We’ve all had music affect our mood, but how can the emotional power of music be harnessed to treat mental health?
Today, Bey and Kirsten speak with two mental health professionals to learn about how music is incorporated into their practices. First, the two sit down with Dr. Marisol Norris to explore the field of music therapy, even trying out an exercise together! Then, they speak with intergenerational trauma expert Dr. Mariel Buqué to learn about her therapy practice and how she incorporates sound baths into her work.
Links for today’s episode:
- Learn more about Dr. Marisol Norris and her group, The Black Music Therapy Network, Inc.
- Learn more about Dr. Mariel Buqué and her upcoming book, Break the Cycle
Resources for today’s episode:
- NAMI for general, non crisis mental health needs/resources
- Text ‘HOME” to 741-741 for NAMI Philadelphia’s crisis text line
- Black Emotional and Mental Health Collective, Therapy for Black Girls, and Black Mental Health Alliance for BIPOC mental health resources/directories for culturally competent care
Transcript
Hey, what's up, everyone?
Speaker:It's The Bul Bey, checking in ahead of today's episode.
Speaker:There is mentioning of police brutality so if this is an activating subject for you,
Speaker:please proceed with caution, and we will leave resources in the show notes.
Speaker:Hey, what's up? My name is The Bul Bey.
Speaker:And I'm Kirsten Michelle Cills.
Speaker:Welcome to the So Curious podcast, presented by the Franklin Institute!
Speaker:All right, today's episode is really
Speaker:interesting because we're going to be combining the topic of last season, the
Speaker:science of mental health, with the topic of this season, the science of music.
Speaker:Full circle. Yeah, this is going to be interesting.
Speaker:All right, so first we're going to be sitting down with Dr.
Speaker:Marisol Norris to learn about music therapy.
Speaker:So what is it? How does it work?
Speaker:What does it look like in practice?
Speaker:Which is very interesting to me.
Speaker:And then we'll be speaking to therapists and intergenerational trauma expert Dr.
Speaker:Marielle Bouquet about how she
Speaker:incorporates sound baths into her therapy practice.
Speaker:Okay, so what sort of music do you listen to to support your mental health, Bey?
Speaker:You know, Korn, System of a Down - I'm
Speaker:totally joking - Limp Bizcit! Ummm, mantra-like lyrics.
Speaker:You're singing a song, you're bopping
Speaker:along, but then you're saying these phrases like. "I deserve it!
Speaker:Because I'm worth it" And all that stuff, that kind of lifts me up a little bit.
Speaker:So, lyric, you like when the lyrics align?
Speaker:I'm definitely a lyrical person. I love bars.
Speaker:I love lyrics. I love words.
Speaker:What about you? What about you?
Speaker:What supports your mental health?
Speaker:I like to listen to songs that have to do
Speaker:with like, you have time to do the things you need to do.
Speaker:I love to listen to stuff thematically that's like, girl, live your life.
Speaker:I know, showbiz is hard. Yeah.
Speaker:You're going to be okay!
Speaker:Here to teach us how music is used by
Speaker:mental health professionals, we're now joined by Dr.
Speaker:Marisol Norris.
Speaker:Thanks for coming on the show!
Speaker:Hi, everyone, hi! How are you?
Speaker:Welcome to So Curious!
Speaker:I am so excited to be here, I'm glad to be with you!
Speaker:Yeah. We're going to get into this good
Speaker:conversation, and we got a bunch of questions.
Speaker:Dr. Marisol Norris.
Speaker:Can you introduce yourself?
Speaker:Explain what it is that you do.
Speaker:Brag about yourself for a few minutes.
Speaker:All right, so I am Dr.
Speaker:Marisol Norris.
Speaker:I am a music therapist.
Speaker:I've been a music therapist now for 13 years.
Speaker:I am the director of the music therapy and counseling program at Drexel University
Speaker:and also the founder and CEO of the Black Music Therapy Network.
Speaker:And so a lot of my work really goes into
Speaker:teaching about music therapy and also really connecting different communities
Speaker:within music therapy so that it becomes more accessible.
Speaker:Amazing. Awesome.
