intention

How to Heal with the Power of Intention in Sound Therapy: Part 5 – A Mini Case Study of Ruth

February 3, 2014 by Tony Nec

Thank you to everyone who has sent me comments and feedback on my Sound Reflections. This helps me to gauge what’s relevant and it’s very helpful ! 🙂

Some people have suggested that it would good if I wrote about some my personal experiences and research with intention and sound therapy, in addition to writing about what other people have written!

So, as an example, I thought I’d share with you what happened at the end of last week with a client who came to me for sound therapy. This was the first session that I held with the client.

This mini-case study demonstrates how effective it can be to set clear intentions both as a therapist and as the client, and how these two intentions fields interact and can be mutually supportive for the benefit of the client.

Setting the intent for the session

10 minutes before the time of the appointment with Ruth (not her real name) I cleared the energy in my treatment room, sat down and did some breathing and visualisation exercises to enter a still, quiet space within – what I call the cave of my heart. I prayed for the love of God – the Source Energy in our Universe – to fill up this cave in my heart and for the treatment to be for the client’s highest good.

The case history

Soon after she arrived, Ruth told me that she had received funding for this treatment from the Woman’s Rape and Sexual Abuse Centre, Cornwall. She had experienced childhood abuse which was adversely affecting her health and wellbeing. 2 years ago, difficulties in a relationship, triggered repressed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) which led to her experiencing the symptoms of fibromyalgia such as severe aches and pains throughout her body, anxiety and insomnia. A recent incident in another relationship had caused a flare up of these symptoms, which is why she came for this treatment.

While taking the details of her medical history and life story, I picked up on her saying that one of the things that she found very helpful was the relaxation period at the end of yoga sessions that she did for while in 2012. She also told me that she was seeing a psychotherapist once or twice a week and was currently on anti-depressant medication. She was also still involved in the group work work and receiving support at the abuse centre.

I asked her to say how much pain she was currently experiencing on a scale of 0 – 10. She said it was about 5.

The client’s intention

I then asked her what she would like to get from this treatment, expecting her to say something like ‘feel less pain’. Instead she said “peace”.

Usually, when I work with intention, I invite my clients to remember a time in the past when they have felt truly loved and supported by another, or when they have given that love to another. This helps to activate feelings of unconditional love, non-judgement and acceptance and that they can apply to themselves. However, in this case, an inner voice – my intuition – said don’t go down that route with Ruth. She’s experienced severe, traumatic abuse and relationship difficulties. You need to work in a different way this time.

So I asked Ruth how she would know if she felt ‘peace’ at the end of the treatment. After a few moments of silence, I asked whether she had felt that before in her life. She said that she had never felt it! I could tell from the misty look in her eyes that this was what she yearned for more than anything else.

However, I’ve found that for the treatment process to be effective, it’s helpful if the client can be specific in stating their intention and, in addition, they can also ground their desired outcomes in bodily feelings and sensations that they can experience and describe.

So, instead of focusing on what she called ‘peace’ I referred back to the times when Ruth had felt ‘relaxed’ at the end of the yoga classes that she had taken. I asked her if she could remember how that felt, and she said yes.

I then said: “Well, would you like to feel something like that again as a result of this treatment?” Her eyes started to shine a little brighter and she replied: “Yes that would be wonderful. I know that a lot of my pain and anxiety is caused by stress, and so feeling more relaxed would be great!”

When I said: “So shall we go for that then?”, she nodded enthusiastically. I explained in outline what would happen in the treatment session and asked her to lie down on the futon.

Building up the mutual field of intention

Before making any sounds, or doing anything obvious externally, I knelt quietly next to Ruth, repeated what I did before she arrived to activate feelings of unconditional love in my heart field and set the intention for Ruth to feel relaxed and at peace. I ‘sent’ that intention, combined with the feelings of unconditional love from my heart to her heart.

I took Ruth through a guided progressive relaxation process and then asked her to bring into her mind’s eye how she had felt at the end of the yoga sessions. I asked her to imagine in vivid detail how she would be if she had those relaxed feelings in her life – what that would be like…..and to know that this was actually happening now.

Finally I said: “Please let go of all those thoughts and feelings. Simply listen to the sounds.”

