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Sound healing

SUSTAINABLE WAYS OF CREATING SOUNDS FOR WELLNESS

Sustainability is a comprehensive subject. As a result, a product can be deemed sustainable if its manufacturing ensures that the resources used to create it are available for future generations while also having the least possible impact on human health and the environment. A sustainable product is one that is made primarily of natural or recycled materials, requires little energy to manufacture, uses few non-renewable resources, and has a minimal environmental impact.
Sound produces echoes in our brain and vibrates throughout our body and radiates our sense of wellbeing. Sound produced by most of the headphones and earphones use magnets and conductive coils (electromagnetic induction) to move these diaphragms back and forth, which, in turn, produce sound. The sound produced using this technology is causing more distress to the human body. Sound that is produced around us should be amplified in an astonishing way so that it can heal the soul of a human body. The headphones, earphones and speakers are technology driven instruments that are dumped in a massive amount across the world causing more waste that is not leading towards a sustainable world.

Sound healing is thought to have originated in ancient Greece, when music was utilized to treat mental illnesses. Music has been used to enhance military morale, help people work quicker and far more successfully, and even ward off evil spirits by chanting throughout history. Sustainability and sound healing have a deep connection if seen precisely. The tools used in sound healing to produce sounds that are sustainable for the environment and also heal the human body without causing any harm to the environment. Some of the sound healing tools are gongs, singing bowls, harp, drums, crystal singing bowls, tuning forks as well as many others. Historically and continuing today, drums are created from birch, beech, maple, and oak, among other woods and materials to make drum shells. Two-ply and three-ply plywood was also used. It’s easier than you think to find a fun, educational activities for kids that blend music with environmental sustainability. If you and your family are looking for a fun weekend activity, handcrafted musical sound healing tools are the right fit to create lovely memories. Create percussion instruments from recyclable materials that are made out of natural material such as a gourd filled with seeds to create rattles that are a sustainable way to relish sound healing. Use your creativity to create sounds that nourish and balance your mind, body and spirit in natural ways.

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Depression Music Meditation Social Media Sound healing

Social Media Surfing and Depression

Social Media Surfing and Depression

INTRODUCTION

In today’s fast-paced and quickly turning upside-down digital space, there is no upper or lower limit for the age group that travels in the social media empire. Statistics show 25% of women and 12% of men of any age, are at risk of developing depression. 

Let’s first understand the universe of depression, and then move onto why and how social media can cause it. 

DEPRESSION

Depression gets enveloped by three feelings- 

  1. Worthlessness
  2. Hopelessness
  3. Helplessness

Worthlessness comes when you see a post having a brand-new Lamborghini. Hopelessness sweeps in when you like a story you did not want. And, helplessness pounces on you when you see your acquaintances celebrating the marriage of your close friend. These are just examples. Some people genuinely feel it in varicolored emotions. Are you too one of them?

Read on to find out more about it.

SOCIAL MEDIA

Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn came into existence to make our lives better. They wanted to help humans communicate better.

But there is so much miscommunication happening in the forests of social media that nobody understands. Just depressed souls do. For example? #FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) runs in the blood and swims in the brain pool of the depressed souls. Depressed souls question their existence, attempt to quit their lives, and walk on eggshells because of social media. 

AFTERMATH OF DEPRESSION DUE TO SOCIAL MEDIA

In most people, depression gives rise to feelings of body-image dissatisfaction, lowered or nil self-esteem, and questionable self-concepts. Their world collapses if they do not get many likes, comments, subscribers, or reactions to the posts. They take it as if the women or men who got the maximum number of likes, comments, or subscribers were equivalent to Miss or Mister World. Or, they probably get treated like the King or Queen of the social media platform.  

PSMU

Nowadays, a new term has got coined for depression. It is called PSMU- Passive Social Media Use. One merely keeps on scrolling through the various social media platforms on looking for a ray of hope or post that would make them feel happy about themselves. PSMU gets closely linked to depression. 

A study was conducted on students to help understand PSMU better. It led to the belief that the students who spent more time scrolling suffered from loss of interest and concentration, loneliness, fatigue, and an inferiority complex. In the past 25 years, the episodes or prevalence of anxiety and depression have increased by 70 percent in young people. 

SOCIAL MEDIA- A DOUBLE-EDGED SWORD 

Let’s say that some social media leads to addiction, but on the other hand, it helps some people through catharsis. Catharsis is the act of opening up emotions and feelings to someone or the world. 

Some mental health doctors over the social media platforms use scrolling through the patient accounts to understand them better. A person usually posts about what they truly feel. Some might mask their depression- that is a whole new topic altogether, called the masked depression. We can talk about it later. 

Depression is a genuine health condition, and it needs monitoring and treatment immediately. Thanks to the widespread awareness of depression through again, the double-edged sword- our very own- social media platforms. 

DEPRESSION IN CELEBRITIES 

Depression does not necessarily affect only the general population. It has gladly affected the celebrity clan as well. Celebrities like – Robin Williams, Michael Jackson, Heath Ledger, Jim Carrey, Johnny Depp, Chris Evans, Dwayne Johnson, Marilyn Monroe, Katy Perry, Sia, Lady Gaga, Angelina Jolie, J. K. Rowling, Deepika Padukone, Sushant Singh Rajput, and many others suffered from depression. 

HOW CAN YOU COPE WITH IT?

Give sound therapy a chance. It might seem funny at the moment, but music has the power to heal a deadened soul. It has proven to be beneficial and healthy in healing depressed souls. For starters, how about you listen to music by Dr. Karen Olson?

CONCLUSION

As often as possible, move from observing life to fully living it! Change to inside out thinking rather than outside in. Use movement, vibrations to help shift your mood. Stagnant energy can be a definition of depression. Find your flow and follow it. Vibrational sound therapy is energy in motion traveling through the sound and music to your heart which frees stuck places inside. Being able to move, listen and flow through music and sound therapy is an effective way to combat the harmful effects of social media.

Using sound therapy can help to raise your energy, vibration, and mood level. Depression can cause you to be feel lethargic. Simply listening to your favourite music can be one form of sound therapy that can help you counteract the sadness that social media can create.

Another suggestion is to find uplifting people to follow on social media. Make a point to unfollow or pass by posts that take you to a dark place. And, of course, it would be a fantastic goal to gradually decrease your time on social media. Do your best to create posts with that will uplift people, and move away from the urge to feel you need to impress others. Create a community of support in your social media “family” of friends and followers.

Choose to social media surfing with uplifting music, dancing, going for a walk, journaling, watching a positive video, anything that you enjoy doing. Find the ways and activities that bring you joy and notice more light coming into your heart and life.

Categories
Music Meditation Sound healing

Music and Vibration Tips for Sound Healing Meditations

sound healing

Sound healer and best-selling author Karen Olson is well-known for using her sound healing method to help people find peace, freedom, and the power to live their dreams.

Did you know that adding a form of vocal toning and vibration/sounds can improve the effectiveness of your music for meditation and sound healing?

How Can Sound Healing and Vibration Improve Your Music?