Speaker:So what is music therapy? Yeah.
Speaker:Break it down.
Speaker:Yes, so the beautiful thing is that there are so many different ways to define that
Speaker:question, and the way in which I like to think about it, is that music therapy is a
Speaker:healthcare profession that utilizes a wide range of music to really support health
Speaker:and well being of individuals, groups, communities at large.
Speaker:That's awesome.
Speaker:So over the course of 13 years, which is - that's a flex, first of all
Speaker:Well, I had to do the math today, I was like, how long have I been doing this?
Speaker:No, that's awesome! I was going to ask, what communities have
Speaker:you focused on throughout that time, and why have you focused on those communities?
Speaker:Yeah, so actually I've worked in a lot of different settings.
Speaker:I've worked in acute care psychiatric settings, worked within dual diagnosis, so
Speaker:people that are dealing with aspects of mental health along with addictions, I've
Speaker:worked with children with intellectual disabilities.
Speaker:I've worked with - here in the Philadelphia Family Court system with
Speaker:children and their noncustodial parents, kind of developing family networks.
Speaker:And so, a lot of my work actually does go through a broad array of areas of just
Speaker:human health and well being, and really focuses on aspects of trauma, of loss,
Speaker:aspects of familial conflict and resolution and overall wellness.
Speaker:And now, wait, how does music come into play in all of that?
Speaker:That sounds, like, super complex and heavy, but music has a place in that.
Speaker:Music has a place.
Speaker:And I think this is why it's so hard
Speaker:sometimes to define music therapy, because we know that we use music in our day to
Speaker:day lives for different things, but we don't always have it in our awareness.
Speaker:We use it to dance!
Speaker:That is probably one of the most noted experiences with music!
Speaker:But there is such a wide range of ways to utilize music, and sometimes when we just
Speaker:bring it to our awareness, we realize that we're actually using it in our moment to
Speaker:momen,t in our day to day, to address a wide variety of our health needs.
Speaker:We love stories and examples on this podcast.
Speaker:So, based on what you've seen in your time
Speaker:in the field, what are some examples of things that stick out to you as really
Speaker:notable impacts that you've seen, of music therapy's effect on mental health?
Speaker:Yeah, so actually, currently I'm doing songwriting workshops called Lyric and
Speaker:Flow at 11th street, and it's exploring trauma through songwriting.
Speaker:And one of the prime ways in which we're
Speaker:utilizing music in this space is, one, thinking about the ways in which music has
Speaker:helped us to be conscious - and I'm going to speak about consciousness quite a bit.
Speaker:That's kind of my lens as a psychodynamic therapist...
Speaker:What does that mean, really qucikly?
Speaker:So psychodynamic therapy is really
Speaker:thinking about the ways in which we have lived experiences that are sometimes
Speaker:placed in the forefront of our minds, and then others that are placed towards the
Speaker:back of our mind, the back of our consciousness.
Speaker:And so oftentimes music is seen as something that can elicit different
Speaker:experiences that all of a sudden are emerged to the forefront of our mind.
Speaker:So, for example, you can be listening to a song and then
Speaker:all of a sudden become extremely emotional.
Speaker:You're not really sure why, but by the end
Speaker:of the song, you're like, oh, my goodness, I know why this song moved me!
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:And so it's thinking about the ways in which music has this effect of actually
Speaker:remembering or bringing something into a clearer picture.
Speaker:And so I use that word "remembering" as almost like putting pieces of something
Speaker:together, putting the members back of a picture together.
Speaker:And so in different ways, that kind of
Speaker:"remembering" does take place within this particular group.
Speaker:And so, most recently, it's beautiful how as a therapist, as a music therapist,
Speaker:sometimes you have to do a lot of holding of the process to make sure that people
Speaker:that may or may not have day-to-day relationships with creating and
Speaker:constructing songs, sometimes it might take a while to get a song done, right?
Speaker:So I've been doing this group now for over
Speaker:a year with different cycles of songwriting.
Speaker:And there's some cycles that people take a while to get their song out, and there's
Speaker:some cycles where it's like, oh, are you ready to write a song?
