Sound and Nervous System Healing Christina Zakhem, N.D., HHP

What is Stress?

At its core, stress is an internal response to a perceived threat to our existence or wellbeing. The word "perceived" is crucial, because stress isn't just about what happens to us, but how we experience and interpret what happens to us. For a child, stress might look like the first day of school, separation from a parent, or navigating social dynamics on the playground. For a young adult, it could be the weight of college debt, the pressure of academic performance, or the uncertainty of launching into independence. As we move through life, stress takes on different forms: the demands of a new job, the upheaval of moving to a new city or the complex challenges of immigrating to a new country. Here's what makes stress so personal: two people can go through remarkably similar experiences and have completely different responses. One person might thrive in the challenge of a new job, while another might experience it as overwhelming. The difference lies not in the event itself, but in each person's unique past experiences, available support systems, and current resilience capacity. When we perceive a stressor as manageable (when we have the tools, support, and inner resources to meet it) we can move through it and return to balance. But when a threat feels like it exceeds our capacity to respond, when we perceive it as ‘danger’ that we cannot handle or move past, something different happens. The stress doesn't simply resolve when the event is over. Instead, it can become lodged in our system, creating lasting effects because we weren't able to fully process it at the time.

How Stress Gets Stored in the Body

When we cannot fully process a stressful experience, the body holds onto what we couldn't move through, storing it as bodily memory: chronic tightness in our shoulders, restriction in our chest, tension in our jaw, or that persistent knot in our stomach. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, in his book The Body Keeps the Score, explains that trauma and chronic stress produce actual physiological changes. The brain's alarm system becomes recalibrated, stress hormone activity increases, and our ability to filter relevant information from irrelevant information becomes altered. We stay in heightened alert even when there's no immediate threat.

Here's what's also important: it's not only major traumatic experiences that create these effects.

Most of us carry memories that can ignite visceral reactions in our bodies. Maybe it's the smell of a particular perfume that brings back an uncomfortable memory, a certain tone of voice that makes your shoulders tense, or a song that immediately transports you back to a difficult time.

These memories become transcribed not just in our conscious mind, but in our subconscious, in our organs, and in our tissues. They can be reactivated by certain words, a smell, a person, music, or even a particular time of year.

When these memories surface, they trigger a cascade of responses that make us feel uncomfortable: emotions rise, hormones flood our system, neurotransmitters fire. Our body is essentially replaying the experience biochemically even though it's not experiencing the same ‘event’, but rather something with similar triggers.

The good news is that sound can be a powerful tool to restore coherence within the body and the nervous system and support the release of tensions within the tissues.

The Importance of Safety, Curiosity, Engagement, and Choice in Healing

True healing happens when we feel safe enough to be curious, engaged, and able to make choices about our experience. This is when our system can get into a parasympathetic state (rest and safety).

Trauma robs us of choices. When we're overwhelmed, we lose our sense of agency. We may freeze when we want to move, stay silent when we want to speak, or feel trapped in patterns we consciously want to change. This isn't a character flaw. It's a nervous system that hasn't yet received the signal that it's safe to come out of protection.

Sound healing works precisely because it offers a gentle, non-invasive way to signal safety to the nervous system. It doesn't require us to talk about our trauma or consciously process difficult memories. Instead, it speaks directly to the body through rhythm, vibration, and frequency, helping guide us back into a relaxed and open nervous system state where healing becomes possible.

Sound and The Nervous System Entrainment is the brain's ability to synchronize with any external rhythm. You don't consciously think about it, rather your physiology naturally aligns with the external rhythm. The nervous system has the ability to entrain. Think about what happens when a song you love comes on. You don't consciously think about moving to the beat. You don't analyze the rhythm or calculate when to step. You just start moving. Your body naturally syncs with the music effortlessly. In a similar way, when we're exposed to steady, rhythmic sound, our nervous system has the remarkable ability to match that frequency. The external rhythm acts as a guide, and our internal systems (our heartbeat, our brainwaves, our breathing, even our muscle tension) begin to align with it. In sound healing, we use this principle intentionally. By introducing specific frequencies and rhythms (through singing bowls, tuning forks or toning), we can  guide the nervous system away from states of hyperarousal or shutdown and toward states of calm, presence, and safety.

Sound releases natural opiates which create a calming effect in the body. It has also been shown to slow heart rate, lower blood pressure and reduce stress hormones.

Most importantly, it increases oxytocin in the body, the trust hormone that supports feelings of connection and safety.

Singing Bowls

Singing bowls, particularly Tibetan and Himalayan singing bowls, have been used for centuries in meditation and healing practices. These metal bowls produce rich, layered tones when struck or when a mallet is circled around their rim.

Singing bowls typically produce frequencies between 100hz and 900hz, which falls within the range that activates our parasympathetic nervous system/rest and calm state (20hz to 500hz). When you hear or feel a singing bowl, your nervous system begins to entrain to its steady, harmonic vibration. The sound waves literally wash over and through you, creating both an auditory and a physical experience.

Studies on Anxiety, Tension, Fatigue and Chronic Pain

In a study on singing bowls, participants experienced a rapid 60% decrease in anxiety in just one hour. Participants also experienced a 63% reduction in pain in just an hour. (Goldsby et al., 2017). That’s faster than ibuprofen for pain (without the long-term side effects) and weeks ahead of most anxiety meds.

In another study on Himalayan singing bowls with 105 people, participants experienced a 70%+ drop in tension and fatigue in just 40 minutes. (Panchal et al., 2020)

A 2008 study with 54 patients with long-term spinal pain tried crystal singing bowls and experienced up to 50% less pain and better mood after 6 sessions. (Wepner et al., 2008)

All of these and more show promising results for those struggling with chronic ailments.

The Power of Tuning Forks

While singing bowls work through audible sound and vibration, tuning forks offer a more targeted, precise approach to sound healing. Weighted tuning forks are activated and placed on the body to create a focused vibration that penetrates deep into tissues, bones, and fascia.

Pain Reduction Through Targeted Frequency

Tuning forks can be applied to specific areas of tension or pain in the body. The vibration they create travels through the tissue, helping to release chronic holding patterns and reduce inflammation at the cellular level.

One of the most fascinating effects of tuning fork therapy is its ability to stimulate the release of nitric oxide in the body. Nitric oxide relaxes blood vessels and oxygenates the body, reducing tension and improving circulation.

Finding Your Way Back to Safety Through Sound

The beauty of sound healing is that you don't need special equipment or training to begin. Start small. Try humming for a few minutes in the morning. Humming has been show to put us in a relaxed state. Play recordings of birdsong while you work or listen to classical music before bed. Notice what happens in your body. Notice where you feel the vibration, where tension begins to soften, where your breath deepens.

If you're curious about exploring sound healing more deeply, or if you'd like to experience the targeted work of singing bowls or tuning forks in a therapeutic setting, I invite you to connect with me at The Circle of Wellness Montreal through our Sound Healing Services. These sessions include insurance coverage under Naturopathy. Sometimes the journey back to balance needs support, and I'd be honored to guide you.

Remember, your nervous system is waiting for the signal that it's safe and that signal could come in the form of sound.