A Q&A with Sharon Carne on bringing harmony to your health; how sound can help healing. Listen to the complete podcast and view the video at http://www.understandingautoimmune.com/Carne
Sound is food for your nervous system.
Leaf blowers, car horns, and fingernails on chalkboards can drive your body into instant ‘fight-or-flight’ and test your sanity. Harsh sounds elevate stress levels and create imbalances in the nervous system and physical body. Unpleasant sound can even lower immunity and raise our blood pressure.
Sharon Carne, founder of Sound Wellness shares with us how sound and music can be easily applied to your everyday life – to reduce stress, help you focus, energize you, and support your health.
S. SAYLER: Let’s explain exactly what sound wellness is. How does sound help us heal?
S. CARNE: Sound is defined as vibrational energy. And we know that everything is in vibration. Especially at the quantum level ─ the atomic level ─ everything is moving and everything is vibrating.
Sound is defined as vibrational energy. It’s an energy and in order for it to move, it has to push against atoms and molecules. And as it pushes against atoms and molecules, it sets everything into the vibration that is why it’s called “vibrational energy.”
The cool thing about sound is that it’s one of the few energies that can actually change how matter itself vibrates.
S. SAYLER: This is fascinating. Just a couple of weeks ago, we had Dr. Nelson Bradley from the ‘Emotion Code’ and he was sharing how our bodies are ─ my words, not his ─ just big lumps of energy and how when we move some old trapped emotions out, our energy changes. It’s a vibrational / energy thing that happens.
That’s going to lead me to my next question, which might be a little rabbit hole, but I know you’re always game for that. Recently, a friend took me to see an energy healer. One of the things this person used on places in my back, especially my low back, were tuning forks. I heard the tuning fork, and then I feel the vibration on my back and my first thought was, uhuh. But I was absolutely shocked and amazed at how fast things changed in that place that she was working on. Can you give me a little more reason why?
S. CARNE: That’s a fabulous question. I’ve worked with tuning forks and bowls and the voice for many years. Tuning forks are like lasers that send a vibration to a specific area. Sound is also food for your nervous system.
I want to share a story by John Beaulieu. He has developed protocols and many tuning forks and ways of using tuning forks. Dr. John Beaulieu is a music therapist and a naturopathic doctor. In his work as a music therapist, he had the opportunity many years ago to spend 500 hours ─ not all at once ─ in an anechoic chamber.
An anechoic chamber is a small room that has absolutely no outside influence. So it’s completely silent. It’s completely dark. It’s void of any noise, any sound, any light, anything from the outside ─ no fans, no nothing. He spent 500 hours in there. As a trained musician, he also practiced listening to all of the sounds that became more evident from the body that we don’t usually hear because there’s so much sound and all kinds of stimuli around us.
He discovered that the nervous system ─ the brain, the spinal cord, and all of the activity of the neurons ─ has several different sounds; and these sounds are in what’s called “intervals” or spaces between notes…. One nerve is at ‘this note;’ another nerve might be at ‘this one,’ and another one might be at ‘this one.’ All of these nerves are sounding at different ranges of sound.
One day, he had a pair of tuning forks with him because he wanted to play with the tuning fork sound. And he was in a bit of a bad mood. So he sat down and he started to listen to his nervous system and it was like the static on the radio when you’re in-between stations.
He said, “When I was angry or upset, my nervous system was like static.” And you can imagine how that would create that feeling. Then, he tapped the tuning forks on his knees and then he brought them to his ears and he listened while the sounds of his nervous system changed immediately to match the sounds of the tuning forks. He developed all kinds of ways of using tuning forks to tune your nervous system to different effects.
Your body is a natural resonator for sound. The sound goes through you so sound also changes the tone as you use sound on it.… I have two forks with two intervals here or spaces. One is a C and a G. The longer one here is a C and the shorter one is a G. In the musical scale, that creates a perfect fifth. And a perfect fifth is the sound that is found to be really stimulating and energizing in a way.
