This summer, I happened upon the healing sounds of Yogetsu Akasaka on the Mindvalley app. Yogetsu is a Buddhist monk who combines his voice with the handpan, a type of steel drum, and I found the music incredibly relaxing.
I’ve often heard about the clarity that can come through meditation, but listening to Yogetsu gave me a new appreciation for what a truly calm mind feels like.
Then, within one week, I received three emails about the therapeutic benefits of sound.
Okay, universe…I’m listening!
One of them was from the Living in the Miracle Zone podcast, featuring Marc Gibson, who works with sound technologies designed to help shift the nervous system from fight-or-flight into rest-and-digest.
What caught my attention was how Marc first became interested in healing sounds.
He had been a drummer in a band when they were booked to play at a school for deaf children. The band was told to put in earplugs and play as loudly as possible.
To their surprise, the children began dancing. Some even lay on the floor, feeling the vibration.
Marc realized music isn’t only auditory – it’s somatic. We don’t just hear music…we feel it.
And perhaps that makes perfect sense. One of the first sounds we experienced before we were born was our mother’s heartbeat.
But what if our relationship with sound goes even deeper?
Our cells may be listening too
The second email came from Lynne Mc Taggart, introducing her upcoming book, The God Notes.
She begins by discussing how immune cells have been found in the inner ear strengthening the connection between music and our physiology.
She also discusses fascinating research suggesting that cells produce sounds and communicate with one another. During periods of stress, cells produce higher frequencies and faster vibrations.
She shares research exploring how different types of music and frequencies affect our cells. According to the research she discusses, red blood cells responded favourably to techno beats with a low female voice, while certain types of music affected cancer cells differently. Cancer cells liked Mozart but Beethoven’s Fifth, killed breast cancer cells.
Other studies have shown that certain tones may decrease inflammation, influence the gut microbiome and alter the metabolism of cells.
Interestingly, fat cells were among the most affected by certain notes.
Perhaps sound is doing far more than simply entertaining us.
Maybe our bodies have been listening all along.
Thank you for reading.
