• Call: (65) 6287 6268

Sound, Color And Energy Exercises- Nourishment For Body, Mind And Spirit

Chiu-Nan Lai, Ph.D.

In recent years I have observed and also heard from others that they are seeing a deterioration in the physical, emotional and mental health of their loved ones. They are not as robust, positive, happy and optimistic as before. The following symtpons have become more common: physically – premature aging, prone to injury and accidents; cognitively – forgetful, scattered-minded, delusional and suicidal; emotionally – depressed, irritable, rigid, disinterest in life, feeling lost, a lack of ability to think independently and creatively; indecisive and hesitation in one’s action. It is not incidental, but a consequence of a damaged environment, as well as lifestyle, dietary choices and actions that are not in harmongy with nature.  Furthermore, the exponential advancement in wireless tele-communications. What was considered abnormal in the past is becoming more and more normal.

Ancient Chinese medicine had a clear understanding of the intimate relationship between  the emotional, mental and physical well-being and the elements of nature -earth, water, fire, wind. Emotional states -joy, anger, sadness, fear, worry and mental processes are connected to internal organs and 5 Elements (五行). When all is in harmony, mental and emotional states will be in balance.  One is optimistic and proactive.  A damaged eco-system injures our etheric body, disrupts the balance of our vital organs – injury to the heart causes over excitement; other corresponding emotional states related to imbalance are: lung – sadness; liver – anger; spleen – critical & unforgiving, or mental agitation; kidney – fear.

The close relationship between the consciousness and vital organs is expounded in a classic of Chinese medicine (黃帝內經中素問篇) in the following way: heart – consciousness ; liver – spirit ; spleen – volition ; lung – will power ; kidney – determination. The five vital organs are not restricted to physical organs (heart, liver, spleen, lung, kidney) but also the functioning of the meridians and their related organs. For example, eyes belong to liver meridian, ears – kidney, nose – lung, brain – heart, tongue – spleen.

Meridian

Sense organ

Element

Heart

Brain

Fire

Liver

Eyes

Wood

Spleen

Tongue

Earth

Lung

Nose

Metal

Kidney

Ears

Water

Relationship between 5 vital organs and elements are: Liver (Wood), Spleen (Earth), Heart (Fire), Kidney (Water), Lung (Metal); and 5 elements follow a mutually-productive or –destructive relationship. For example, wood enhances fire, fire enhances earth, earth à metal, metal à water, water à wood.  The opposing relationship applies as follows, water opposes fire, metal opposes wood, etc; the 5 elements rely on the laws of generation and destruction to maintain its balance. When the 5 elements and vital organs lose their balance, the resulting effects on the consciousness are:

Excessive fire – likes to complain; deficiency in fire – madness

Excessive earth – stubborn, obsessive with the past; deficiency in earth – poor memory

Excessive metal – delusional, obsessive with future; deficiency in metal – lacking in will power, indecisive and fearfulExcessive wood – pride and strong self-defensiveness; deficiency in wood – low self-esteem

I found the answers to common maladies faced by modern people in ancient Chinese medicine. How do we heal? How do we harmonize body and mind? This is the next important question. Apart from physical body, human being possess etheric body and other subtler bodies that are well understood by ancient cultures, Anthroposophy and Chi Gong. Radio waves and electromagnetic fields are especially harmful to these subtle bodies and indirectly harming our physical body. Our physical body communicates to other subtle bodies through chakras (energy centers). I observed that many people have closed chakras, so naturally they are not able to communicate with the subtle bodies, nor receive energetic nourishment and higher guidance from the spiritual realms. These subtle bodies are channels linking us to spiritual realms that we connect for guidance and communication. Damage to the subtle bodies cut us off from the spiritual realms, and we lose direction in our life and all our efforts may bring harm to the world.

Opening our chakras is a first step to repair and healing. I have introduced Dr. Valerie Hunt’s method of chakra balancing exercise in 1999 Nov issue of Lapis magazine; it was also published in “Dr. Lai’s Health Tips”. It is best for people in modern age to do it daily.  You can do it once while lying in bed before sleep, and do more whenever you need it during the day. If the chakras remain closed for a long period of time, the corresponding body parts will experience blockage and ailment. Knees that have closed chakras will experience pain, weakness in legs. With navel chakra closed, one experiences poor digestive and excretory function. Anyone who has received anesthesia will have closed navel chakra. Other than doing the chakra balancing exercise, one needs to ask another person to assist. This assistant does the chakra balancing exercise together, then place the right hand over the naval area and pull away the toxic remnants of anesthesia in the etheric body.
We can also use sounds and colors to heal the subtle bodies. Ancient Indian culture believed that human beings come from the heaven of light and sound. Ancient Chinese medicine also believed in the healing effects of sounds and colors on our body systems. 5 vital organs correspond with 5 heavenly sound notes: “Heaven has five sounds and human has five organs”.  Each sound and organ has a corresponding color. The very first Chinese medicine was music, with herbs added on at a later stage. (This explains why the Chinese character for ‘medicine’ is a combination of the words ‘music’ and ‘herb’). The musical notes in olden times were determined by varying length of bamboos grown in a particular location, and expressed by 5 notes (宫商角徵羽). Here’s a table showing the relations of modern notes, colors, vital organs and elements:

