The vibration of the heart chakra.... silly hippy or simple science???

I was recently asked what "AH - the vibration of the heart chakra" actually means. Not in an airy, fairy, hippy, crunchy, earth mama kind of way but in words of SIMPLE SCIENCE!


And truly, it IS simple science.


1) Lets start with what the body is at it's most basic level - a bunch of molecules vibrating around each other (we learnt that in high school - it's indisputable). Hence we actually aren't one solid mass of flesh, organs and other working parts - we ARE vibrational energy!

2) Now, vibrations can happen at different speeds.  We've all seen the picture of what the sound wave looks like...

The vibrations of low frequency (slow) speed waves create low pitched sounds and the vibrations of high frequency (fast) speed waves make high pitched sounds... still following??

This explains how different vibrations create different pitched sounds.

3) Next, the body is full of different types of textures, densities, water levels, tissue types, functioning  levels, mass etc and thus different parts of the body create different vibrations, in turn creating different sounds. (You'd need an excellent set of headphones to hear them but vibrations still do make sounds whether you can hear them or not!)

4) The main 'vibrational headquarters' of the body are called chakras - there are 7 major ones and each of these chakras create their own very distinct sound. Usually when we see pictures of the chakras it's in colourful illustrations (see above and below left), as opposed to scientific-looking text book like diagrams (see below right), which is why of lot of folks instantly think "airy, fairy, hippy, crunchy, earth mama" instead of "wow - it really is basic science"!

5) When we produce the sound 'AH', (as in poke out your tongue and say....), we are creating a sound wave that matches the sound wave of the heart chakra (the vibrational mass that happens where your heart is.

And THAT is why "AH" is a vibration of the heart chakra!

One of the great things about having this knowledge (now that you do) is how simple it is to use it to benefit your own health well-being. Unfortunately, however, in a bid to keep my posts short so I continue to do them, that, my OMMG friends, is a topic for next time :)

Stay tuned...

Silence is Golden! 5 easy steps to bringing silence into your daily lives!

The conductor of the youth orchestra I was in as a teenager always used to say "the most important part of the music is the silence". This amused me and I used to think about silence a lot as I played.

The passing of Goenka Ji last week has again had me thinking about silence - in particular how vitally IMPORTANT it is, and how DIFFICULT it is to achieve!!!

For those of you who don't know much about this Goenka fellow he popularised the practice of Vipassana Meditation - a meditation which requires 10 DAYS of silent meditation - no talking, giggling, singing, reading, writing, exercising, eye contact with others, touch - no interactions of any kind other than to focus your mind on your respiration and physical sensations for 11 hours a day. (There's a lot more to it than that but that's a story for another day.)


The point here is TEN DAYS OF SILENCE!!!! Think you could do it?? Well I must admit - and I don't usually share this - the girls in my boarding room and I started talking to each other on day 7 (gasp)!

The truth is, silence is something we are unconditioned to in our Western culture - and we really, REALLY struggle to allow it into our daily lives, or at least to acknowledge it and enjoy it.

Picture this - you're driving to work, you've been on the road for about 20 minutes then realise the radio isn't on - what do you do? You turn it on of course! Everyone is out in the garden but for no reason you know of, the TV is on. It's the weekend - you have no real responsibilities or people accountable to but you leave the sound on your phone on just so as not to miss a call. Your alarm goes off every morning regardless of the fact you only need to wake up at that time 5 days a week and so on and so on......

All these random sounds of daily living - the machines, gadgets and people around us - they get in the way of our calm! They disrupt our peace of mind, make it difficult to concentrate, mess with our flow and put 'bristles' in our energy fields! And this happens day after day after day after day after..... (you get the idea).

So hear are five REALLY EASY and EFFECTIVE tips on how you can welcome bits of silence back into your daily lives:

1) KEEP YOUR PHONE OUT OF THE BEDROOM
Yes, you may need an alarm - so buy an old fashioned bedside alarm clock! An alarm clock makes a REALLY annoying noise too - but it only happens once a day. By keeping the mobile off limits in the bedroom you eliminate the text beeps, the email beebs, the ringtones, the click, click, click of the keypad. And if this isn't enough motivation think of all the extra quality time you can be having in the bedroom once it's a phone free zone (wink, wink, nudge, nudge)...

2) TURN THE RADIO OFF FOR THAT SWEET SOUND
The sweet sound of silence that is. This is really important in the car - on the way to work, on road trips, family holidays etc. If you are having conversations or playing car games turn the radio off! You'll concentrate better on the people around you plus you won't be overloading your poor minds with layers of sounds and distracting noise. Try turning the radio or music off regardless of whether you have others in the car with you or not. 5 minutes of silence every now and again gives you heaps of clarity and I find the best ideas come to me when I'm driving :)

3)MAKE SOME DAILY QUIET TIME
This is not about having complete silence all around you but about you consciously considering this to be your quiet time. Obviously announcing to the family that you'll be expecting 30 minutes of silence every morning while you have your coffee and paper isn't going to work for most! So aim small - your quiet time might be while you hang out the clothes, check your emails at the beginning of the work day, go for a run or do the groceries. For me it's at bath time. When I bath my daughter I let her play and splash whilst I quietly watch and enjoy a sneaky half glass of red! Of course I help her and talk to her when she needs or wants me but on the whole we've fallen into a lovely pattern of her having independent play time in the bath while I rest and watch. Quiet time is total bliss!!

4)USE A QUIET TIME SIGN
OK so this one may take a bit of time to catch on to those around you - but, just like when introducing any other rule, a 'Shhh, it's my quiet time' sign (or something to that effect) will eventually catch on and it really works! Hang it on the bathroom door while you have a bath, hang it on your desk when you need to stop gossiping with your colleagues and actually get some work done, put it at the front door if you don't want people knocking or on your bedroom while taking a nap. Don't leave the sign up all day or people won't take it seriously. Keep it up for half an hour so they know you mean business and to keep it an achievable goal.

5) TURN OFF THE TELEVISION WHEN NO ONE IS ACTUALLY WATCHING IT
This is a no-brainer but for some reason we have trouble doing it. It's fairly safe to say we've become so conditioned to having noise constantly surrounding us that we don't even realise the TV is on. Sad isn't it!


So there you have it!

Implementing these 5 gems into your routine will make the world of difference to your qui! Eliminating many random noises of daily living and being consciously aware of the quiet times in your day will make ridiculous amounts of difference to your frame of mind. It's true - silence is golden :)