We are a planet of approximately 7.8 billion. All of us hail from vastly diverse backgrounds and reside in different corners of the earth. However, amidst this diversity, there exists something that ties all our living and waking moments together- sound. Every day, as we step out into the world, we come across different kinds of sounds. While some we categorise as noise, some we classify as music. Both music and sound are mixtures of sound waves at varying frequencies. However, for the purpose of distinction, one can refer to music as ordered sound, and to noise as unordered sound.

sound healing
https://blog.karenolson.com/what-are-the-benefits-of-sound-therapy/

Music at a Glance

At the outset, music is defined as the art and science of ordering and combining tones in a manner that is both meaningful and evocative. From listening to it while strolling the streets, to pursuing it as a career, there’s hardly anyone out there who’s not familiar with the concept of music. Adept at both conveying as well as coaxing emotions, some of the most common elements of music include tempo, rhythm, melody, harmony, pitch, timbre, dynamics, texture, and the kind.

However, besides its array of elements and instruments, there’s much more to music than what meets the eye. There exist elements such as mindful sounds and inaudible vibrations that not only grant listeners a greater understanding of the musical landscape but also arm budding musicians with the tools to whip up compositions that are as impactful as they are vivid. Techniques such as vocal toning for healing have long been used by sound therapists and other practitioners alike to improve their physical and emotional health and well-being. Other tools such as using vibration sounds for meditation prove to be equally effective as well. However, besides improving one’s quality of life, there also exist other measures which promise to enhance the quality of a musical composition by a great deal.

Let’s take a look at some of them.

Evolving Intros and Sound Effects

Whether you can add some basic, even guttural sounds or singing simple vowel patterns while you listen to music or you are a composer and sound engineer who starts a piece with noise and gradually transforming that noise into music, sound and music has many effective variables. Most artists, who work with these “techniques”, use an analogue synthesizer to first create a tone. Subsequently, they convert the tone into a warble, and then turn the warble into a rhythm. Consequently, they layer all the different patterns together to produce a unified piece of music. Using your voice to layer sounds while you are simply listening, or creating a recording, you can feel the vibrations move inside of you.

By using this technique, you can also organise noise into various textures and compositions and settle with the one that aligns best with your mind. For this purpose, you can take the help of a synth sound bank that provide you with a host of different noises that you can include in your music. Introducing such sound effects, (or simply adding drums or percussive sounds that you create), into your composition can increase the quality of your composition by leaps and bounds and allow you to leave a subliminal impact on your listeners and yourself.

Pad Layering

With the help of pad layering, you can incorporate Solfeggio frequencies into the layers of your composition and render them with a feeling of bliss, peace, and serenity for the listener. The six frequencies that are part of the Solfeggio frequencies can be infused into any genre of music. Because of the sentiments that they evoke, these frequencies have long been linked with the school of meditation music. Besides adding a layer of finesse to your composition, the Solfeggio frequencies are also known to leave a deep impact on an individual’s conscious and subconscious mind, stimulating their inner healing in the process. A simplified version, of vocal toning using vowels can create a counter-part.

Bass Layering

If your music consists of low-end elements such as the kick and the bass, then you should probably consider layering the famous Schumann resonance into the mix. Scientifically speaking, Schumann resonance is the natural resonant frequency of planet Earth. Many researchers are of the opinion, that if we were to tune our instruments to these resonances, then our music would become more pleasant, and improve our well-being. Additionally, you can also make use of this tone to design a sub-bass layer. Basically, this is a deep, inaudible sound that can also be created when we sing the lowest pitch we can create, as we connect to Mother Earth, as the vibrations ground and connect all of us. This gives sound healing a unified and grounding energetic pulse.

Using Binaural Beats

Binaural beats are defined as auditory illusions that contain various wellness and health benefits. The binaural beat that a person experiences actually has a frequency difference between the tones that enter their left and right ear. Various studies hold binaural beats responsible for having an impact on the brainwave response. Infusing binaural beats into your composition, thus, allows you to explore into newfound avenues and possibilities. The easiest way to create a binaural beat is with a pair of “ting-shaws” which can be found online. Begin by hitting the two brass rings together, and then put one next to each ear. The pitches are slightly out-of-tune creating a beating sound. Our mind needs to make sense and organize them and this process helps to calm the mind.

Using the Power of Sound with Karen   

Sound healer and best-selling author Karen Olson is well-known for using her sound healing method to help people find peace, freedom, and the power to live their dreams. She has established herself as an authority in emotional and physical wellbeing. Her education, training and personal experience is the subject of her award-winning book, SoundPath: Using the Power of Sound and Silence for Health, Harmony and Happiness. Karen’s SoundPath Method is a unique sound therapy method using music, vibrations, percussion, dancing and more. She helps clients effectively and painlessly remove long-held negative childhood beliefs and remove fear by activating their unique power within. They are able to replace blocks with messages of love connecting them to their inner purpose and truth. Please visit www.karenolson.com to learn more.

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Sound healing

TEN BENEFITS OF SOUND THERAPY

INTRODUCTION

Back in the good old days of Greece, music or sound therapy cured mental disorders. It later became a soothing lullaby for military troops trudging through wars. For some people, music became a warrior that could stave off evil spirits.

Sound healing has been a part of our history for quite a long while now. How about letting it become a part of your present? 

But before we tread on the miraculous pathways of sound therapy, let us take a sneak-peek into the many remedies that exist in the planet of music:

  • Tuning Fork Therapy

Hear and feel calibrated tuning forks when you apply specific vibrations to different parts of the body. Somewhat, like acupuncture, these vibrations have the power to reduce muscular tension and provide energy to the muscles. 

  • Sound Healing Meditation

An age-old meditative practice where different musical instruments create healing vibrations around your body. It was first brought to action in the 12th century in Tibet. The sound healer, Karen Olson, Ph.D., channels healing tones and guided musical vibrational messages to your subconscious mind releases blocks and helping to create more positive mind-body spirit flow and balance in your life. 

  • Vibrational Sound Therapy

A type of sound therapy that focuses of the frequencies and vibrations as energy. It can use tuning forks, gongs, Tibetan singing bowls or a viola, to create vibrations that can heal, relax, and help meditate. 

  • Singing Bowl Therapy

Different-sized bowls and mallets create music to heal the soul internally. When a mallet hits or circles a bowl, tuneful sounds and vibrations come to life. 

  • Psychotherapy

To understand oneself better when it comes to emotions, moods, thoughts, feelings, and behaviours, you need to consult a psychotherapist. Sound therapy supports the work done in “talk therapy”.

  • Exposure Therapy

Beyond fear, there is peace. Exposure therapy has only one agenda: to go beyond your fears and face the anxiety-causing triggers. 

Now, let’s look at ten benefits of sound therapy: 

  1. Pain Management

The sound waves and harmonic vibrations can help relieve both mental and physical conditions that show up as pain as their prime symptom. 

  1. Blood Pressure Controller

Listening to music diverts your mind and relaxes your heart. Music can lower a high-blood pressure count within seconds. 