The sounds

I gave Ruth a 30 minute session with sounds, using a mixture of instruments and my voice. I worked with tingshas, one Tibetan singing bowl, 4 crystal singing bowls with interval of a 5 between each one while also toning with my voice; tuned pipes, again playing intervals of a fifth; gong, harmony balls, shaker, drum, harmony ball and ending with tingshas.

It was a creative, intuitive process. Although I had let go of holding the intention for Ruth, at times during the session I was aware of feelings of unconditional love for her pouring through me. It wasn’t at all like I was projecting my intentional thoughts and feelings into her. I was simply the channel for a bigger, universal loving energy to become more focused on Ruth in that moment.

The outcomes

After the treatment, I asked Ruth how she felt. She said that she had never felt so relaxed before in her life. I asked her what level of pain she now felt. She looked surprised and said that the pain had gone. She stood up slowly and said “Yes, it’s all gone!!”

In the next post in this series of Sound Reflections, I’ll cover the work of Dr Leonard Laskow, a medical doctor, who has developed a program called ‘Healing With Love”.

Sound Therapy Training

If you are keen to learn more about working with intention and healing sounds, please join me on one of our programs or workshops.

Please click here for more details about the up-coming workshops that we are running in the UK, Ireland and Croatia.

Please post your comments and thoughts on this in the box below…

How to Heal with the Power of Intention in Sound Therapy: Part 4

January 26, 2014 by Tony Nec

In the first 3 parts of this series on how to heal with the power of intention in sound therapy, I’ve started to address 3 key questions:

1. What is intent?
2. What are the key elements in creating an effective intent for healing?
3. How can we develop the ability to become more effective sound therapists by working with the power of intent?

In 4 Part, we’ll dive deeper into the second of these questions through exploring the work of Lynne McTaggart, an author who has a great talent for eloquently writing about recent scientific studies in quantum physics in layman’s language.

The Intention Experiment

Her book “The Intention Experiment” published in 2007 cracks the code for how to create effective healing with intention and also provides a detailed protocol for how to do it. Perhaps, just as importantly, she also outlines how we can develop the skills and state of being that is required for us to work in this way.

If you are going to read just one book on how to work effectively with the power of intent in your sound therapy practice, I’d recommend this one.

In the research carried out for her previous book ‘The Field’ published in 2001, McTaggart was looking for a scientific explanation for homeopathy and spiritual healing. She uncovered the makings of a new science which describes an extraordinary quantum field generated by the endless passing back and forth of energy between subatomic particles.

As she states “ this implies that all matter in the universe is connected on the subatomic level through a constant dance of quantum energy exchange. Each one of us is a packet of pulsating energy constantly interacting with this vast energy sea.”

She became especially curious about the role of consciousness – a substance outside the confines of our bodies – which is a highly ordered energy with the capacity to change physical matter.

The view of the new cutting-edge science described in ‘The Field’ was based primarily on research primarily carried out in the 1970s. So for this book on Intentions, McTaggart scoured the scientific literature for more recent experiments and discoveries in quantum physics.

She also turned to people who had mastered intention and who could perform the extraordinary, such as spiritual healers, Buddhist monks, Qigong masters and shamans, to understand the transformation processes they underwent to be able to use their thoughts to powerful effect.

Every one of the first 12 Chapters of the ‘Intention Experiment’ is filled with relevant findings from these sources. So in my opinion her conclusions cannot be dismissed as airy-fairy, new-age, hippie wishful thinking! There is real evidence for what she suggests.

The first thing to note is that there is widespread evidence that Intention can have an effect – it can change physical matter. Importantly for us, McTaggart gives prime importance to healing with intention, though her inquiry also goes beyond healing into ways that we can work with intention for creating a better world.

This means that the process, or protocol as I call it, that she outlines is directly relevant to us sound therapists working with sounds for healing.

The Intention Protocol

So, in McTaggart’s view, what are the key elements in creating an effective intent for healing?

