Wish you could de-traumatize your brain and body? Learn how I achieved lasting Brain Bliss through a one-hour sound exchange practice with Mahalia, The Medical Musician.

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To tune their instruments, musicians must first play.

Listening closely with expert ears, they guide each string (or breath, or key) through the scales and ask where the notes sound out of alignment. It is a delicate and personal process that takes years of practice–and yet the result is pure harmony. 

I had no idea this process could translate to humans. That, with the same gentle, expert listening it is possible to ‘retune’ the disharmony of human trauma. That it may even be possible to refill traumatic memory-space with song and light. 

No idea until…

…I recently received a one-of-a-kind awakening experience from my local Medical Musician, Mahalia. 

In so little time with her I have learned so much; I have gained so much. And it is in the harmonious after-math of this sound-inspired transformation that I write to you, dear reader, to share what I witnessed during a single session. I want to show you the impact that song, sound, and music can have when conducted with innocence, care, and deep generosity.

Most of all, I want to share with you the experience of what Mahalia offers when she says she can provide total Brain Bliss–for there is something in her magic, something in her voice, that I think you could use a little dose of too!

Meeting The Medical Musician

Already in connection with each other thanks to kismet, karma, and all the good energy of the divine dance floor, Mahalia recently asked me to stop by and chat about a book project that’s been on her mind for years: The Medical Musician.

Deeply based in her spiritual practice of using light and sound technology to de-traumatize the human brain and body, The Medical Musician intends to gather everything Mahalia has learned over 25+ years of intense study into a manifesto that describes the glorious magical medicine of music, sound, and vibration. 

As she says: 

“Traumatic experiences (especially brain injuries) can throw us off our natural rhythm and our connection to a deeper personal power. Yet there is a secret conductive power in sound and music that can stimulate ultra-sense physical and emotional responses in us…responses that reconnect us to the core of our souls. These enriching moments of deep and mystical music have the potential to realign us with trauma-free, life altering frequencies and a profoundly energizing inner light!”

Mahalia, The Medical Musician

So I sat down with Mahalia to talk about her work, her passion, and of course, the book. Our minds and connection grew quickly as we explored her world and experience in deep, understanding, sisterhood. In time Mahalia kindly asked whether I would accept a Brain Bliss session, so that I may experience the magic of her sound technology first-hand. 

Yes, I said, my enthusiasm reflected on my face, though I was at that point unsure what to expect exactly. I followed her lead, and in comfortable silence we cleared the room and the air, and then Mahalia gestured for me to lay back on a massage table layered in soft white blankets. I’m just going to begin by gently touching your forehead, she whispers. 

Let’s begin.  

The Tuning Process

Like a piano player, Mahalia gently places her fingers on my forehead and already with the soothing touch I begin to relax. A hum begins as her fingers find and gently massage my right ear; my ‘blocked’ listener. It is a moment before I realize the hum I hear is actually coming from inside me, and that Mahalia is only joining in with it now out loud. I wonder if she has somehow brought up the sound from within. 

Her voice is strong, even, and balanced. I feel its vibration like a cool splash of water over my skin, and settle deeper into the table. Between my deepening, calm breaths I listen as an inner song I seem to know rises to her call. 

I am open to all that will come, I think to myself. 

And so she begins–tuning, like I said. Testing different sounds while in gentle contact with my head, neck, ears, and shoulders. Guided by ocean song she begins to invoke sounds out of water: whale calls, dolphin trills, and other sea-faring music. Calm, unassuming, I let myself become vulnerable. I relax my constant watch on the world and decide to trust. My eyes are closed, and I am listening, waiting, unafraid. 

Facing the Monster

Then, without warning she whispers where she feels weight: the weight of pain, the weight of trauma. I don’t rise from my reverie to confirm it, but everything she says is true and so the tears come quickly after that. 

How could she know? The question is repeated when she asks if she can speak into my skin and brings her voice close to my body. How could she know? The commanding intention of her tones find their way to my bones, my ovaries, my bloodstream. Thoughts pour into me, of echo-location, of dolphins finding each other with clicks and whistles. 

I become only experience. Hiding hurt-things from within answer Mahalia’s song.