  1. Prevent Heart Diseases

The various rhythms and frequencies created in sound therapy can bolster keeping your precious heart happy. Thereby, it can keep heart diseases at bay. 

  1. Better Sleep

The healing vibrations of sound therapy can move through the water in the body. Our body is 70 percent water, and these vibrations can relax the brain and soothe you to sleep better. 

  1. Cholesterol Controller

A strange and rare benefit of sound therapy is reducing cholesterol levels. Music facilitates movement in your body. The more you move, the more you lose unwanted tissue or fat. 

  1. Stress Alleviator

High-frequency music can take you away from stress triggers. Sound therapy can retune your brain and alleviate your stress. 

  1. Curtails Headaches

Do you want to say goodbye to migraines and chronic headaches? Then, say yes to sound healing meditation. Recent studies show even two weeks of sound therapy is enough to get relief from headaches. 

  1. Reforms Relationships

Stress is the leading cause of strained relationships. Psychotherapy and alternative therapy can assist in treating tension. Apart from that, sound therapy can always lower anxiety and help resolve conflicts.

  1. Depreciates Mood Swings

Be it tuning forks or bowls, sound therapy can give you more energy, patience, and understanding. These are the three weapons you need to tackle mood swings. 

  1. Encourages Spiritual, Mental, And Physical Well-Being

Who doesn’t want a renewed purpose in life? In particular, after the challenges of Covid-19 Pandemic. Music has the strength to give purposefulness, well-being, calmness, and profound happiness. 

REMEMBER:

Sound therapy has more to offer to masses even today. All you need to do is get hold of the best soothing music for your hungry soul. 

Any therapy — be it vibrational sound therapy, sound healing meditation, tuning fork therapy, vibrational sound healing or singing bowl therapy — could become your best friend for life.

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Sound healing

FINDING HAPPINESS DURING LIFE’S OBSTACLES

“I am fed up. I have to meet up with a specific target every month and this is really stressing me out”, Cynthia sobbed. She was lost in thought, staring at her laptop until her phone rang. It was her boss calling to know how far she had gone with the documents needed to be submitted and reminding her to meet up with her customers.

Cynthia is a single lady who has two lovely siblings (a brother and sister) and she lives with her mom. She is a banker, but she isn’t happy with her career choice. On her way to work, she saw a letter from the owner of the house that the rent is almost due. “oh, not this time when I am struggling to pay for my brother and sisters’ expenses”, she sighed. Her mom asked what was going on and she showed her the letter. The mom’s paycheck was so little it could not pay the children’s expenses. Cynthia rushed off to work, just in time to catch the bus. She had received a severe warning for being late to meetings, so she really needed to be on time. 

Her everyday life was filled with meeting customers, trying to make her goals; socializing with customers and keeping them interested in the progress. After that, she goes back home, faces the noise from her siblings, and then works on paying bills. She had a lot going on in her life and she usually gets upset, and depressed. Finally, this caused her to get sick, and feel a lot of despair. She was so weak to do anything and even with that weakness she was still stressing herself with trying to meet up with clients while she tried hard to put on a “good face” with make-up and a smile. She needed to because her life and the life of her family depended on her salary and she needed to be sure to keep her job. This went on for days, until she got very sick, and had to be rushed to the hospital. When she felt calmer at the hospital, the doctor gave her some drugs and spoke to her about taking some time out to herself and to remember to just breathe. She explained her situation to him, he understood and suggested she talk to a therapist. The doctor was concerned and checked on her continuously. He gave his full support to help her with her goals. He even helped her find some new clients, and even opened an account with her. She became happier and knew how to control her anxiety. Anytime she feels stressed, she calls her therapist and the doctor and takes time to relax, and play with her younger siblings. She even takes a break from work sometimes. Her mom found a better job with a better paycheck, thanks to the doctor. 

Several months passed, and she started dating the man who helped her see light again. All these happened because she spoke about what had been bothering her. Before, she couldn’t see anything good and felt negative about everything, and she hated being with people, especially when there were crowds. She used to feel hopeless and helpless and cry all the time and she was very lonely. But the minute she spoke up and shared her struggles, she was helped in ways she could not imagine. 

So, whatever you might be going through, be it, schoolwork, business, bullying, rape, financial struggles … whatever would lead you to overthink, know there is help. The saddest thing is when someone feels there is no hope, and they never reach out and share so they can’t receive help, and in the saddest case, this can lead to suicide. Remember, there is someone who will understand what you are going through, know you are not alone. Don’t allow your mind to get stuck in negative, hopeless thoughts that destroy your peace of mind. We are all human. Everyone has challenges, everyone feels like they have made mistakes. Please learn to share and talk about it. Reach out, be around your loved ones, exercise, take a deep breath and give yourself credit for how far you have come. Speak to yourself in positive affirming ways.

Learn about The SoundPath Method (a unique sound therapy process); you will find a way to work through challenges step by step. You will experience the healing power of music which heals the body, mind and soul. Most importantly, trust that you will find the guidance you seek, and you will have peace for your journey as you find your dreams.

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Listening

What Are The Benefits of Sound Therapy?

Sound Healing Meditation (1)

We live in a high-paced and incredibly dynamic world where the ecstasies of simple joys are poised delicately alongside the numbing browbeating of daily defeats. In such a scenario, it often becomes difficult for us to draw a line between them, resulting in a situation that leaves us feeling absolutely stressed and overwhelmed.

Best Sound Frequency for Meditation

Why Sound Therapy?

To make sure that these predicaments don’t affect our everyday hustle and cause us to fall behind in getting the rest, that we need we must t, actively find ways to relax and have fun..t To begin with,, the options are limitless- from writing and painting to jogging and cycling, any activity that gives you a break from the monotony of your day-to-day schedule lifts your mood and gives you more energy. 

However, one must always  remember their personal limitations as well as the demands of their schedule as they choose the best ways to exercise and unwind. Ideally, one must practice something that can not only be adapted as a routine but which also presents the least  interruption of their regular duties and responsibilities. This is where sound healing meditation and sound therapy c can help. It is a highly impactful technique that makes use of a mixture of various sounds and vibrations to effect a positive impact on one’s physical, mental, and emotional well-being. 

Let’s look at the benefits of sound therapy.

Stress Relief

Sound therapy practices such as using vocal toning for healing and other related techniques prove to be extremely effective when it comes to  helping people reduce their stress and challenges. The soothing sounds involved in the process not only work towards re-tuning your brain but also helps you replenish brain energy by  using high-frequency sounds that elevate brain functioning. 

An effectivesound therapy session at the end of a long and exhausting  day makes you more able to cope with the stress of the day by helping you stream your thoughts and ideas in much more productive ways. In the process, it helps you be in charge of your mental and emotional health. 

Helps to Lessen Headaches

Many people use sound therapy to relieve headaches including migraine headaches. This is because sound therapy helps them address the issues of stress and high blood pressure which are, more often than not, the root causes behind headaches. Many big fans of sound therapy unanimously t agree that the practice helps them alleviate their symptoms for good, in a matter of a few weeks.