In summary this is it:

* Create, develop and enter an intention space

* Power up your intentionality through meditation and practices like chanting mantras

* Move into peak focus through mindful awareness of the present moment

* Get onto the same wavelength as your client by focusing on compassion and making a meaningful connection

* State your intention and make it specific to the desired healing outcome

* Mentally rehearse every moment of it with all 5 senses

* Visualize, in vivid detail, your intention as established fact

* Time it right – get in the mood – work with intention and healing when you feel well and happy

* Move aside – surrender to the power of the universe and let go of the outcome

I cover each of these points in more detail in the small book that I’m writing on this subject for our Diploma in Sound Therapy training course run by the Colour of Sound Institute.

There are two additional parts to this protocol that I’ve found in my sound therapy practice and in our sound therapy training which increase the power of the intention process….

Firstly, add an additional element to the above process:

* Amplify the intention with appropriate frequencies by creating sounds with acoustic instruments and our voices, knowing that sound is the carrier wave for our consciousness i.e. our intent.

Secondly, invite your clients to also be involved alongside you as the sound therapist in the same process of working with intent in this way.

By doing this they will be taking greater responsibility for their own health and wellness and they will be adding another intention into the field which will magnify the force of the intention in a non-linear manner. It’s a bit like 1 + 1 = 3.

We must remember that the way this process works best, as Lynne McTaggarts points out, is to not to hold onto too tightly to the idea that intention is like a strong ‘ooomph’, or mental push, through which you project your thoughts to another person to ensure that your wishes are carried out.

We have to step aside from our personal egos, surrender the outcome of the process to a higher force and let go of our attachment to the outcome.

Thank you again for reading these Sound Reflections, and please do send me feedback by email to [email protected] or leave your comments in the box below…..

Warm wishes,

Tony

Do Your Own Intention Experiment

January 21, 2014 by Tony Nec

I’ve received a lot of replies to my last Sound Reflections post about the power of intention.

Many people commented on the work of Mesaru Emoto.

I particularly like the one I received from Wendy Wharton….

Please read what she said below……and take up the suggestion of doing your own experiment with water…..perhaps prove to yourself and your circle of family and friends that what you think and say really does effect the quality of water, and therefore ourselves too!

Hi Tony

I have two books by Dr Emoto and was lucky enough to attend a talk of his when he came to Bournemouth last year.

My friend after the talk did some experiments with rice. It was interesting and worked as he described in his book…..

The idea is to have two identical jars with airtight lids. You put the same amount of cooked rice in each jar.

One jar you mark with the words ‘love you ’, and one with ‘hate you’.

Leave them in the same place for 30 days without touching them.

Spend a few minutes with each jar at least twice a day, talking to them, using loving, kind words for the first one and nasty, aggressive words for the second.

Take some photos, before and after, to ‘prove’ what happens.

In Emoto’s his and my friend’ s experiment the one with love that was spoken to nicely the water remained clear and the rice stayed the same.

But the one with the word ‘hate’ and that was spoken to in a nasty way changed, and the water was black on the top like tar!!

experiment with rice and water inspired by mesaru emoto — experiment with rice and water inspired by Mesaru Emoto

Apparently the quality of the water started changing after about 12 days.

Have fun if you try, it is all wonderful stuff!!

Love and blessings,

Wendy x

Please give it a go and let me know what you find.

Send us your photos, and we’ll publish the best…

If you missed the last post about Mesaru Emoto and his ‘Messages From Water’, and you’d like to read it, please click the link below:

click here to go to our last webpost

How Do I Give Distant Healing With Sound Therapy?

January 20, 2014 by Tony Nec

Recently I received an email from a student who wanted some guidance on giving distance healing while using sound therapy.

Here is what she wrote:

Hi Tony,

My friend has asked me to do a distance healing for her friend and I am wondering of it’s okay to ask what sort of things you suggest for lower back disc problem and paralysed right leg and foot.

I have sent some energy and positive intention last night but would like to follow more formal procedure tomorrow.

I now know the Ephphata and veni sancte spiritus chants, found Namo Amitaba ‘I go to the buddah for light’ and was wondering what other ones I should consider?

Maybe Hraum and D notes for sacral area? Using C note for root chakra and grounding to address the lower part of body with the leg and foot problem?

I have heard there are family problems and in the back of my mind I am linking that to lower back issues -lack of support? So I would like to send comforting love to that issue too. Which is the best vehicle or ‘carrier wave’ to send that?

I am asking for your advice as I am not sure whether to use just one chant/mantra or a few? I have so many books and theoretical ideas but not much experience. I would welcome any tips of what you might do if that’s okay?

