We’ve just enjoyed our annual yoga retreat in Springbrook. Springbrook is famous for its old growth forest and has a very special energy, perfect to enjoy transformational events like yoga retreats. It was a jam-packed weekend of yoga, meditation, laughter, ritual, good food and fun. And one of the highlights of the weekend were two sessions of sound healing. The practice of sound healing is the practice of being deeply immersed in sounds and vibrations that have the power to cleanse and heal. Sound healing promotes self-discovery through deep relaxation and meditation.

Hearing is the first sense we acquire as a foetus. Our experience in the womb is one of both audible and inaudible vibrations. Perhaps this is why we respond so readily to sound vibration. While growing within our mother’s womb, we hear and feel the rhythm of her heartbeat, the various pulses as the blood moves through her veins, and the sound of her digestive system swishing and gurgling. During the dying process, the sense of hearing is the last one to disappear. That is why in various spiritual traditions around the world, when someone is dying, scriptures are read, and sacred mantras are chanted. This brings peace to the dying person.

Many cultures use sound to invoke a healing response in the body. From Tibetan bowls, tuning forks, Aboriginal didgeridoos, crystal singing bowls, shamanic drums, gongs, rattles and chimes, together with chants and mantras, a sound healing session intentionally creates waves of harmonic sound which envelop and surround the body. According to quantum physics, every cell is made up of small pieces of vibrating matter joined together by magnetic forces. It is believed that during illness or disease, the vibration in the cells is less effective, or there is a reduction in the frequency of the vibration. Alternative health practitioners theorise that when your body is exposed to healing sounds, the sound vibration helps to raise the frequency of your body, which brings it back into vibrational balance. 

 Used regularly, together with other healthy lifestyle practices, sound therapy is believed to help you achieve an optimal vibration.

Different sound bath instruments serve different purposes. Crystal and singing bowls help to keep you grounded, resonate with your chakras and allow you to attain a meditative state. Bells and gongs help to remove deeply stuck energy. Chimes balance the air element, and drumming, particularly the heartbeat drum, invokes a very primitive response in the body. 

From human DNA to bacteria and worms, from the Earth to solar systems and distant galaxies, and from the newborn stars to the black holes, everything has its own sound and vibration. The whole universe hums with its own rhythm and frequency. And when we can hum with the frequency of the universe, we become one with it and are moved into optimal resonance. 

Margot Wagner
 Yoga Under the Bodhi Tree

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