Confidence Boost  

As sound therapy allows you to make new and positive patterns in your brain, it automatically  gives you a newfound wave of confidence. It allows you to overcome your existing insecurities and vulnerabilities, helping you to flesh out an effective and reliable coping mechanism. Additionally, it helps you take up new challenges and broaden your horizon with every passing day. It makes you capable enough to identify and fix the hiccups that plague your daily routine and streamline your activities in a much more efficient manner.    

Improves Focus

Sound therapy has been proven to improve  your attention span and focus It helps you get rid of distracting and irrelevant thoughts and redirect your focus in the right direction. This is accomplished by lowering your brain wave frequency.  This not only helps you juggle your daily responsibilities in an improved manner but also allows you to be more productive. 

Builds Better Relationships

The majority of relationships become challenged by poor communication and misunderstanding. More often than not, this stems from the stress and anxiety that plagues them on a daily basis. The inability of people to properly communicate and compartmentalise their various issues ends up interferring with their interpersonal dynamics and then puts a toll on their personal relationships. Sound therapy gives them a promising way to reduce their stress levels, and consequently build and foster relationships that have unshakeable and unwavering foundations.

Improve Organizational Skills

As sound therapy helps you improve your focus and boost your confidence levels, it contributes towards enhancing your organizational skills. Once your thoughts are clear, and problems being effectively dealt with, meeting your deadlines and managing your tasks becomes much easier for you. A This improves your leadership skills, and overall management of yourself and others..    

Using the Power of Sound with Karen   Sound healer and best selling author Karen Olson is well-known for using her sound healing method to help people find peace, freedom, and the power to live their dreams. She has established herself as an authority in emotional and physical wellbeing. Her education, training and personal experience is the subject of her award-winning book, SoundPath: Using the Power of Sound and Silence for Health, Harmony and Happiness. Karen’s SoundPath Method is a unique sound therapy method using music, vibrations and more. She helps clients effectively and painlessly remove long-held negative childhood beliefs and remove fear by activating their unique power within. They are able to replace blocks with messages of love connecting them to their inner purpose and truth.

Categories
Music Meditation Sound healing

The World of Sound, Silence, Vibrations and Change

We experience sound before we are born, and it carries us beyond the veil as we transition from this life. We hear a symphony of sounds in our mother’s womb, with the surrounding fluid magnifying and transmitting the vibrations into our cells. Our mother’s heartbeat, her breathing, and the pulsation of blood swooshes a rhythmic pulse, which peacefully accompanies the building of our cells and organs. Our parents’ voices and the sounds of our mother’s day-to-day life make up our interior world from the very beginning of our time on earth.


As we go through the various stages of life, our body stores our experiences in a manner more primal than language and explanation. If something traumatic happens, and it seems to be more than we can handle, we create internal protections. These protections can help at that moment, but then that pat- tern becomes instilled, stored, and stuck inside of us on a deep subconscious level. We need to unlearn and replace these defense mechanisms.


Sound and vibrations reach below the conscious mind, below language and explanation, to use “ultrasonic surgery” to dislodge old patterns. Then, we can fill those stuck and empty spaces with unconditional love, reconnecting to the place we remember subconsciously in our mother’s womb—that place where all our needs were met, where we were enough and knew that we were loved.


Even if there were times when we couldn’t receive this fully as a child, we can do it now. We can reset to our pre-trauma state. That trauma doesn’t have to be a huge incident that appeared in the newspaper. We can experience chronic trauma over time— constant put-downs, feeling unsupported, or being subjected to any behavior that made us feel unnurtured, unloved or unaccepted by our “tribe.”


We innately know that we were born to fit in and be cared for. We know that we are unique and special. I believe that even though trauma may have drowned out that message, it remains underneath the chaos and is always there for us to reconnect with.


Your soul knows and never forgets the truth of who you are and what you are here to do. You are seeking this connection. This is the quiet voice that silence can help you to hear.


When you tune in to higher vibrations so we can co-create a new lifestyle based on faith instead of fear, trust instead of doubt, and harmony instead of discord. Tuning up the mind and body creates balance and a renewed sense of clarity.


If you’ve gone through life feeling like you’re not enough or striven to earn the approval of others—listening and finding connection through meditation and music will raise your confidence and increase your peace of mind.


Explore various sound healing methods such as The SoundPath Method to gain insight and to learn vibrational tools that access the subconscious mind and the brain’s ability to reprogram pathways within itself—opening up new channels to a life filled with ease, harmony, happiness, and success. These vibrational tools often involve music, or at the very least, rhythm. However, no specific knowledge of music or rhythm is required. The SoundPath Method is flexible enough to adapt to one’s own preferences and tastes.


Let’s begin by looking at the concept that humans are instruments that need to be kept “in tune” in order to achieve the best results. Most people—even those with no musical training at all—can recognize when a singer is out of tune. Fortunately, most people’s lives are not so far “out of tune” as to be beyond help—if they understand some basic concepts and implement the right corrective measures.


Music is a conduit to connect to the energy and vibrations, when used intentionally, they create change Fundamental to the SoundPath Method are some lofty scientific principles about energy, but again they need not be thoroughly studied nor completely understood. We just need to know enough to be able to use them to reach our own self-improvement goals. Like gravity, we only need to know that it works. We can leave it up to the experts to debate about how it works.


Among those experts is Bruce Lipton, Ph.D., who made groundbreaking discoveries about the role of the conscious versus the subconscious minds, as outlined in his book: The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Conscious Matter and Miracles. It has been shown that only about five percent of what we do is controlled by our conscious minds. And, considering that much of what we observe and experience in our lives today is related to the behavior of our parents who had modeled for us what they themselves had learned at a young age…it could be stated that we behave more out of habit than choice. Lipton’s concepts, when effectively applied, have the potential to change lives. We no longer have to passively watch our own stubborn patterns accelerate and repeat in mysterious and “unfair” ways.


Scientists used to believe that our genetics determined our fate. But, now we understand that our genes act as a blueprint that receive programming based on observation and the experience of repeated behaviors. After age seven, our programming controls our genes! The programs have been “auto-saved,” becoming our very own GPS—our personal navigational reference system. When our subconscious mind is running the show, we tend to be unaware of it, so we can easily believe that we are victims. However, we don’t need to pass along all of our ancestor’s habits and beliefs. We do have a choice!


The first step in this sound and vibrational reprogramming process is gaining awareness. Usually, our minds are in “la-la land” while we unknowingly sabotage ourselves. What the conscious mind wishes is very different than the wishes of the subconscious mind. It’s like the unconscious mind is in the driver’s seat while the conscious mind occasionally barks an unheard order from the back seat. The subconscious mind doesn’t like to change. Our best chance for creating new subconscious patterns is when we’re in a meditative or Theta brainwave state; just before we fall asleep and wake up is an optimal time to “rehearse” the changes we want.


