If your back hurts, a singing bowl could help

Imbalance in your chakras is said to cause pain. Try lying down for some zen healing

Iconfess, I’m not really the type for whom meditation works. I envy those for whom it does, but generally I find myself thinking about all sorts of random things even during ‘pranayam’ (breathing exercises in yoga). So I was sceptical when I decided to go for the Tibetan singing bowls/gong meditation class. But the children’s holidays were just around the corner and that called for desperate measures. If there was some way I could fill up on Zen to last me through the insanity of summer, I was going to give it a try. So off I went.

The class was held at the house of the practitioner. As soon as I entered, I was pleasantly greeted, both by the lady of the house and by the aroma of burning camphor. The beautiful house smelt divine. I was intrigued by the very pretty paraphernalia of the class laid out on a mat on the floor. There were several metal bowls of different sizes and colours. One striking carved, large bowl was filled with water. There were several wooden mallets of various sizes, some covered with felt and some with fur. There was two huge gongs, one on top of another, balanced in a frame, with Tibetan (Uchen) characters on them. And there were two pipes — a wooden one with elegant carvings and another of metal, with rings attached to it.

Since I was the only newbie in the group of eight women who had come to be a part of this experience, the instructor explained to me that the different bowls corresponded with different chakras (energy centres) within our body. Imbalance in the chakras is said to cause distress or pain. When the bowls are struck on the side with the mallets in an upward sweeping motion and the gongs are struck with the longer mallets in an outward sweeping motion, a wide range of vibrations are produced. Our body, being receptive to the sound, tries to match the frequency of the sound vibrations and in this way, the chakras get balanced, leading to the healing of the emotional or physical pain the chakra imbalance may be causing us. In scientific terms, this is known as brainwave entrainment or synchronisation. Brainwave entrainment technologies are used to induce various brain states, such as relaxation or sleep.

She patiently explained this theory, demonstrated how the sound is made and then she invited me to try making the bowl sing. She guided me as to how to hold the mallet and where to strike and how to rotate it against the bowl. I followed the instructions on the bowl filled with water and to my amazement, I could see the a ripple forming in the water and after a while, some droplets of water started jumping up, as if the water was boiling! When I touched the bowl it was vibrating. And of course there was this sound.

We started the session with the chanting of three simple sounds, and then the instructor made us lie down on our yoga mats and guided us through a relaxation technique called ‘yoga nidra,’ in which one relaxes each part of the body by turn starting from the little toe and ending with the head. The mind is also supposed to be stilled in this process. The theory goes that the more relaxed you are, the more receptive to the sound vibrations and there is potentially more healing.

After the yoga nidra, the instructor started playing on the bowls. The notes were gentle in the beginning. It was sort of like listening to ‘sa re ga ma’. Then they started rising, finally rising to a crescendo. I was surprised at how loud the sounds were. It reminded me alternately of listening to a western classical music concert and to a, well, gothic movie soundtrack. See what I mean? Clearly, I am not the meditating type! I was also conscious of other peoples’ breathing, the rumbling of someone’s stomach, the hum of the air con and the chirping of the birds outside. And I started feeling cold, having forgotten to bring a blanket along with my yoga mat as instructed by the teacher.

But the sounds were interesting. At times, they sounded like the ringing of a temple bell. At times, they were like falling rain. Since we were supposed to be relaxing, I guessed eyes were supposed to be closed but I couldn’t help cheating by opening them occasionally to see what was making that particular sound. The sounds flowed into one another and had an echoing quality about them. This is called a ‘sound bath’ in the west.

This went on for half an hour and then the instructor stopped making the sounds and slowly brought us back to the world and real life. Once it was over, she asked me how it had been. I told her honestly that personally I find it boring to lie down and just listen. But certainly, taking half an hour to lie down with eyes closed and focusing on music was relaxing and energising.

One of the other participants shared with me that she does these sessions regualrly, once a month. She even does one-on-one sessions, where the vibrating bowls are placed on or touched to your body. She said that her chronic back pain has vanished after a one-on-one healing session.

Overall, it was an interesting experience. I don’t know about the chakras and the healing, but one thing is for sure, given a chance to play those bowls myself, and make those sounds, I will definitely go for the class again. For now, I’m just hoping that enough Zen has gotten stored, even if subconsciously, to last through the boys’ shenanigans through the summer. One can always hope, right? To contact the instructor of the Tibetan gong meditation session, email Mina at minadasani@gmail.com

In scientific terms, this is known as brainwave entrainment or synchronisation. Brainwave entrainment technologies are used to induce various brain states, such as relaxation or sleep