by DeAndrea Muhammad
Music and sound have been demonstrated to aid with healing in various studies and with diverse pathologies. Music and sound affect the brain in terms of mood and feelings. In addition, music and sound therapy have also been studied with physical diseases of the body.
The violin can produce many different frequencies based on the precise placement of the bow. The violin’s strings are tuned to produce unique sound frequencies in a way that is reliant on finger placement along the fingerboard. Based on its architecture, the nature of the strings, and tuning, the sound frequencies produced by different violins could be highly diverse. Similarly, active neuronal dendrites, which have active channel conductances, are tuned to different input frequencies in a way that is dependent on the synaptic input’s dendritic position.
Stress and tension have been linked to heart disease, diabetes, addiction, and mental health difficulties. Meditation, including mindfulness-based meditations, singing bowls, and gongs, has been demonstrated to be effective in producing a relaxation response, reducing anxiety, and improving overall well-being. The body’s physiological response to relaxation includes reduced blood pressure and activation of the parasympathetic nervous system to counteract the fight-or-flight response.
According to Goldsby, the use of Tibetan bowls, crystal bowls, and gongs elicited a better mood, reduced tension, decreased anxiety and physical pain, and increased overall spiritual well-being. Though the rationale for the bowl’s therapeutic effects was not identified, current theories explore the option of the effects of binaural beats. The brain entrains to the hertz difference between tones played in each ear, driving the brain into deep relaxation brainwave states like beta waves or even meditative or trance-like brainwave states like theta waves.
Music and sound have also been used to assist in healing the physical body. In children with cystic fibrosis, music was seen as an effective adjunct to treatment. Montero-Ruiz found that instrumental recorded music that had been deliberately produced, played, and compiled was an effective airway clearance therapy supplement.
Its use improved the children’s and parents’ pleasure of therapy while also lowering the perceived time required to complete it. It was also concluded that using a music CD might be viewed as a cost-effective solution in terms of avoiding costs associated with respiratory infection exacerbations.
On the 88th birth anniversary of the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, the world was able to witness the mastery and skill of the Beethoven Violin Concerto. On social media, it was expressed that all should continue to listen and watch the Beethoven Violin Concerto because it would provide healing.
Music can give healing because it is linked to the coding of our DNA, explained Mother Tynnetta Muhammad in her column “Unveiling the Number 19.” She stated, “DNA Code breaks down into a chemical, physical structure of 64 triplets, which has a resonance field that can be likened to a whole note of music, (1, 1/2, 1/8, 1/16, 1/32, 1/64).”
Man did not invent but instead discovered the laws of musical harmony. These principles represent the underlying harmony in all of creation, just as numerical harmony was not invented by man but is a natural element of it. Those who notice such harmonies are filled with awe for the Creator’s beauty. Beauty, whether in the form of sight or music, awakens in us a sense of wholeness and harmony in nature, of which we are apart. The way we react to beauty is ingrained in our DNA. It’s a natural reaction to God, wrote Mother Tynnetta.
While the world is fighting a global pandemic, Min. Farrakhan is offering healing to the world, not only through the sound of words but also through music. The word travels through our ears to our intellect so that we may heed the proper guidance, while his musical sound travels to our very essence.
Scholars of today have found music and sound to be statistically significant in healing the mind and body, and the scholarship of the students of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad has elevated these studies to include the mind, body, and spirit or the entire being.
In a 2018 interview published in The Final Call, Min. Farrakhan stated, “If I understand your question, music has great power to calm the troubled spirit; to lift people beyond where they are and to give people motivation to overcome a bad spirit, a bad idea, a bad thought.” Let the music play.
Sister DeAndrea Muhammad, MSN, RN PMH-BC, has worked in psychiatric-mental health care for over nine years. She is a master’s-prepared Registered Nurse and is board certified in psychiatric mental health nursing by the American Nurses Association. She is also trained in mental health first-aid and nonviolent crises intervention.
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