From an energetic and vibrational standpoint, music allows the spiritually connected listener to have more direct contact with one’s subconscious programming. I see this regularly as I practice and teach the viola. I can remember the tedious hours, days, and weeks I would spend, trying to learn a new way to hold my bow or align my left-hand finger motion until it became a part of my playing without my thought. Of course, I used the new “habit” over and over again, so it automatically received consistent reinforcement.


This principle and the process of creating new habits are very apparent when I am teaching a proper bow-arm technique to my students. The right arm motion is not at all natural. The elbow needs to learn to open at a right angle and extend to keep the bow parallel to the bridge so it can create a ringing sound. When the bow goes “off course” the sound gets thin, glassy, unpleasant sounding almost like a whistle. We can work very hard to break that habit. Yet, if we are focusing on a difficult left-hand technique, for instance, the bow will wander back to its old habit. I have learned very well that we need to focus on one task at a time until the mind can gradually put it all together. There is no need to become disappointed when the bow begins to wander again. But it is a reminder that the consistent work isn’t complete, as the new habit has yet to fully replace the old. Even once it has become a habit, it’s still important to warm up each day, like an athlete, to provide the proper reinforcement.


If the conscious mind has barely a five percent impact on the choices we make and the situations that manifest in our experience, how do we bypass it and communicate directly with the subconscious mind? Even the attempt to make a change in the conscious mind, often only reinforces the problem we’re trying to solve. The SoundPath Method will give you a way to establish direct communication with your subconscious mind and bring into awareness your core beliefs. The tools and exercises in this book will explain how to use sound therapy and specific vibratory frequencies—along with more traditional methods of self-healing, like meditation—to create positive change down to the cellular level by reprogramming subconscious beliefs.


You can choose to move on from feeling stuck, in pain, grief-stricken, or hopelessness. New patterns can finally be established. Past situations no longer need to influence the present moment; now you’ll have a way to move forward and freely choose to live your dreams.
The SoundPath Method exercises will often include using your imaginative sense, like daydreaming, to create an experience as if it is real. The subconscious mind does not fully distinguish between what is experienced and what is imagined. We can choose to use this ability to our advantage. For example, you will be asked to imagine the vibrations inside of you, similar to when you stand near a huge loudspeaker with pounding bass notes that shake within you. The energetic messages to the subconscious mind are felt; they can be perceived physically, or through guided imagery, just below the threshold of your think- ing, conscious mind.


As our connection to the energy fields of sound and music helps us use these exercises and gain knowledge to implement change, we become progressively clearer and more vibrant. When our body, mind, and spirit, are in alignment, our body knows how to heal and achieve optimal health. In this state, we are able to magnify the results of all our desires, including medical care and optimal health. Our higher level of vibration helps us to sing from the mountaintops, as the resonant sound echoes our symphony of support. Learning the SoundPath Method does not include one-time moments of awareness that are then forgotten and discarded. Instead, it can become a “way of life” that includes ongoing maintenance exercises, similar to getting and keeping your physical body in shape rather than dieting only to blindly return to a former lifestyle.


Spiritually speaking, when our instrument is in tune, the overtones are all ringing and resonating in agreement. In other words, our relationships are whole and healthy; our finances are abundant; we have the courage and the passion for living our purpose; we experience high self-esteem and joyful self-expression. However, if the instrument is unbalanced or out of tune, it isn’t effective on any level. The sound is terrible. No matter how skilled the musician, it can’t be played effectively, and trying to do so is a miserable experience.


Likewise, when a person is “out of tune,” he or she will experience symptoms such as anxiety, insecurity, doubt, shame, blame, jealousy, and addiction. Such a person is prone to seeking direction and approval from others. Life feels unnecessarily difficult; things often go wrong, and accidents happen far too frequently. Intimate relationships are tarnished with disagreements. And, since schedules tend to be hectic, it can become difficult to care for one’s physical needs like eating well, exercising, or getting enough sleep. Most challenging of all, it may feel impossible to get control over negative core beliefs that magnify these struggles. This is certainly the opposite of being in the flow and having things come together with joy, happiness, and ease. It is our lifelong imperative to get our instruments in tune.


So how do we do this? How can we create harmony and alignment between the player and the instrument which will restore balance and allow our music to ring out freely? How do we release the chaos of negative core beliefs that may have haunted us throughout our lives despite our best efforts to change?


As with any instrument, making the right adjustments is crucial. We must learn specific practices which will keep our instrument tuned so we can experience all that life has to offer. The process of tuning up our “instrument” is remarkably similar to the experience of a musician tuning a physical instrument. And, it all comes down to sound and vibration.


The SoundPath Method shows us how to become master musicians for our own emotional and spiritual awakening. These techniques will demonstrate ways to combine vibration, entrainment, tapping, and drumming, with techniques like meditation, breath work, intention-setting, and movement, to bypass subconscious blocks. These blocks keep us reliving the same negative experiences over and over again, regardless whether we “know better by now” or have struggled to overcome the same challenges for many years.


I don’t need to tell you that music can affect our moods, emotions, and even our bodies. But, most of us are less familiar with other ways that music has played a pivotal role in human social and emotional development throughout recorded history. From Paleolithic flutes carved more than forty thousand years ago to Native Americans ritual songs for everything from marriage celebrations to war, music has long been understood to be a mystical force in our world.


There are extreme examples of using music to create trance states so deep that people in India have reported being bitten by cobras without experiencing illness. Prisoners of war have endured terrible abuse such as starvation and physical injury using humming and singing as a technique to focus the mind beyond the pain. And, we all know people, you may even be one of those people, who’ve come through a time of depression or trauma by focusing on a piece of music that spoke to them giving courage to keep moving forward.


There’s music within each of us, waiting to be awakened. You must allow that music to come to you because gifts that aren’t shared will eventually disappear. Gifts we share are multiplied. Memories of pain we keep reliving can be healed and released, allowing us to move forward and make more joyful memories. This vibrational memory can carry us to higher places where we no longer allow anger, negativity, and fear to steal our gifts from us.


Instead of resigning ourselves to more years of struggle, we can use sound to cut a new pathway through our subconscious blocks, finally healing lifelong negative core beliefs. This is a new concept for most people, but it isn’t nearly as far-fetched as it may appear at first glance. The famed scientist Nikola Tesla said, “If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency, and vibration.”


There’s a power greater than our problems. Sound opens our consciousness to reflect it. Learn to think in sound. Let rhythm be our inner pulse connecting us to universal life. Let the music lead us to our inner story

Categories
Sound healing

How to Boost Your Immune System To Guard Against Disease

Taking the effort to learn about and build your immune system will add quality days to your life. Self-care needs to come first in order to live life to the fullest, and everyone you love will also receive more, especially the gift of your vibrant self.

A healthy Immune System helps you fight off disease and recover more easily when you do get sick. In a weakened state over a period of time, people can develop an autoimmune disease, which are conditions that make your immune system attack your body by mistake. Under normal circumstances, your immune system protects you from viruses and bacteria. As soon as it detects these invasive pathogens, it will send out a battalion of cells to wipe them off the face of the earth. 

Any healthy immune system has no trouble differentiating between your own cells and those that are invading. That said, for those with autoimmune disease, the immune system will think that the skin, joints, or other parts of your body are actually a foreign entity. 