Speaker:And the lyrics get all put down in that one, half an hour, or what have you!
Speaker:And so when we think about trauma, we oftentimes think about these very negative
Speaker:experiences that have long lasting impacts on multiple aspects of our lives.
Speaker:And for this particular group, they didn't want to focus on the element of "harm"
Speaker:because they had done such a great job in the previous group to actually think
Speaker:about, okay, hey, we're placing all of this stuff in the song.
Speaker:They were like, "Can we talk about peace now?
Speaker:Can we talk about joy?
Speaker:Can we talk about all these different
Speaker:pieces?" And I think that was so very significant because, oftentimes in
Speaker:therapeutic and health settings, we think about therapeutic work as something that
Speaker:may be placed onto someone rather than it, kind of, happening collaboratively and
Speaker:also happening and emerging from the person themselves.
Speaker:But in that process, sometimes it becomes
Speaker:a little dehumanizing where the person gets splintered into many different pieces
Speaker:rather than all the things that are also, very life affirming.
Speaker:Yeah, I love that. Dr.
Speaker:Norris, you gave us so much to think about.
Speaker:I want to ask you, walk Kirsten, myself, and some of the listeners through your
Speaker:process, what does a music therapy process look like?
Speaker:What do we do first?
Speaker:So that's going to change depending on
Speaker:each setting, and also based upon the goals of the setting.
Speaker:So most music therapists do work through some aspect of goals.
Speaker:So it depends upon what is the experience
Speaker:of the person or the people that are coming to therapy.
Speaker:Is it something around socialization, having access to healthy relationships?
Speaker:Is it about building coordination within different parts of the body?
Speaker:That has a different set of goals.
Speaker:This is like, AKA, getting over someone or AKA, learning how to dance?
Speaker:Is that what the goal is according to what you just said?
Speaker:Maybe they're connected in some way!
Speaker:But yes, you can have a relational goal
Speaker:that has to do with moving through conflicts in a relationship.
Speaker:And there can be goals around that.
Speaker:Simple things like forgiveness. I know
Speaker:these are kind of like, broader concepts . But for example, cognitive dissonance.
Speaker:So this idea of having tensions around our
Speaker:experiences, whether it be cognitive tensions, emotional tensions around things
Speaker:that are happening in our world, there's ways in which we can think about how music
Speaker:itself has elements of dissonance that's built in.
Speaker:Can the exposure to, or the creation of
Speaker:dissonance within music, help and expand into other aspects of our life?
Speaker:So, for example, this was many, many years ago, but I remember I was working with a
Speaker:group of my peers, actually, and we were doing toning, vocal toning.
Speaker:And so vocal toning is pretty much just
Speaker:singing elongated vowels on a singular note with a group of people.
Speaker:And as you kind of move through different sounds, you usually start creating some
Speaker:kind of consonance or dissonance within the sounds, right?
Speaker:So if we all started to do like just did a note, like if I went hmmmmmm...
Speaker:Yeah, I was going to say, can we do it?
Speaker:We can do a little here, let's try it! I'm down.
Speaker:I'll start with a note, and I'm going to
Speaker:invite you to kind of come in on any note that you choose.
Speaker:If you need to take a breath and reenter, that's fine.
Speaker:Let's see if we can play with it a little bit.
Speaker:We might want to change our notes and see where it takes us, right?
Speaker:And I see, okay, getting water, getting ready!
Speaker:Bey's doing warmups, yeah!
Speaker:So like if I were to start, I would start here.... Hmmmmmmmm....
Speaker:Hmmmmmmmm...
Speaker:Hmmmmmmmmm...
Speaker:Okay, so there's a lot of things we could talk about there!
Speaker:Yeah, so what? Break it down!
Speaker:So we could definitely talk about... Yeah, be kind!
Speaker:The overtones! Yeah!
Speaker:We could talk about different aspects of the actual sound.
Speaker:We could talk about the vibrational experience, as well.
Speaker:We can talk about the onset of breath, like the entry into that note.
Speaker:Physiologically, usually you have to prepare yourself to start, as you did.
Speaker:You drank some water to get us started.