I used some bells and did a reiki meditation to prepare last night but wonder what’s up today as I have lots of problems with electrical appliances today and am feeling unsettled by it. Usually I only have these electrical field issues when I am overwhelmed, other times I find these mysterious happenings very interesting.

I try to observe and not judge and let things move through. Usually it’s not scary and I just observe but I’d like to feel sure I want to only send good energy out.

Love and light,

Here’s what I wrote in reply

Hi K

Thanks for your email.

I think for this distance healing to work well you ideally need to do a number of things:

1. Have some kind of personal connection with the recipient, ideally a phone call, or email conversation, at the very least know their full name and have a photo of them

2. Have a sense of their belief / faith system and align your chant and other sounds to that

3. Agree with the recipient a time for the distant healing to take place, and invite him / her to be still, open and receive it at that time

4. Then follow the sound intention transformation protocol that I’ve given you, and which is in Module 7 of the Certificate in Sound Therapy program.

5. Keep it simple. Stick to one chant per session, and maybe one instrument. The sound waves and vibrations don’t physically carry to the person. Your intention does carry though. The sounds amplify your intention. They help to align you with the ‘field’ and connect more fully and deeply with the energy of the recipient.

6. With distant healing don’t get too technical with what note to use etc.

7. Focus on developing feelings of love & compassion in your your heart and send that feeling out together with the intent.

8. Visualise that the recipient is already healed and what it feels like to be healed

9. Invite your friend who asked you to do the healing to also be involved at the same time, and any one else who might add their healing energy to the field.

10. Don’t get caught in analysis paralysis – you need to step into the flow, do it and make it happen. Admit to yourself “I’ve got enough books for now. I’ve seen enough YouTube videos for now.” Use the time and energy that you currently put into reading and being on the computer to practicing sound therapy and building up your experience.

The electrical happenings are probably a sign that you are ready for this work. Don’t give them too much significance.

I hope this is helpful.

Love and light

Tony

How to Work with the Power of Intent in Sound Therapy: Part 3

January 20, 2014 by Tony Nec

In part 2 of this series covering how to work with the power of intent in sound therapy, I outlined some of the key concepts that Jonathan Goldman illustrates.

To remind you, in his book, “The 7 Secrets of Sound Healing” he states that: “Intent is the energy behind the sound. It’s the consciousness we have when making the sound, which is then encoded upon it, travels on it, and ultimately is received by the person listening to it”.

MESARU EMOTO – MESSAGES FROM WATER

Mesaru Emoto PhD has perhaps produced the most vivid record demonstrating the power of intent. Since the mid-1990s he has conducted over 10,000 experiments with water and produced a number of books around the theme “Messages From Water”.

Emoto’s water crystal experiments consist of exposing water in glasses to different words, pictures, or music, and then freezing and examining the aesthetics of the resulting crystals with microscopic photography. Emoto claims that human consciousness can have an effect on the molecular structure of water.

This has massive health implications as our physical human bodies are composed of 60 – 70% water, and water is needed for most body functions, including to:

maintain the health and integrity of every cell in the body
keep the bloodstream liquid enough to flow through blood vessels
help eliminate the byproducts of the body’s metabolism, excess electrolytes (for example, sodium and potassium), and urea, which is a waste product formed through the processing of dietary protein
regulate body temperature through sweating
moisten mucous membranes such as those of the lungs and mouth
lubricate and cushion joints
aid digestion and prevent constipation
moisturise the skin to maintain its texture and appearance
carry nutrients and oxygen to cells
serve as a shock absorber inside the eyes, spinal cord and in the amniotic sac surrounding the fetus in pregnancy.

Emoto’s experiment conducted with polluted water taken from Fujiwara Dam in Japan is an astonishing study of the effect of intent and frequency. Photographs of frozen water crystals were taken before and after a Buddhist monk chanted and prayed for 1 hour.