It then releases proteins to attack these healthy cells since it is under the impression that they are invasive pathogens looking to cause the body harm. Some autoimmune diseases will target a specific area of the body like how type 1 diabetes attacks the pancreas, whereas other diseases such as lupus could attack the entire body.

NUTRITION

The first and most profound way you can improve your immunity against all manner of illnesses and infections is to make sure you have your nutrition well covered. The immune system is powered by what we eat and is unable to perform optimally unless it gets the necessary ingredients.

Eating a primarily plant-based diet may help give the immune system a boost. The immune system relies on white blood cells that produce antibodies to combat bacteria, viruses, and other invaders. Vegetarians have been shown to have more effective white blood cells when compared to nonvegetarians, due to a high intake of vitamins and low intake of fat.

Eating a low-fat diet may also be protective. Studies have shown that limiting dietary fat helps strengthen immune defenses. Research also shows that oil may impair white blood cell function and that high-fat diets may alter the gut microbiota that aid in immunity.

Maintaining a healthy weight can also benefit the immune system. Obesity has been linked to increased risk for influenza and other infections such as pneumonia.3 Plant-based diets are effective for weight loss because they are rich in fiber, which helps fill you up, without adding extra calories. Fiber can also lower BMI, which is linked to improved immunity. A plant-based diet has also been shown to reduce inflammatory biomarkers.

Vitamins, Minerals, and Antioxidants

Studies have shown that fruits and vegetables provide nutrients—like beta-carotene, vitamin C, and vitamin E—that can boost immune function. Because many vegetables, fruits, and other plant-based foods are also rich in antioxidants, they help reduce oxidative stress.

Beta-Carotene: Beta-carotene is a powerful antioxidant that can reduce inflammation and boost immune function by increasing disease-fighting cells in the body. Excellent sources include sweet potatoes, carrots, and green leafy vegetables.

Vitamins C and E: Vitamins C and E are antioxidants that help to destroy free radicals and support the body’s natural immune response. 

In particular, vitamin C is considered one of the most important nutrients when it comes to supporting good health and fighting invaders. Among other things, vitamin C is an antioxidant, meaning that it helps to destroy “free radicals” that damage cells. Vitamin C is also a precursor to the feel-good neurotransmitter serotonin, which can help to put the body in a calmer and more restorative state.

You can find vitamin C in countless fruits and vegetables, including (in particular) citrus fruits, mangoes, apples, peppers, kale, sprouts, berries, and more. Most people don’t need to supplement with extra vitamin C, but this being a water-soluble vitamin means that it is nearly impossible to “overdose.”

Vitamin E meanwhile is a powerful antioxidant too, and also a key player in many of the fundamental biochemical reactions throughout the body governed by the immune system. Vitamin E sources include nuts, seeds, spinach, and broccoli.

Vitamin D: Research shows vitamin D supplementation may reduce the risk for viral infections, including respiratory tract infections, by reducing the production of proinflammatory compounds in the body. Increased vitamin D in the blood has been linked to the prevention of other chronic diseases including tuberculosis, hepatitis, and cardiovascular disease. Food sources of vitamin D include fortified cereals and plant-based milk and supplements.

Zinc is a mineral that can help boost white blood cells, which defend against invaders. Sources include nuts, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, beans, and lentils.

Folic acid is extremely beneficial for our immune system too, so much so that it is often added to foods. This is especially true for young children. Folic acid is found readily in whole-grain products, such as rice and pasta.

Iron is important due to its role in forming blood cells. You’ll get iron from beans, broccoli, red meats, and fortified cereals.

Selenium is a useful ingredient for regulating the immune system, improving its efficiency and preventing unwanted inflammation and other effects. Selenium is found in garlic, broccoli, sardines, and tuna.

Another tip is to try and support a healthy microbiome. This refers to the collection of microbes living in your stomach, intestines, and elsewhere. Most bacteria are harmless and actually good for you, and in fact, they play an important role in keeping bad bacteria AND bad viruses away. If you have a stronger gut fauna, then you will be less likely to contract viruses of all kinds.

So how do you support this in your own body? One tip is to try to consume more fibrous foods, as well as more fermented foods and yogurts. The latter two contain nature cultures of friendly bacteria, while the former will help to feed the bacteria by passing through to the areas where they live.

The most important thing you can do for your gut bacteria though is to consume as varied a diet as possible. Studies show that the cultures with the strongest microbiomes are also those that eat a rich and varied diet. One good goal to aim for is to consume 50 different ingredients/foods every single week.

STRESS

One of the most profound things you can do to strengthen your immune system is to learn ways to reduce stress. This is something many of us don’t consider as being truly important, but the truth is that when you are highly stressed, you become “run down” and far more susceptible to colds and other illnesses.

There is actually a very logical reason for this. When you are stressed, this essentially places the body into what is known as a “fight or flight state.” This is the body’s response to danger, controlled by the sympathetic nervous system, and intended to help improve our chances of a positive outcome in a physical confrontation. This literally prepares your body to either get into a physical fight or run away from danger.

In the fight or flight mode, our body increases the production of adrenaline, cortisol, dopamine, and other excitatory neurotransmitters and hormones. These trigger numerous physiological changes throughout the body: accelerating the heart rate, increasing muscle tone, narrowing vision, and even thickening the blood. 

All these adaptations are intended to improve our chances of survival – the thickening of the blood for instance is intended to encourage clotting so that we will scab over and not bleed out in case of injury.

What this ALSO does though, is to drive blood and oxygen away from the vital organs and toward the muscles and the brain. We need muscle to fight, and we need a sharp mind to spot chances to escape. We DON’T need to be concerning ourselves with digestion at this point. Likewise, we don’t need to channel a lot of energy into immunity – there are more pressing concerns than the common cold right now! Thus, when you are stressed, your muscle tone increases but your immune system is suppressed. Stress alters the hormone cortisol and change your glycemic, sugar levels, and put you into a phase of adrenal deficiency. This leads to inflammation and auto-immune diseases (which includes a list of at least 80). 

Fight or flight “stress” in the wild where our bodies evolved, was immediate and short-lived. Today though, sources of stress often persist and follow us around. You might be stressed about some aspect of your relationships for instance, about money, or about your boss. Perhaps you have too much work on your plate in the office. During these unprecedented times, we have lots of added stress.

Keeping yourself in an anxious state keeps your system suppressed. This means you are going for long stretches of time as highly vulnerable to ANY illness that might attack. This is chronic stress, and it’s terrible for our health.

So how do you overcome this stress? For many of us, sources of stress are unavoidable. It’s not so easy to simply quit your job, and your money troubles are unlikely to go away overnight, even if you want them to!

What you can do though, is to change the way you react to those troubles. This is where meditation and mindfulness come in, both of which are tools that we can use to better manage our long-term chronic stress. Studies show that meditation can help to reduce the incidence of disease, and this is a great way to improve many other aspects of health too. Mindfulness is the practice of focusing on the present moment, breathing deeply and allowing ourselves to appreciate all that we have. The SoundPath Method includes meditation and mindfulness through the practice of using music and vibration to manage stress in healthy ways.