Speaker:But you also usually want to have a
Speaker:capacity of breath in order to keep and sustain a sound.
Speaker:So, for us to kind of think about those
Speaker:moments, what happened when someone needed to change.
Speaker:I could sense when someone was going to change or take a breath.
Speaker:Like, what was the process for us?
Speaker:Did someone say, okay, I'm going to hold
Speaker:my note a little bit longer just to not break the sound?
Speaker:So there's some aspects of that that's
Speaker:present here, but to kind of go back to that idea of dissonance and consonance.
Speaker:I remember within this particular group
Speaker:that I was working with, we were doing this toning for an extended period of
Speaker:time, and we actually ended on this wildly dissonant note.
Speaker:And one of my colleagues, he was just like, "I couldn't stand it! What was -
Speaker:I can't believe it. Why didn't you kind of come back to the one, Marisol?
Speaker:Why didn't you come back to the one?" And
Speaker:I was like, "Well, why should we come back to the one?
Speaker:Does life always allow us to come back to the one and to that tonic chord that gives
Speaker:some familiarity and has a lot of consonance?
Speaker:What happens in those stages of dissonance in your life?
Speaker:Is that your response?" When you heard
Speaker:- when we were making our chords, did you feel comfort?
Speaker:And those that are listening did you feel
Speaker:comfort when we were able to kind of find something that was harmonically pleasing?
Speaker:Thinking about even simply the metaphors of being able to navigate that experience
Speaker:and thinking, there is a real life application to the ways in which I take in
Speaker:music, and it actually speaks to the ways in which I live in the world.
Speaker:That's a very simple shift.
Speaker:But to think about the songs that you
Speaker:select, to think about the ways in which, you know...
Speaker:And I'm using some of these more tragic experiences!
Speaker:But sometimes, if you're going through a very sad day, do you turn on something
Speaker:that is also quite sad and kind of invoke the Iso-principle, where you match your
Speaker:experience with the experience of your music? And then from there, does it kind
Speaker:of spiral downward, or does it bring some level of relief?
Speaker:Or does it allow for a shift to occur?
Speaker:Is it cathartic in some way?
Speaker:There's so many different ways that we can take in sound and we make meaning of it,
Speaker:but to shift our awareness to that is really important.
Speaker:Dr. Norris, I want you to talk, I want you to
Speaker:get a chance to talk about your group and the group that you founded.
Speaker:It's called Black Music Therapy Network Incorporated.
Speaker:Talk about the mission, the goal, the North Star, what it is, what you do?
Speaker:So, the Black Music Therapy Network is
Speaker:really focused on health and well being of black communities through music.
Speaker:And so the bulk of our work is really
Speaker:organizing around how to provide services within the community, how to ensure that
Speaker:the practices and approaches, even within music therapy as a profession, are
Speaker:culturally not only relevant, but culturally sustaining.
Speaker:And what I mean by that is that, the cultures that are existent within the
Speaker:communities that we serve, we want to amplify all the good that does exist and
Speaker:the ways in which music has already been used within those cultures to support
Speaker:their overall wellness and to sustain that, rather than replacing it with
Speaker:something that may feel dissonant or not as connected to their day to day being.
Speaker:And so, a lot of our work does have to do
Speaker:with kind of leaning into this liberatory lens, the ways music is used also for
Speaker:protest, the ways in which music brings communities together.
Speaker:Most recently, I was in Indianapolis working with a campaign, Justice for
Speaker:Herman Whitfield III, who was brutally murdered by police officers in his home.
Speaker:And actually, his mother called 911,
Speaker:called for help because her son was having a mental health crisis.
Speaker:And this was the first onset.
Speaker:And instead of getting ambulance,
Speaker:unfortunately, police officers arrived to the scene, and it was truly devastating.
Speaker:And so when the Justice for Herman
Speaker:Whitfield campaign reached out to the Black Music Therapy Network, they just
Speaker:really wanted an opportunity for music to be used to, one, foster some element of
Speaker:processing, for grief, to bring and unite the communities, the various activists
Speaker:that are working together, and to galvanize around the next call, right?
Speaker:And so we use simple things like call and response as something that's part of our
Speaker:regular, everyday musical lexicon within black communities.