Through her, the damned parts of me speak in tongues. She gives voice to their hatred, and I hear how engorged they’ve become–how much I’ve fed them. And yet in speaking out loud to me, they reveal themselves too: show me where they live. Given location, like the swift tide Mahalia’s voice is back to eradicate the poison. With murmurs of comfort – both in words of English and words of Water – she expels the disease of my hurt, starves it, banishes it, and fills the empty space it leaves with love. 

The process is not easy. Again and again over our hour the pain I’ve fed for years ebbs and flows to the surface. Mahalia encourages me to move my own voice–to sing through the incoherence. So many times I choke on the notes coming through, only to have Mahalia carry them forward for me: giving them space, giving them room to breathe. In the classic call-response form of a duet, we begin to converse through sounds and hums and cries that cut deep to the core of any torment I’d been feeling–expressing it loudly or quietly or through powerful laughter and song. I feel cared for in this reflective way, and I know what Mahalia means then when she says she is merely a conductor for music that’s already there: 

“Unresolved trauma can manifest as unresolved frequencies, and so if there is something out of tune, I am aware of the notes that are not playing in exquisite harmony. I only reflect on these notes so that the musician in YOU can rise to its fullest expression of euphoria. As the conductor, I simply hold space for that alignment.”

Mahalia, The Medical Musician

Discovering my Heartsong

As Mahalia’s song continues, I sense my alien hurts falling away like leeches left without blood. What pains were once hidden and immortal in their shadow feel lesser; almost sanitized with light. 

Her voice coaxes imagery of diamonds dancing, and I imagine a room of floating, spinning diamonds showering their intense rays through the darkness. I imagine this light clarifies discovered hurts; exorcizes risen pain. I get the distinct sense of glass shattering. Of finally breaking free of something invisible that had been closing in.

And behind all that–a familiar note in my mind. A home note. My own note. My instrument, in tune, calling. 

I follow the sound, cradled still by Mahalia’s voice, to a place of paradise within. So often have I found fire through meditation; this new sense of water at first surprises me. Then I allow the wash. I lay in the water of my mind, the shores of my heart, clothed only in flowers, my hair free in the water. I listen to the waves close over my ears, the calls of far-gone ocean animals fading into the distance. All goes quiet except the still-ringing hum of my heart-song, like a singing bowl’s ring; the echo of pure notes on a harp’s string. And then the strangest sensation: a growing in the heart, a certainty of love, a deep knowing of the power centered there. Mahalia covers me with a downy blanket and I stay still in that peace for as long as it holds. 

Find Your Brain Bliss

Brain Bliss is a sensation, I realize now. It’s the light feeling after you’ve received a massage, and only as you walk out of the room do you realize how much you’d been carrying. It’s a medicine that I didn’t think was possible until I experienced it myself. It is therefore a gift that Mahalia gives to her people–what she calls ‘the golden moment’ so we may (as she says) feel the incredible yumminess of awakening!

And…I do feel aligned. This ‘golden moment’ has evidence in my existence now. My voice is louder. My senses are stronger. My will is powerful. I have not these last days shied from the energies that had so recently become fearsome to me. As a result I’ve had days full of open, strange, and exciting encounters with strangers and friends alike. I’m almost light-headed with a sense of possibility, generosity, and awakening–and yet I sense that there is more work to be done. That like every instrument I’ll need constant care. 

I’d like to do more sessions with you, says Mahalia, echoing my thoughts as we discuss what came up during the session. 

Yes, I say back. 

I will be coming to see you again.

Too soon the outside world-sounds come back to us, and yet I hear the note ringing behind it all. We gently express gratitude to each other and say our goodbyes with laughter and love. As I journey home I know what she’s said is true: that I will be feeling the effects of this day for months. 

Even today, I can still hear that note ringing–can call it up like water from a well. With this song I remind myself of my water paradise, of the diamond light, of the depth of that heart-warmth, and somehow there is the strength to keep the poison out. 

As if through music, I can tie off the wound for good. 

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If you want to join in and experience incredible illumination through Mahalia, I recommend you visit her website – she has an entire library of free sound-technology resources (including interviews and testimonials), and has created an online Academy  you can use to start your Brain Bliss journey! 

Header image courtesy of Akira Hojo