Another thing you can do is to try and counterbalance those negative moods with positive ones. That means spending time with friends, doing things you love, planning for the future, and going on holiday. If you think about the people you know who never seem to get sick, they’re likely the same people who have boundless energy and enthusiasm for life. This is not a coincidence!

Sleep is crucial for boosting your Immune System and Fighting Chronic Disease

Our bodies need sleep to rest and recharge. Without a sufficient amount of sleep, we increase our risk of developing serious health problems—like heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease, and obesity. Inadequate sleep has also been linked to suppressed immune function and even symptoms similar to those caused by diabetes. One study found that those who sleep fewer than five hours per night are more likely to have recently suffered a recent cold compared with those who sleep more.

Need help falling asleep? Try adding healthful fruits, vegetables, grains, and beans to your diet. One study found that diets rich in fiber and low in saturated fat can lead to deeper, more restorative sleep. Learn more about how a plant-based diet can lead to better sleep.

Likewise, you also need to make sure that you sleep as healthily as possible. The opposite of the fight or flight response (which is also known as a sympathetic response, or a catabolic state), is rest and digest – or an anabolic state. It’s during this tie that our body sends more energy to our immune systems and digestion, to help us repair and fortify our bodies for the day ahead. This happens when we are physically and mentally at rest.

And you are never more at rest than when you are asleep. Sleep is the most anabolic state the body can enter naturally and is a time when you will build muscle, restore tissue, and drive our infection and illness.

The more sleep you get, the more resilient you will be against all kinds of diseases.

Please read Karen Olson’s blog It’s Time to get the Health Benefits of a Restful Night’s Sleep. Here are some of the tips for getting the best sleep possible:

  • Making sure that your bedroom is as dark and quiet as possible 
  • Aim to go to bed and wake up at a consistent time every night/morning
  • Take a warm bath or shower before bed
  • Use an essential oil like lavender or vanilla in a spray or diffuser.
  • Avoid exposure to blue-light emitting devices for half an hour before bed
  • Avoid stimulating activities such as exercising or watching movies
  • Using supplements and not eating heavy food at night before you go to bed
  • Use meditation and breathing exercises to calm your thoughts
  • Keep your bedroom at a comfortable temperature. 

More Tips

Did you know that flossing your teeth has been shown to reduce your chances of getting illness and disease including cancer? These two things might seem wholly unrelated, but it makes sense when you consider just how much-unwanted bacteria enter the body through the mouth. This is why our immunity takes a constant beating from foreign invaders, and it’s why you will improve your chances of avoiding disease if you floss regularly! More importantly, this demonstrates the way in which seemingly unrelated issues affect immunity – and why self-care is so important.

Another tip is to make sure you spend lots of time outdoors. This is because spending time outdoors will increase your production of vitamin D – a vitamin that actually works more like a “master hormone” than an actual vitamin. This is to say that it will stimulate the release of other hormones, many of which boost your immunity. This is why recent research shows that vitamin D is actually significantly more powerful than vitamin C when it comes to strengthening immunity.

Sunlight and fresh air can also benefit your health in other ways, and to once again draw upon circumstantial evidence: consider that people who spend a lot of time outdoors rarely seem to get sick! Being in nature is calming, restorative, and fun!

While you may not be able to practice all of these things, taking into account just a few of these strategies can be highly effective in helping you to support your immune system against viruses and disease. 

Remember, you are worth it! Good health is our most valuable gift. Don’t take it for granted. Make positive self-care a priority and enjoy every day to the fullest! Keep a “bank” of your positive thoughts, faith, and healthy habits so that you can count on them to get you through any challenges.  Here’s to your health!

The SoundPath Method™ is not intended to replace traditional medicine but is meant as a complementary therapy. If symptoms persist or an ailment is severe, patients are expected to consult a medical doctor. SoundPath Method™ is a system of balancing energy for the purpose of stress reduction, relaxation, and empowerment only and is not intended to replace the prevalent medical or physiological diagnosis and treatment. It is only meant to complement traditional care and to be used as a preventive system. Additional benefits are possible but not achieved by all participants.

Categories
Sound healing

It’s Time to get the Health Benefits of a Restful Night’s Sleep

Experts say that you should spend roughly one-third of your life sleeping. But what happens when we can’t achieve that goal? The irony of a good night’s sleep is that the harder we try to achieve one, the less likely it is to happen. So, let’s look at some ways to help you fall into a restful night of sweet dreams.

Take a look at your daily routine and you may discover what’s causing your sleeping issues. Are you under a lot of pressure or stress? Have you changed your diet or used a new medication? Think about the activities you’re involved in especially during the early evening hours to the moment your head hits the pillow. The goal is to increase your awareness about what you’re doing and see if it could be interrupting your sleep.

Are you playing catch-up with your work or having unresolved issues loop in your mind? If so, your mind may be on overdrive and unable to turn off.

Do you find yourself consumed with your work, or routine chores like laundry, house-cleaning, grocery shopping, and cooking? It’s valuable and imperative that you schedule in downtime for relaxation, and a time to stop for the day/night. Unresolved issues need to be addressed during waking hours so they can be released when it’s time to turn our mind off and sleep.

If you’re having trouble sleeping, but don’t want to poison your body with harmful sleeping pills, there are a number of natural sleep aids you could try instead. Read on to learn more about the best natural sleep aids that could have you sleeping like a baby again in no time at all!

Here are some of the best organic sleep aids available:

Lavender is an age-old remedy for insomnia. Lavender oil also works well in the bath.
Spray a calming lavender essential oil mixture into the air. Sprinkle a few drops of lavender oil on a cotton ball and slip it inside your pillowcase. Or, keep a lavender plant on your nightstand. Vanilla has similar effects.

Chamomile, which you can drink as a tea, has an amazing calming effect and promotes better sleep.

Chinese medicines & acupuncture can both help you get a better night’s sleep. Speak to your local Chinese herbalist, naturopath, or acupuncturist to tailor a treatment plan to suit your needs.

Try a natural sleep supplement. A small amount of valerian, an occasional small amount of melatonin or a homeopathic formula might help you shift your body’s habits so you can fall asleep and stay asleep with more ease.

It can be difficult to properly wind down from a busy, stressful day. Look into these tips and create your best technique that can help you transition into a more relaxed state and prepare you for sleep.

Advice about sleeping usually starts with telling you to go to bed and wake up on a consistent schedule because your body likes to slip into routines. In reality that’s much easier said than done.

If you have a day job, you pretty much have to get up when the alarm goes off. On the other hand, your bedtime is up to you, and that’s where your plans can get off.

For all your good intentions, you may find yourself binge-watching TV or shopping online until the wee hours. Then, you feel rotten the next day, and resolve to turn over a new leaf. Unfortunately, you spend the next night chatting on the phone with your BFF.

