelings. Dorset was
able to take one of my songs, and sing it simply, yet with
so much emotion, that it made me cry. And that’s
one of the secrets of memorable singing.
Having lulled you into relaxation with a story, here’s
the science bit: everything is moving, from electrons
whizzing around an atom, to distant planets moving.
As the movement happens it causes vibration which emanates
as sound (some of which are within human hearing, some not).
Now, there is a healthy vibration for everything. The
organs of the body, your car, even, your house. Where
something is vibrating out of sequence, or out of harmony,
with everything else, is the beginning of a problem.
Rather like, if one violin goes off-key in an orchestra, before
very long, they’ll all go off! Similarly, with
the body, if one thing goes out of line, most likely soon,
it will affect other parts of the body. By the way,
there is ‘emotional resonance’ as well as the
scientific kind – the song makes you cry perhaps because
it resonates with some past emotion that you have experienced
and can connect with and remember.
Sound healing uses sound to bring a non-harmonious frequency
in part of the body or in the energy field around the body
(the ‘aura’) back into harmony.
Kinds of sound healing
The sound practitioner may just ‘tone’ or sing
at or near the clients’ body, or use instruments such
as bells, crystal bowls, Tibetan bowls, special medical ‘soma’
instruments for introducing sound to the body, and so on.
(The wonderful Awahoshi does crystal bowl healing in Bali
sometimes: www.bali3000.com/crystalsound/)
I have just been gifted with an amazing set of gold plated
crystal tuning fork wands! There are thirteen, attuned
to the chakras (there are more than seven chakras –
some higher onesare above the head, by the way). I have
been using the wands in the same way as crystals, for healing
– to balance the body’s energy field or aura by
directing certain vibrations where they are needed until the
energy field comes into balance and harmony. I also
make vocal tones intuitively which are often different from
the ones the tuning forks make but complement them.
People often think of the chakras and energy system as being
quite simple – like, you need orange for the sacral
chakra, green for the heart, etc. and that will bring it into
balance. In actual fact in healing, something more complicated
and multi-coloured and subtle seems to be needed, using all
sorts of ‘colours’ (or sounds) in various places
not restricted by true ‘chakra colour’.
An inspired friend asked if I could ‘sing a colour’.
I think this is possible, and in fact, suspect that one can
sing any kind of energy (eg, a forest, water, unconditional
love...) and introduce it into the energy field. A very
portable way of doing energy work!
How does sound healing work?
By ‘resonance’, the tendency of co-located objects
to vibrate at the same frequency. For example, if you
sing an ‘A’ note near a guitar, the guitar string
will respond with an ‘A’ and you will hear it.
If an ‘A’ note is sounded near the human body,
the body will resonate along with the ‘A’, coming
into harmony with it.
Jonathan Goldman is one of the foremost sound healers, and
director of the Sound Healers Association, and he has come
up with an interesting formula for how sound healing occurs.
It is this: “VOCALISATION + VISUALISATION = MANIFESTATION”.
What he means, is that the intent of the healer is an integral
and essential part of the process. So as the healer
vocalises, they also are visualising the desired outcome (which
could be to place a certain colour or vibration in a certain
place in the aura, to heal a specific physical or emotional
issue, etc.) Interesting to see this articulated (it
seems to be what I unconsciously do when sound healing!)
PROJECT OM – your chance to tone for the planet!
We can all do this of course, not just for ‘experts’
or ‘healers’ – and in fact a unique chance
to join in is coming up on November 8th! You may have
heard that this is an amazingly auspicious day in terms of
planetary activity. At 8.13 pm New York time on the
8th November, six astrological bodies will form a geometrically
perfect star of David in the sky (the Sun, Jupiter, Mars,
Saturn, Chiron, and the Moon). As you can imagine, this
doesn’t happen very often! Plus, an eclipse of
the full moon at the same time! Wow! It’s
from November 5th to the 11th, with the peak on the 8th.
It is being titled the ‘Harmonic Concordance’
and interpreted as a special moment for world transcendence.
There will be a ‘rolling OM’ – repeated
toning of the sacred sound ‘OM’ at whatever pitch
pleases, with simultaneous mental projection of Light and
Love, from 8.13pm until 8.22pm NY time. Prophecies predict
that if enough people (144,000) join in sound then a new era
of consciousness will be ushered in! Don’t forget
to project ‘love and light’ along with your sound
making – the intent is what makes the healing work,
remember! Puja and other websites have details.
Think of it as a powerful prayer issuing into the universe.
Something you can really DO about the suffering in the world
that often we feel so powerless about!
I think it’s also fair to say that all healing is about
love (or all love is about healing!) The healer invokes
the love in their heart for the human they are dealing with,
in order to cause an improvement to happen. The power
comes from god/spirit/whatever, through the healer as medium.
Exercise: Sing! As you go about your day, consider
introducing humming, La La LA ing, Om-ing, and any song that
comes to mind! (I sing to the ladies selling sarongs
and the guys offering transport! It seems to calm them...!
Or maybe it calms ME...)
Joy juice
In a spirit of giving and foolery, I have invented something
called ‘joy juice’. It is for one to two
people, lasts for ten minutes, and may include sound healing
and music making. It is free. Happens at Ashram, subject
to my availability/energy! Call to book, or catch me
if you can! (part of ‘joy juice’ is –
can you catch it!)
NEXT ISSUE: The Incredible Lightness of Being
Jeli Lala created the ‘Ashram of Jewellery and Art’
– Gifts, Crystals, Tarot, Art, Healing, Café
- at no. 1, Sukma St., Tebesaya, Ubud (opposite Jazz Café),
with husband, Putu S. She has studied yoga and other
spiritual practices for over ten years. She writes “In
this column, I share some of my personal experiences and spiritual
methods – hopefully, you’ll find this interesting,
and maybe it will give some ideas for your own journey.
Come visit!”
Jeli welcomes comments and may be contacted on:
Email: jelila@jelila.com
Website: www.jelila.com or www.imagine-retreats.com
