Sound Healing - Steel Tongue Drums All Entries
Beta and Theta Brain Patterns
These instruments help move you from Beta brain waves (anxiety and fight or flight reflexes) to Alpha, Theta, and Delta brainwaves that are associated with relaxation and meditation. Steel tongue drums nourish the forebrain, which governs 40% of our problem-solving and decision making skills. When we are in Beta, we lose blood flow to the forebrain, challenging the decision-making process. Steel tongue drums also assist with balancing the hemispheres of the brain. The left hemisphere or the analytical side, and the right hemisphere, our intuition.
How It Works
Sound healing is a practice used by cultures such as the ancient Egyptians, Chinese, Native Americans, and even the United States military. It is used to help with mental issues, restore balance and happiness, and achieve peak performance. It is claimed that sound healing can assist with side effects stemming from depression, developmental disorders, anxiety, PTSD, and help manage physical and mental pain. For healthy individuals, managing one's sound environment can be a way to recover from daily stress and enhance productivity, communication, and a feeling of well-being.
Our physical and emotional - perhaps even spiritual states - can be conceived as a particular blend of frequencies, from our heartbeats and blood pressure, to the pace of our thoughts and movement. Due to a negative feedback loop, the human body and mind can sometimes maintain in a self reinforcing state of stress or imbalance. The common admonition to simply snap out of it is not usually helpful because of this loop.
The human body and mind are extremely attuned to the environment, so a more helpful approach is to adjust the environment to help us feel the way we want. The basic principle of sound healing is to introduce a particular frequency and rhythm that we will adapt our internal frequencies, thus helping us overcome internal conflicts, blockages, and illness. This can be a sound or vibration, directly introduced into the body.
Steel Tongue Drums
A form of tongue drum has been around for a very long time if considering the wooden versions created by the Aztecs known as log drum or tone drums. Another similar instrument is the Slit Drum of African origin. These were the early predecessors to the modern-day steel tongue drums.
Are they hard to play?
One of the great things about this invention is it does not require any particular skill to play it. Anyone who wants an easy to play intuitive instrument can learn to play a tongue drum. You do not need a musical background to get all the benefits from playing. There is no right or wrong way to play the tongue drum, just pick up your mallets and start by hitting the inside of the cutouts. The cutouts are in the shape of a tongue, hence the name, Tongue Drum. Almost immediately, you will feel your self getting sucked into the music and start to feel relaxed. Your mind goes into a meditative state where you can tune the world out for a while. You can also play with your fingers however, that takes a little more practice and some calluses. We carry finger sticks to save your hands from building up calluses. If you want to sound more enhanced, then stick with the mallets. They help in producing proper vibrations from the drum and musical scales.
Flower of Life Symbol
Each tongue drum is decorated with the Flower of Life. The meaning behind the flower of life symbol is that it is believed to represent the cycle of creation. It depicts how all life comes from on singular source, represented by the circle in the center of the pattern. There is believed to be a secret symbol hidden within the flower of life symbol, which is said to hold the most significant and sacred patterns of the universe. It is believed to be a sort of blueprint for all life, with the fundamental patterns for everything from atoms to planets and everything in between.
What is included?
You get the steel tongue drum, mallets, and a purple, padded and lined backpack/ bag to protect your investment and safely enjoy your drum anywhere.