Remember it is most helpful to have a vision of your big goal (getting to sleep) and find small obtainable steps towards it. Begin by finding ways that work for you to gradually get into bed earlier. What you need are some new habits to break the cycle. Check out this list of things you can do to help you go to bed earlier and wake up fresh in the morning.

Decide on a schedule and rituals leading up to the time you want to be in bed. Make a commitment to yourself:

Turn off electronics at least a half-hour before bed. The light emanating from backlit screens like cell phones, tablets, and e-readers can trick your body into thinking its daylight and time to be awake. Your phone, tv, and electronic devices emit “short-wavelength enriched light” a/k/a/ blue light. This interferes with sleep because blue light seen at night contains photo-sensitive retinal ganglion cells which causes the body to produce less melatonin (which helps you sleep).

A few things to try if you resist shutting your screens off: there are apps that alter the specific rays emitted. Use the “nightshift” on your iPhone or invest under $10 for blue light blocking glasses on Amazon. Also check that your window covering blocks out any distracting light, if not, install room darkening shades or use an eye covering. Exposure to light causes your body to produce hormones that increase alertness, while darkness does the opposite.

Take a warm bath. Sitting for a few minutes, or a long soak, in warm water can help your muscles and mind relax and prepare for a restful sleep. Pouring in a calming bath oil such as lavender, or even better, Epsom or Himalayan Salt gives a very calming effect.

Take deep breaths through your nose, allow your stomach to expand, hold them for five to eight seconds, and exhale slowly through your mouth. Do at least four of these deep breaths after you switch off the lights, and you’ll feel your body and mind relax.

Make a Gratitude list. Focus your mind on what you can be grateful for and appreciate it, even more, especially the small things you haven’t noticed. Count your blessings rather than sheep and this will help you fall to sleep. Be grateful for the day that is ending, and know you did your best.

Don’t try to sleep. If your focus is on the struggle, you will get more struggle. Absorb yourself in a mindless magazine or book that is mildly entertaining or even a bit boring. Listen to an audiobook, find some white noise or nature sounds or:
Play a lullaby. Music is so effective at putting babies to sleep that there’s a whole category of songs for this purpose, regardless of your age. Any favorite slow, calming music will help distract your mind and hold it in peace. Karen Olson has effective music designed to help you fall asleep.

There are a time and season for everything. At the end of each day, let go of any of the lists in your head and know that tomorrow will be another beautiful day filled with opportunities to discover new things. Accentuate the positive and allow yourself to rest, you deserve it!

Karen Olson, Ph.D. and The SoundPath Method™ is not intended to replace traditional medicine but is meant as a complementary therapy. If symptoms persist or an ailment is severe, patients are expected to consult a medical doctor. SoundPath Method™ is a system of balancing energy for the purpose of stress reduction, relaxation, and empowerment only and is not intended to replace the prevalent medical or physiological diagnosis and treatment. It is only meant to complement traditional care and to be used as a preventive system. Additional benefits are possible but not achieved by all participants.
Categories
Sound healing

Stress Less and Sleep More: Tips for a Restful Night

Like the face mask protecting you, your loved ones and even strangers, your own unique
Musical Mask can guide you and guard you through the dangers and fears of COVID and the challenges it brings. Never before has your Musical Mask had such an opportunity to be “front and center”.
The “7 PM Clap” has organically brought the world together with applause, cheers and song.
Any type of noisemaking is permitted, indeed encouraged, in a true free-for-all of sound. It
expresses gratitude, connection, and emotions. Through it all, the result is music for the ears, and solace for the soul.
Everyone has a Musical Mask, whether they know it or not, and whether they show it or not. It encompasses the themes from your life, including your feelings, your emotions, and your
subconscious as well as conscious thoughts and beliefs. It is an expression of your own inner core, acting as a filter of intrusions from the outside world
This New Normal may not continue forever to include a raucous display of noises at 7 PM in
the spirit of community. But while it does, each of us has a chance to express ourselves to
enhance our Musical Mask. As we do, we will learn to deal with stress more effectively, to
sleep more soundly, and to express ourselves more clearly.
The most important thing, at this point, is just to “start” (and be yourself). Many people have their own musical agenda, very well focused. Others may not. If you are one of those who are unsure how to “start” just look around you. What do you have; what do you see; what kind of noise would you like to make? Forget about “music” for the moment. Do you want to hear a hard sound or a soft sound? Do you want something metallic, like bells or chimes or a gong or maybe just use a cardboard box to sound like a drum. Would you like rhythm or a cadence, like a drumbeat? Then, just grab whatever pots and pans, or plastic containers, or wooden spoons, a pillow, or whatever you choose, to join in the display.
Once you “start” you will quickly find it easy to adjust your sound, and your tools, to your own unique preferences. And to adjust your Musical Mask, to your subconscious mental and emotional needs and desires. For those who may seek a more specific regimen of proactive techniques, the following are “5 Tips for the Use of Intentional Music to Alleviate Stress During Uncertain Times”.

Grab a pot lid “gong”, and a container or pillow on which to “drum” with wooden spoons or your hands and throw some rice or beans into a plastic jar to shake as a rattle. Get your pen and paper ready. And select two pieces of music to listen to (one anguishing peace, and one more soothing): if you would like a suggestion, loop “Whirling Wonders” from Karen Olson’s Timeless Being CD and try “Serenity” from Karen Olson’s SongPath CD. Then, proceed to the Five Tips as follows:

1. Take time to PAUSE: please find a comfortable spot, close your eyes, take a deep breath through your nose, feel your stomach expand, relax your shoulders, hold, then slowly release the air through your mouth. Repeat and feel the air vibrate your nose when you inhale and vibrate your lips when you exhale. On your next exhale, release a deep sound. Continue repeating until you feel you are “finished”.
2. Grab your rattle and close your eyes, tune-in within and notice: Do you feel any stress anywhere in your body, does one part feel heavy? Shake your rattle starting at the top of your head, move around your body the best you can and work down to your feet. Dislodge any stuck energy. Open your eyes and move your body; get up and dance if you feel inspired. Let the sound and energy flow through you.
3. Grab your drum and wooden spoon and have your “gong” nearby. Close your eyes and bring up a feeling that causes you stress, breathe into that feeling, have a “conversation” as you release and express any frustration you may have through your drum and/or “gong”. Continue until you feel like your story and song has been sung.
4. Put on the agitated music as you freely write anything that comes through your mind, just expression, not well-crafted sentences, simple thoughts. When you are done, realize that your circumstances and thoughts are separate from you, and who you are. Now, tear up the paper and when you can, discard them.
5. Now, put on soothing music, get comfortable, lie down if possible. Feel yourself safely supported by what you are lying or sitting on. Bring up images of yourself experiencing a specific dream, vividly feel the details in your mind, create an image that you can hold. Listen deeply to the sounds and feel the vibrations inside of you.
Feel the sounds carry you across a rainbow bridge with the light creating all of the colors of your dream. Know that this is true, as you leave your fears behind and embrace the many new possibilities ahead.
https://soundcloud.com/karenolson/whirling-wonders
https://soundcloud.com/karenolson/karen-olson-songpath-09-serenity