The past couple of weeks I’ve been exploring “sacred sound”. The awesome Fabeku Fatunmise describes sacred sound as a combination of sound and intention, or in his words: “Sacred sound wraps itself around what you want and feeds it. It nourishes it and gives it presence. It energizes your focus so fully that your focus starts to shake with excitement, knowing it’s just about ready to take the stage and rock out.”
Fabeku has a pretty cool free download of ten minutes of sacred sound – singing bowl and drum - that is really worth checking out. I’ve been playing it once or twice a day, taking time to slow down my breathing, and soak in a few minutes of peace. And I’ve been finding myself a lot calmer, focused and enjoying some spurts of creativity.
I’ve also been playing around with my own hoop drum, a djembe and an amazing little singing bowl I got from Fabeku.
The concept of “sacred sound” appeals to me. I’ve often used music to relax with or shift my energy level higher when I’ve needed it. I’ve used music to pray with. Hymns, Taize chants, and classical pieces are often a part of my prayer and worship time. These are things I think of as “sacred sound” too – maybe in not quite the same stuck-shifting way as what Fabeku works with, but in the sense that it is sound that transports, uplifts and has some pretty groovy positive energy with it.
And that got me pondering this morning about what other sounds I would label as sacred. I started listing them in my journal and so far have come up with:
- listening to the heart beat of my beloved while snuggling close
- a cat's purr
- a baby laughing (or a bunch of babies laughing! - dare you to watch this and not giggle)
- birds singing in my backyard
- a small child's soft breathing while sleeping
- the fountains gurgling in my ponds
- leaves rustling
- loon calling
- waves lapping on shore
- snow crunching underfoot
- windchimes (when the breeze blows gently, when it's really windy, windchimes are just annoying!)
I’ve noticed that quite a few in my list are nature sounds. I am blessed to live in a small town surrounded by mountains, lakes and trees and I wonder what a city dweller’s list would look like?
I think the point is that there is so much noise around us, we’ve tuned out. We miss the truly beautiful notes in our day. Some of this constant noise may actually be pretty harmful to us - to our health, to our energy levels.
Grab your journal and make a quick list of sounds you would call sacred. Sounds that uplift and heal you. Don’t over think it, just jot things down. (Why not download Fabeku’s free sacred sound clip while you’re doing that…). Become aware of the noise around you. What sounds are you missing or tuning out? How can you bring more of these sacred sounds into your life?
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