Speaker:But this is the metaphor for what needs to happen in this moment.
Speaker:A call is being made for change, and it's
Speaker:our job as a community of people to make a response to that.
Speaker:And so, that's just some of the work that we do.
Speaker:But it's really kind of leaning into the transformational ways in which music is
Speaker:part of our everyday lives, but lifting and amplifying it as being inherently
Speaker:healing, inherently healthy, and inherently part of our wellness practices
Speaker:that sometimes gets pushed to the side and marginalized within our communities.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:You're just doing such incredible work
Speaker:that must make such a difference in so many lives.
Speaker:Thank you so much, Dr. Marisol Norris.
Speaker:This has been so wonderful.
Speaker:Thank you for joining us in studio. In Studio!
Speaker:It's so great to chat with you!
Speaker:And thanks so much for joining us on So Curious.
Speaker:Thank you for having me.
Speaker:Thank you so much, Dr.
Speaker:Norris, for coming onto the So Curious podcast!
Speaker:That was really cool.
Speaker:I love the idea, or the note of being aware.
Speaker:Because I want to make cool music and I want to make music that impacts people.
Speaker:I want it to be the humming thing that we did. Hmmmmmm...
Speaker:Hell yeah. I love that.
Speaker:Yeah. And now we're joined by Dr.
Speaker:Mariel Buqué to speak on her work. Dr.
Speaker:Mariel, welcome to the So Curious podcast.
Speaker:How are you? Doing good, doing good.
Speaker:How are you two doing? We're great.
Speaker:We're doing great!
Speaker:And we're always talking to people, like yourself, who know way more about these
Speaker:topics than we do, so excited to learn from you!
Speaker:Yeah, so could you please introduce yourself and tell us what it is you do?
Speaker:Absolutely. So I'm Dr.
Speaker:Mariel Buqué, I'm a licensed psychologist, and an intergenerational trauma expert.
Speaker:I'm also the author of an upcoming book,
Break the Cycle:A Guide to Healing Intergenerational Trauma.
Break the Cycle:And I do therapy from the perspective of holistic therapy, which is very much an
Break the Cycle:integration of indigenous practices, ancient healing practices, meditation,
Break the Cycle:soundbath meditation, and all of that into the more Western
Break the Cycle:version of therapy that we all know as talk therapy.
Break the Cycle:And so your practice focuses heavily on intergenerational trauma.
Break the Cycle:Can you explain to us all what that is?
Break the Cycle:What's your definition? Yes, absolutely.
Break the Cycle:So intergenerational trauma is the only
Break the Cycle:trauma that gets passed down generations in families and communities.
Break the Cycle:And that happens at the intersection of
Break the Cycle:two important experiences that people tend to have.
Break the Cycle:One of which is our biology, like any
Break the Cycle:genetic expressions that are passed down from our parents when they conceive us.
Break the Cycle:What that means is that if we had a parent
Break the Cycle:that was, let's say, chronically stressed or in their own traumas, their bodies
Break the Cycle:expressed that they were in these traumas through a lot of floods of hormones, and
Break the Cycle:their nervous system was probably very overactive for a long period of time.
Break the Cycle:So all of that information gets passed genetically to the baby upon conception.
Break the Cycle:And then the psychology side is basically
Break the Cycle:everything that happens once the baby's conceived.
Break the Cycle:If they're inside of the parent's womb and there is a lot of stress in that parent's
Break the Cycle:life, a lot of those hormones are still flooding through.
Break the Cycle:Then they're born into a world where maybe, let's say, the parents are
Break the Cycle:undergoing a divorce, or there's chaos in the home, there's a lot that the child is
Break the Cycle:ingesting then, maybe they're bullied in school.
Break the Cycle:And that's yet another set of experiences that feel very overwhelming for a kid.
Break the Cycle:And maybe they're in their own
Break the Cycle:relationship that's turbulent, and so the cycle continues.
Break the Cycle:And I can tell by the way you're talking
Break the Cycle:about this, this is something that means something to you.
Break the Cycle:And your work really is in the advocacy of mental health within BIPOC communities.