Mesaru Emoto talking at the the World Congress of Quantum Medicine (notice the tuning forks)

This is how Emoto described what happened in a talk he gave to the World Congress of Quantum Medicine in Spring 2013:

Referring to the slides he showed during this talk, Emoto said….“And this is experiment at the Fujiwara Dam using the Kotodama spirit of word. Buddhist Monk. So he made a prayer of Japanese Shinto to that water of Fujiwara Dam. And I would say surprised after the experiment, even the quality of the water looked improved the cleaner. It is a crystal. Before the prayer it looked awful, frightening. It was like a ghost or something. Its eye, nose, mouth, and chin, ears, and hair. Can you imagine? So after one hour of the prayer, this is it. The change. It’s so beautiful. It’s unimaginable. How is this possible?”

Water from Fijiwara Dam, before offering a prayer and chanting

Water from Fijuwara dam after offering a prayer and chanting

Emoto called this an experiment of purifying water using Kotodama, which translates as “Word Spirit”. It is a discipline that originates within the Shinto religion and involves (amongst other practices) the intoning of sacred sounds, both syllables and individual vowel-sounds. A basic tenet of Kotodama is that sounds have an intrinsic value capable of affecting physical reality.

The photos in this experiment clearly show a significant change in the structure of the water crystals. How was this possible? It seems that through prayer, a clear intent for the water to be purified was set at the outset. The Buddhist monk, who in fact was the Reverend Kato Hoki, the chief priest of Jyuhouin temple, Omiya City, then created specific frequencies, by chanting the Kotodama sounds and remained in prayer for an extended period of time (1 hour).

As Jonathan Goldman says: “If a chanting priest can change the mudlike vibrations of a polluted water into the snowflake-like vibrations of clean water, we really should begin to realize the power of sound and consciousness to heal not only our physical body, but also the planet.” The Divine Name, 2010

In order for this to be useful to us as sound therapists, we need to unpack this experiment with purifying water more fully.

It might be helpful to learn more about these Kotodama sounds, to practice intoning them and to incorporate them into our sound therapy work.

A useful source of information for this is the chapter on Kotodama in the book ‘The Tao of Sound’ by Fabien Maman.

However this series of Sound Reflections is more concerned with the intent part of the sound healing formula (Frequency + Intent = Healing), so I’d like to focus here on the prayer dimension in this experiment.

What exactly do we mean by prayer and how is this relevant to sound therapy?

GREGG BRADEN: HEART-FELT FEELINGS OF COMPASSION

In ‘The Divine Matrix’, 2010, Gregg Braden recounts a couple of trips he made to Tibet in an effort to understand the key dimensions of prayer more fully. He visited numerous Buddhist monasteries, observing and participating in some of the practices

To an Abbot of one monastery he asked the question: “When we watch you intone and chant for 14 or 16 hours a day, when we see the bells, bowls, gongs, chimes, mudras and mantras on the outside, what’s going on in the inside?”

The answer he received was: “What you’ve seen is what we do to create the feeling in our bodies. Feeling is the prayer”

In other words prayer is not necessarily a verbal or visual construction, as we tend to think of it In the West. Commonly for us, prayer involves making a request for a specific outcome (perhaps healing) to God, or Source, however we may define it.

In Tibet however, feeling is the prayer. That’s very different. Prayer is a heart-felt phenomenon. And not just any feeling will do. In another monastery, Braden was told that the feeling being activated by all that toning and chanting and other sounds and practices is the feeling of compassion.

He was told that compassion is what connects all things. Compassion is both a force in the universe as well as a human experience.

And in order to achieve compassion, we must approach a circumstance without a strong expectation of the rightness or wrongness of a situation and its outcome.

Braden says: “The great secret to bringing the focus of our imagination, beliefs, healing and peace into present reality is that we must do so without a strong attachment to the outcome of our choice”.

PARADOX

There’s a paradox here.

We know from Emoto’s work and from many other sources, that we can change things; that healing can and does happen and that our consciousness, our intent, is a powerful force for change.

Yet if we strongly desire a specific outcome of healing, and hold onto that desire, the efforts we make to create it through sound may actually reinforced the reality that the disease, illness or pain is present.

A strong attachment to making the healing happen, entails a belief that a miraculous recovery is necessary. If the healing still needs to occur, the implication is that it hasn’t taken place yet…if it had we wouldn’t be asking for it our intention and prayers

No matter how well intentioned, it doesn’t matter how much we meditate, chant mantras, OM, make other sounds and pray for the recovery if the underlying message, the intention is ‘please let this healing happen’ – it’s not likely that it will.