There is also some very interesting science that John Beaulieu did with a neuroscientist. They teamed up to find out if the sound of tuning forks would stimulate the nitric oxide cycle in the body. The nitric oxide cycle is a natural cycle and it’s absolutely essential to our health. There are reams and reams of research in the last twenty years or so that show how important it is. There are many medications that help to stimulate nitric oxide. It’s involved in almost every process in our body ─ that molecule. So it’s really important.
They found that whether they were pointing the sound to live cells in a petri dish or they had human subjects listening to the sound, the sound of this perfect fifth ─ two of the sounds they studied ─ stimulated the nitric oxide cycle in less than thirty-seconds completely naturally.
S. SAYLER: How can people work with tuning forks to create changes in the body for the better?
S. CARNE: Working with sets of tuning forks takes a little training and understanding of the different sounds that you can create with them.
In the studies, the perfect fifth has been shown to create such a profound difference in the body; working with the perfect fifth is so simple and it’s so supportive to your health and well-being because it stimulates that nitric oxide cycle.
One of the things I love about this perfect fifth ─ we do have them on our website because, as a share about them, a lot of people want to explore. Once they feel the sound in their bodies and if it feels supportive, it’s a tool that you can use.
And if you keep them on a kitchen counter or the bathroom counter, it takes thirty seconds to use them. Usually, I spend a minute and I’ll tap them. We have a piece of rubber, an activator, you tap them on and then listen till the sound stops. So you just place them by your ears. Then, I like to switch hands and then tap them again and then listen.
The interesting thing is that each ear hears from the other side of the brain so that when you switch the sounds, then, you’re connecting the hemispheres of the brain in addition to stimulating the nitric oxide cycle.
So that takes about a minute as far as creating a complete change in your nervous system that lasts pretty well all day ─ some people find a couple of days.
S. SAYLER: I had to laugh there when you said in the bathroom. I thought, “Oh, right. What are you doing in there, honey?” I think I’ll do it somewhere else like in the kitchen or the living room.
You’re holding the fork right by your ears. Would other people be affected standing nearby, in a different area or close by even though they’re not holding it up to their ears?
S. CARNE: No, because the forks are very quiet. When you tap them, you can’t hear the sound until the fork is close to the ear or you feel the vibration when placed on your body.
S. SAYLER: You’re holding it about four or five inches from your ear. That’s pretty close. If we use tuning forks ─ you mentioned the benefits could last for a day or two ─ is there a way to overdose on it?
S. CARNE: On the research on the perfect fifth, in the studies that I’ve read on how the perfect fifth stimulates that cycle, you don’t really need very much. One minute is really all you need.
If you are using the tuning fork on the body several times in one place ─ so you tap the tuning fork; you place it on the body till the sound stops; then, you tap again and place it on the body till the sounds stop. And if you do that more than twice, they’ve discovered in the resources that it will depress the nitric oxide cycle. I didn’t see anything, in particular, about the perfect fifth but, in the research, they did mention this.
Now, you can place the fork on different points so that for someone with arthritis, for example, these are wonderful on joints. I have arthritis in my fingers. Joints, like your wrists are easy to work with and forks can really be supportive of problems with the wrist by placing it on the wrist.
Elbows; sometimes, muscle tension ─ these forks that you use on the body are my favorite for shoulder massage ‑ just a gentle shoulder massage by placing the fork in different areas where the muscles tend to be really tight.
S. SAYLER: I’m amazed that the shift that we heard from the perfect fifth is still hanging in there for me. I can still feel a difference from how it was when I started the show. So, obviously, it has a fair amount of residual staying power.
That’s the amazing power of tuning forks with Sharon Carne from SoundWellness.com. Find the complete audio and video of this interview http://www.understandingautoimmune.com/Carne
And, thank you for coming with us on another great adventure in Q&As. Remember to join the Courage Club!
In joy;
Sharon
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