Steven Shard first came to the downtown Yoga Love and Meditation Boutique while he was dealing with some persistent symptoms of sciatica in his lower legs.
This caused considerable muscular discomfort which was reduced by attending guided pranayama and meditation session.
However, recently Shard has also discovered an unlikely source of healing for a physical ailment at the yoga studio on Cleveland Avenue: Sound.
A studio staffer, Nathalie, introduced her singing bowls to her Pranayama & Meditation classes in early 2020, which she had purchased in India after taking specific classes on using them to heal.
For Shard, the now-familiar lilt enhances his overall experience of the meditation sessions and helps him focus on his consciousness by blocking the ‘noise’ of the world outside.
“They offer a welcome respite from the daily grind of life,” he says.
“And a bonus is that when in use during a session they block out any other ‘noise’ — whether that be internal or external — while practicing pranayama or meditation,” he says.
Kirsten French, who runs the studio, has now recently added a gong to the repertoire of instruments in her studio that uses the powerful medium of sound to heal the body and mind.
The gong, Shard says, helps to keep his awareness sharp, and just hearing and feeling the resonant gong is a wonderful experience.
“In essence, both the healing bowls and the gong heighten one’s awareness and focus, but in a tranquil manner, and essentially help heal one’s mind,” he says.
Healing is what was exactly on French’s mind when she ordered the gong from Tibet.
“Sounds make vibration and it travels easily through water, and sound vibration travels easily through our bodies because it is 60 per cent water,” she says.
The gong, along with the tuning forks and singing bowls, work by using the vibration of sound to get the body’s stagnant energy moving.
This stagnant energy shows itself as disease and discomfort, French says, and the vibratory power of sound is the catalyst that unblocks and releases the energy, allowing both the mind and body to heal again.
“The gong generats sound waves and vibrations and this sound bath helps you to enter an altered state of mind, where you work towards sense withdrawal,” she says.
“Once you have turned off your external senses, the music and its vibration help heal the energy that is stuck in your body.”
For the busy person who works too much, it is an opportunity to experience a deep sense of relaxation.
For the more advanced practitioner, it can be an opportunity to go deeper into the practice of meditation and enable a withdrawal of the body and the mind.
“It helps them withdraw and enter a deep state of meditation and actually still and quieten the mind,” she says.
French is now taking classes on how to use the gong so it can be used even more effectively to still the mind while its vibratory energy heals the body.
