Today, almost all yoga centers offer meditations and relaxation concerts by gongs and Tibetan bowls. Many people always come to such meetings. And no wonder: the soothing sound of idiophones acts like a panacea for all symptoms of stress and exhaustion. How to explain the therapeutic effect of these instruments? Find out in our material!
Tibetan gongs and bowls affect humans on two different levels. It is the impact of the supertonic-rich sound on the auditory analyzer, and through it – on the human consciousness and psyche. This impact causes sound illusions, detachment from the rush of thoughts and the sensation of having no sense of time. The second level is the impact of the sound field itself and its vibrations on the human body. Under their influence, muscles relax and body sensations change.
These two interactions put a person into a kind of sound trance – a state that exerts a powerful healing and recovery effect. This trance spreads to different levels of organization of the human body, from the cellular level to the spiritual level.
So far, gongs and bowls have been used mainly by those operating with metaphysical and esoteric knowledge. Nevertheless, there have been studies in Europe and the United States confirming the therapeutic effect of the instruments.
It has been proven, for example, that the sounds of gongs and bowls lead to changes in the recording of electrical activity of the cerebral cortex (EEG). Sound bathing improves cellular respiration, improves blood parameters and helps people recover faster from many diseases, even cancer. However, the latter findings are not confirmed and representative enough to be accepted by the scientific community.
Gongs, compared to bowls, produce a much broader sound spectrum, making their healing power incomparably higher. To get the sound field produced by one medium-sized gong, we need at least ten bowls! Let’s use this metaphor: each bowl is like a separate fruit distinguished by its distinct smell and taste, and a gong is like a vegetable salad in which the flavors have been completely blended.
Is it worth playing the sounds of gongs and bowls? If you have a good recording and good quality equipment, such a sound bath can also have positive effects. Especially if one has had real contact with the sounds of bowls and gongs before. In that case, the recording can activate the neural networks that process the experience of a real sound bath and reproduce its effect. Provided, of course, that it is done with concentration and awareness.
People struggling with chronic stress, anxiety, restlessness, people with runaway thoughts who have trouble relaxing and unwinding derive particular benefit from sound baths. Meditations with gongs prove to be of great use to people engaged in creative activities who are in crisis and looking for new inspiration and ideas.
main photo: unsplash.com/Conscious Design
