The Power of Shamanic Sound Healing

Shamanic Sound Healing is any mode of organized sound which facilitates the transmutation of energy in the body. Common modes of this healing work include singing, chanting, gongs, singing bowls, flutes and whistles.

Sound healing works through frequency. The cells of our bodies are currently vibrating at a given resonance as a result of our physical, emotional and mental habits. The thoughts we think, the substances we ingest, the emotions we hold, express or repress, the experiences we live through and the environments we live in all affect us at a cellular level. These factors can leave long-lasting traces of themselves, remaining in cellular memory for days, weeks and even years.

Subtle Planes

What is held in cellular memory is not easily accessed by therapeutic intervention of the conscious mind or physical medicines. We may believe ourselves to be completely healed of a particular trauma on the emotional or physical level, yet our cells are still holding onto the experience, “convinced” that the traumatic situation is still happening. In such a case, shamanic modalities like sound healing can be tremendously beneficial, as the sound can permeate the cellular plane of the body, catalyzing transmutation of energy upon the subtle plane of frequency.

The reverberation of carefully chosen tones permeating our cells, tissues, muscles, bones and brain can yield very remarkable results both as to physical energy and the extension of consciousness. Our cells respond immediately to the changes in the magnetic field of the room when such sound is introduced, and this catalyzes changes in our nervous system, emotional state and physical bodies. On the spiritual plane, sound therapy directs the currents of energy in the aura, cultivating the chakras and the channels connecting them, which can be trained just like muscles.

This phenomenon happens by way of entrainment. If you press and hold down the key of a piano gently enough that it does not sound, and then simultaneously strike another key, the first key will sound at the same note as the second, even if they are octaves apart. This is entrainment. When an opportunity is created, one vibration will entrain to another so that both reverberate at the same frequency. In shamanic sound healing, the patient is put into a light trance or deeply relaxed state so that when the sound is introduced, the cells of the body will then entrain to the frequency of the sound.

Primordial Frequencies

It is important to realize that although we hear sound by means of ears, we are actually bathed in the sea of the vibration that is sound all the time— even when our ears or minds do not register it. The sound which strikes upon our eardrums is only a small part of the actual sound vibration, and it is this greater part which is striking both upon one’s body and upon the surrounding surfaces. To the ordinary person this may seem meaningless, but to the spiritual seeker this is quite an important consideration.

As we encounter a given note, our auras are infused not only with a sound but with a frequency, for each note is a sonic expression of an archetypal force. A frequency is not a static entity, but a mode of operation, a way of being, a character, a state of change or tendency in movement. Therefore its manifestations are innumerable as it may turn up in any and all spheres of life activity.

We may encounter the self-same frequency through different organs of perception or faculties of mind. A frequency can manifest as a certain color to the eyes, a certain sound to the ears, a certain mood in the emotional faculty, a certain medicine in the plant kingdom, a particular number, symbol, gesture or deity in a ceremony, or a certain mode of awareness, perception or relating in a given situation. The frequency which represents visually as GREEN as a color also has a manifestation in the mineral kingdom and in the celestial zodiac; there is a note which is the sonic mode of this frequency, and this frequency also corresponds in esoteric psychology to an entire mode of consciousness, quality of idea and domain of life experience. We have all felt the possession of one of these archetypal modes, as though we are being worn as a garment by some primordial agent taking action through us; this is the experience of entraining to a given frequency.

Mind-Body Connection

As we introduce a frequency into the energy field, it creates changes in consciousness, which in turn creates changes in our physical body or circumstances.  As we enter the “portal” to the dimension of a certain frequency, we can translate it on physical, emotional and mental levels. Depending on how we are translating the frequency, we may be initiated into a certain philosophy or way of thought; we may have a revelation through an epiphany or a vision. We may discover a deeper level of feeling or emotion that we had been unaware of, recover lost memories, or feel subtle, nearly physical sensations like heaviness, buzzing, floating, spinning, heat, cold, etc. All of these are different ways our auras translate, “metabolize” or integrate the frequencies that are infusing into our fields through the vehicle of sound.

These different effects have been studied and interpreted as the results of varying brain wave states. Scientists have observed that certain activities seem to transpire when certain brain wave states are induced through sound. Beta states correspond to relaxation, Alpha states correspond to healing, Theta states to encounters with the Higher Self and spiritual awareness, and Delta to deep sleep.

This principle of sympathetic resonance or entrainment is the key to all magical, ritual and shamanic work, all metaphysical healing and all esoteric study. Simple practices like meditating upon a color or humming a sound have far reaching consequences. Volume and timbre also affect the frequency which is carried into the body. Experiment how different pitches, instruments, vowel sounds, volumes and octaves affect your mind, heart and body.