Meridian

Element

Sound

Color

Heart

Fire

#C

Red

Liver

Wood

#A

Blue-Green

Spleen

Earth

#F

Yellow

Lung

Metal

#G

White

Kidney

Water

#D

Blue-Black

Harmonious colors and sounds have nourishing effects, and disharmonious ones have negative effect. Observe and hear what colors and sounds are there in the environment, and what colors and sounds your body needs. The earth is in the note of F. You may use F tuning fork to touch a wall to cleanse a room. First, hit it on a soft surface (like one’s thigh) and touch the wall with the handle side.  From root chakra to rest of body below it, our body needs F note for balancing. We can place tuning fork at coccyx or dantian (below navel).

The human voice is the best instrument and most effective for healing. A French musician-acupuncturist together with a scientist researched on the effects of sound on cells in laboratory. Red blood cells show the biggest reaction to human voice, especially note A440. The red blood cell radiates at every A note, and it radiates in response to  musical instruments that sound the A note. Cancer cells are intolerant of musical scale; generally they will explode at the 6th and 7th note on the scale, while normal cells do not. Singing is good sound nourishment; try it from a lower note to high note, and then high to low. If you observe mindfully and notice which note allows you to lose yourself.  Repeat that note and you will hear a lower reverberation. That reverberation is the note fundalmental and unique to each one of us. Sounding this note helps us to recover and uplift rapidly. Some illnesses are a result of a certain sound deficiency; if we are able to discover that missing note, sounding it will certainly be a good medicine.

Observing the relationship of the 5 notes and vital organs, and the principle of generation and destruction in 5 elements, we can have a good idea of how to supplemjent the note.  For weak spleen and stomach, enhance the fire (heart) #C and earth (spleen) #F. We can use simple musical instrument or tuning fork to sound the notes. Other than musical notes, vowels are also good nourishment for internal organs. We can combine vowel sounds (e, o, AH, -A, EI, OO) with the musical notes.

We are able to receive colour nourishment from colour gels, nature and our imagination. Vegetation grown in the wild and from organic farming is also a source of colour supplement. The following guided imagery exercise is adapted from Dr. Mitchell May and Harold McCoy’s methods. It helps to repair our etheric body, especially after chemotherapy treatments:

Imagine yourself lying on a beach. Clear turquoise water washes over you, cleansing away all your pain and ailments, fear, all negative emotions and mental pollutions. Turquoise color has the effect of purification and transformation; we can use it to cleanse ourselves and the environment. To cleanse the environment, imagine a turquoise colored wind blowing away all impurities. Then imagine the sea water turning red, radiating red light. Immerse yourself in the red sea water, absorbing all the redness that you need. Then have the sea water turning sky blue colour. Likewise, immerse yourself in the water of sky blue. Next, turn it to yellow, green, orange, magenta and indigo, etc. Finally, immerse yourself in water radiating all 7 colours of light. Imagine the oceans and all waters on the planet are made up of these 7 colors, mending and purifying the earth.
Combining color and sound therapy with guided imagery and energy (chi) exercises help to open and repair our subtle bodies. There are many energy exercises in Chinese culture;  waidangong is a popular one. Spiritual growth and joy relies on a healthy body and subtle energetic bodies. When these bodies are injured by electro-magnetic waves and radio waves, our consciousness degenerates to a depressed state; not only that we cannot receive spiritual wisdom. We may even reject it.  Many of the younger generation feel lost, are addicted to the virtual world, and often do not have the warmth and joy of being human.  They feel disconnected from nature, and are isolated, antisocial and cruel in human society. These younger generations are in dire need of healing their subtle bodies, with therapeutic use of colors, sounds and energy exercises, thus restoring their healthy humanity,  mind and emotions. I hope more parents and grandparents are aware of these, and begin the preventive work of protecting our younger generation.

http://www.lapislazuli.org/TradCh/magazine/201011/20101101.html