Break the Cycle:Can you talk about why it's important to you?
Break the Cycle:Yeah, it's important to me for several reasons.
Break the Cycle:I mean, the motivation to do this work
Break the Cycle:came from working in Upper Manhattan, in Washington Heights.
Break the Cycle:And my community was basically the
Break the Cycle:community that existed there, right? Like, I was so much a part of the community that
Break the Cycle:one time I went into the lobby in the OBGYN office where I worked as the mental
Break the Cycle:health clinician, and my cousin came out and said, "Hey, Mariel!" And I'm like, oh,
Break the Cycle:I'm literally in my community doing the work, right.
Break the Cycle:A lot of the motivation to do intergenerational work stemmed from the
Break the Cycle:stories that I would hear in my community, both personally and professionally, around
Break the Cycle:how these pains continue to get translated forward, generation after generation.
Break the Cycle:And in addition to that, the understanding from a place of advocacy and from a place
Break the Cycle:of, just being more of a feminist-oriented psychologist, integrating people's
Break the Cycle:identities and systems-based perspectives into the work, the understanding that we
Break the Cycle:are living within societies and communities that continue to perpetuate
Break the Cycle:traumas and these traumas make their ways into our homes.
Break the Cycle:And for BIPOC individuals who are
Break the Cycle:marginalized, these traumas are relentless.
Break the Cycle:They're everyday traumas.
Break the Cycle:And so, if I were to do trauma based work,
Break the Cycle:it had to integrate that lens and that perspective.
Break the Cycle:And I had to help people heal on multiple levels.
Break the Cycle:Not just heal their hearts, but extend that healing to their communities and
Break the Cycle:extend that healing over to the societies that they live in.
Break the Cycle:And what does that healing work look like?
Break the Cycle:What's like, the actual activities that people do?
Break the Cycle:And how does that translate into, I guess,
Break the Cycle:more calm state, more well balanced, well being?
Break the Cycle:Yeah, it's a great set of words for it
Break the Cycle:because that's in essence, where we start the work.
Break the Cycle:So, because I operate from the perspective of being a holistic psychologist, like I
Break the Cycle:mentioned, the work that I do first starts with centering the person and helping them
Break the Cycle:to feel more comfortable within their own bodies.
Break the Cycle:That means that we start regulating their nervous system.
Break the Cycle:And that's the initial point at which we start.
Break the Cycle:Because what I always like to say is that I can't unpack a person's history,
Break the Cycle:especially a history as heavy and long as an intergenerational history, when that
Break the Cycle:person is feeling like they're in an inflamed body.
Break the Cycle:Because what's going to happen, if we're uncomfortable with the emotion, we're
Break the Cycle:going to disassociate, we're going to avoid, we're going to not want to
Break the Cycle:continue, we're going to drop out of therapy.
Break the Cycle:All the things, right?
Break the Cycle:So what's most important is to help the person feel settled first.
Break the Cycle:And we do that through a number of things, right?
Break the Cycle:There's soundbath meditation.
Break the Cycle:There's deep breathing that I integrate into the work.
Break the Cycle:There's letters to people that have loved us or that continue to love us even if
Break the Cycle:they're no longer living, like ancestral letters.
Break the Cycle:There's different mechanisms of regulating the nervous system that we know in the
Break the Cycle:area of psychology, especially somatic psychology, that is really effective.
Break the Cycle:Like, rocking from side to side, which
Break the Cycle:invites in a rhythm that helps the nervous system feel relaxed.
Break the Cycle:Humming is another thing that I integrate into the work.
Break the Cycle:And all of that is the initial work, right?
Break the Cycle:So when a person is feeling like, okay, I
Break the Cycle:can tolerate the emotion that comes with unpacking my history, then we start
Break the Cycle:transitioning into actually doing the work.
Break the Cycle:Wow. Yeah.
Break the Cycle:That is so much I mean, that... No, that was a lot.
Break the Cycle:That's incredible that you're doing this.
Break the Cycle:I'm very intrigued by your work with sound baths.
Break the Cycle:So can you tell us, what is a sound bath?