As Braden says: “We must first have the feeling of healing and the answers to our prayers of well-being in our hearts as if they have already happened before they become the reality of our lives.”

So now we have uncovered more clues to how to work effectively with intention in our sound therapy practice.

LYNNE MCTAGGART – THE INTENTION EXPERIMENT

In my next post I’ll refer to the findings of Lynne McTaggart in her book ‘The Intention Experiment’. This will help to clarify the key factors that we need to get in place for ourselves and in our practice.

As this series of reflections develops I’ll also be adding in my own research, experiences, thoughts and feelings, so you’ll get more of my take on all this too.

Until the next time,

Tony

Please give me you feedback – you can leave your comments below or email me: [email protected]

How to work with Intent in Sound Therapy: Part 2

January 12, 2014 by Tony Nec

In Part 1 of this series on how to work effectively with the power of intent, I wrote that the more we understand and work with the dynamics of intention, the deeper the healing and the more effective our sound therapy practice will be.

In this post, I explore the work of Jonathan Goldman, one of the early pioneers of sound healing in America.

It was in his first book: ‘Healing Sounds – The Power of Harmonics’ (1992) that Goldman coined the formula:

Frequency + Intent = Healing

Frequency is the sound being created.

Intent is the energy or consciousness behind the sound.

Healing is the desired outcome from the sound.

What Goldman means by this formula is that healing outcomes are not solely related to the frequencies or notes that we create.

He states that “the intention of the person working with the sound is as important as the frequency of the sound that is being projected at a person to create resonant frequency healing.”

In other words, producing the same sounds with different intentions could lead to different healing outcomes. Equally, the same intention plus different sounds could lead to the same or similar healing outcomes.

For example, there are number of musical notation systems relating different frequencies to the same chakra. By holding a strong intent we can tonify, disperse and balance the chakras using any of these different notational systems.

In “The 7 Secrets of Sound Healing” (2008) he defines intent as “the energy behind the sound. It’s the consciousness we have when making the sound, which is then encoded upon it, travels on it, and ultimately is received by the person listening to it”

In his first book, Goldman mentions how he was introduced to the concept of intent by Steven Halpern PhD. Halpern’s graduate research in the early 1970s exploring the connections between sound, consciousness and healing was the first to employ the more subtle and sophisticated new technologies of brainwave biofeedback and Kirlian (aura) photography.

Based on this research and his work as a musician, composer and producer of healing music, Halpern authored two books ‘Tuning the Human Instrument’ (1977) and ‘Sound Health’ (1985). He coined the phrase, quoted by Goldman: “sound is a carrier wave of consciousness”.

This means, as Goldman says ‘that depending on where an individual’s awareness is placed when he creates a certain sound, the sound will carry information on that state to the person receiving it”.

“With this word ‘intent’, we are really talking about the consciousness of the person creating the sound.”

He goes on to write that “This encompasses the overall state of the person making the sound and involves the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual aspects of that person.”

in a nutshell, Goldman is saying that the state of consciousness that we are in when we give sound therapy is as important as the sounds (the frequencies) that we create in determining the healing outcomes for ourselves and our clients.

Moreover, our state of our consciousness is the product of 4 key aspects of our being:

physical
mental
emotional
spiritual

The more balanced and healthy we are in all these aspects, the more likely it is that there will be positive healing outcomes from our sound therapy work. This suggests that we do need to look after ourselves well, not just for our own benefit but for others too.

Goldman also indicates the value of developing the state in which we can align our intent with our highest selves, or the “Divine Will‘. When we are able to do this, we can by-pass the lesser aspects of our selves which may be out of balance, and which would hinder the healing process. When that happens we let go of the need for “My Will” to be done, and instead surrender to letting “Thy Will” be done.

In “The 7 Secrets of Sound Healing” and “The Divine Name”, Goldman refers extensively to the research and writings of Gregg Braden relating to the power of intent. I’ll cover all that in my next post …

Until then, I wish that you keep fit, well and happy…

Tony 🙂

PS Please watch out for this series of Sound Reflections and remember that I always welcome constructive feedback…..so please join me on this journey and send me your thoughts and suggestions……

Thank you