Break the Cycle:What instruments do you use?
Break the Cycle:So sound baths are, in essence, sound medicine, right?
Break the Cycle:So sound bath started many moons ago,
Break the Cycle:hundreds upon hundreds of years, in Tibetan culture.
Break the Cycle:And within the culture itself, there were some brass instruments that were used to
Break the Cycle:emit frequencies of sounds that could induce a relaxation state.
Break the Cycle:Fast forward a number of years.
Break the Cycle:There have been different kinds of sound bowls that have also been utilized, like
Break the Cycle:quartz bowls, which is primarily what I use.
Break the Cycle:And each of these bowls emits sound
Break the Cycle:vibrations at certain frequencies that taken together basically, like, bathe you
Break the Cycle:in sound, create micro vibrations that are said to settle your body back into place.
Break the Cycle:In addition to that, it also helps us to balance out the mind.
Break the Cycle:And the way that I do sound bath
Break the Cycle:meditation is that I introduce mantras, deep breathing, other things that I know
Break the Cycle:are also going to help the mind element, in addition to also rebalancing the body.
Break the Cycle:Wow. How did you come to use sound baths in
Break the Cycle:your treatments and your therapy practices?
Break the Cycle:Yeah, I'm very curious about that too.
Break the Cycle:How did you decide to do this?
Break the Cycle:Well, the story comes from my wanting to integrate, and really diving into a lot of
Break the Cycle:ways to integrate ancient practices into the therapeutic world.
Break the Cycle:And I was already doing meditation and
Break the Cycle:vision and imagery exercises for quite some time, because I had actually been
Break the Cycle:trained in a three year fellowship to integrate these practices into the work.
Break the Cycle:But on a birthday a number of years ago, my cousin, knowing that that was how I
Break the Cycle:wanted to orient the work, actually gifted me a sound bow.
Break the Cycle:Awwww... Yeah, she's wonderful.
Break the Cycle:She's actually a neuroscientist and she
Break the Cycle:studies a lot of these perspectives, but from the structural mind.
Break the Cycle:And so she understood how important it was to me to really understand the science
Break the Cycle:behind it, but also understand how to integrate it.
Break the Cycle:And so she was really the segue to getting
Break the Cycle:into sound bathing and bringing that element into my work.
Break the Cycle:That's wonderful.
Break the Cycle:I mean, we talked so much in our mental health season about - we talked to people
Break the Cycle:across a very wide variety of the mental health world and there was such a large
Break the Cycle:common thread of how important a support system is.
Break the Cycle:So I think that's so wonderful that your
Break the Cycle:cousin was so supportive and pushing you into something that you love.
Break the Cycle:Yeah, shouts out to them. But can you walk us through how you would
Break the Cycle:use sound baths during a therapy session, and specifically, how they kind of
Break the Cycle:integrate in with the intergenerational trauma work?
Break the Cycle:So what I like to do in session is that I like to sandwich my sessions.
Break the Cycle:What I mean by that is that I bring in the
Break the Cycle:sound bowl and sound medicine as like a part of how we segue into the work.
Break the Cycle:And part of the reason why I do that is
Break the Cycle:because of the same philosophy that I hold around making sure that the body is
Break the Cycle:settled and able to invite in the discomfort of talking about heavy things.
Break the Cycle:And so that's a really essential piece.
Break the Cycle:And then at the end of session, I
Break the Cycle:sandwiched the session with a meditation and breath work.
Break the Cycle:And the reason being is because,
Break the Cycle:typically, what happens in the middle is pretty unsettling.
Break the Cycle:People are talking about long histories,
Break the Cycle:they're talking about family dynamics and oppression.
Break the Cycle:I mean, like, just the works of things
Break the Cycle:that feel really heavy and unsettle their nervous system.
Break the Cycle:Even though we've done the work at the beginning to settle.
Break the Cycle:So we rebalance it.
Break the Cycle:We come back to what feels like it can be helpful.
Break the Cycle:So prior to starting with anyone, of
Break the Cycle:course I introduce what sound bathing is, I provide information, and of course
Break the Cycle:, provide clients with the agency to choose and to opt into these practices.
Break the Cycle:In between, if I notice that they feel
Break the Cycle:unsettled or they look unsettled, I bring in that perspective yet again.
Break the Cycle:Like I'll say, "Hey, I'm noticing you're a little jittery, or I'm noticing that your
Break the Cycle:body shifted, and can we notice that together?
Break the Cycle:Let's breathe in and then we resettle the
Break the Cycle:body," because I want them to feel safe as the work continues.
Break the Cycle:So that's in essence, kind of what it would look like, right?
Break the Cycle:It's a full integration of the work, but
Break the Cycle:very intentionally, before and after, and then wherever I see fit.
Break the Cycle:And so how it works with intergenerational
Break the Cycle:trauma is that I help people to understand and visualize how their body is
Break the Cycle:transitioning and healing as they're doing these practices.
Break the Cycle:And I also help them to understand how important it is to, outside of therapy,
Break the Cycle:for them to also do the exercises that are going to be helpful.
Break the Cycle:What a practical set of steps to really
Break the Cycle:kind of get yourself into a place of wellness.
Break the Cycle:And it's a practice too, right?
Break the Cycle:It's not like, "oh, I'm done!" It's like, no, it's a practice.
Break the Cycle:Yeah. Well, thank you so much.
Break the Cycle:So, on behalf of the Franklin Institute and myself and Bey, we want to thank you
Break the Cycle:so much for taking the time to be on our show.
Break the Cycle:We really appreciate it. Yeah.
Break the Cycle:And any parting words for the listeners?
Break the Cycle:Any final thoughts?
Break the Cycle:Yeah, things that are really heavy, like
Break the Cycle:mental health and trauma can sometimes feel like they are really hard to tackle.
Break the Cycle:But I would just urge people to take each day to just introduce a little bit of
Break the Cycle:gentleness and maybe one practice into their day and just be patient with
Break the Cycle:themselves, because the combination of all of the things that they'll do will
Break the Cycle:eventually lead to a life that feels less heavy.
Break the Cycle:So just stick it out. That's beautiful.
Break the Cycle:Thank you so much. This was so centering.
Break the Cycle:So thank you so much for being with us. We really appreciate it.
Break the Cycle:Wonderful. Thank you.
Break the Cycle:It's been such a pleasure.
Break the Cycle:That was such an incredible, calming,
Break the Cycle:centering, grounding note to end the episode on.
Break the Cycle:That was really awesome. Yeah, that was great.
Break the Cycle:That was great. Kirsten, have you ever had a sound bath?
Break the Cycle:I have never had a sound bath.
Break the Cycle:I would definitely want to try it. What about you?
Break the Cycle:No, I'm right there with you. I've tried other things.
Break the Cycle:I've done float therapy, so I would absolutely be down.
Break the Cycle:Yeah, that's like literally a bath, right? Amazing.
Break the Cycle:Well, be sure to join us next week for our
Break the Cycle:next episode of the So Curious podcast, because we are going to be exploring all
Break the Cycle:the different ways that our brain can interpret what we hear.
Break the Cycle:So in my case, I see colors to music, and
Break the Cycle:I hear specific musical pitches to specific colors that I see.
Break the Cycle:That's right, we're doing a deep dive into how our brains understand music.
Break the Cycle:And make sure to give us a five star rating, we love five stars!
Break the Cycle:This podcast is made in partnership with
Break the Cycle:RADIOKISMET, Philadelphia's premier podcast production studio.
Break the Cycle:This podcast is produced by Amy Carson.
Break the Cycle:The Franklin Institute's Director of Digital Editorial is Joy Montefusco.
Break the Cycle:Dr Jayatri Das is the Franklin Institute's chief bioscientist, and Erin Armstrong
Break the Cycle:runs marketing, communications and digital media.
Break the Cycle:Head of operations is Christopher Plant.
Break the Cycle:Our mix engineer is Justin Berger and our audio editor is Lauren DeLuca.
Break the Cycle:Our graphic designer is Emma Seager.
Break the Cycle:And I am Kirsten Michelle Cills.
Break the Cycle:And I'm The Bul Bey! Thank you!
