Featured image: A person using sound therapy to reduce anxiety and stress.
Article written by Tanya Douglas
Our tendency to overlook our well-being results in persistent anxiety and other psychological problems, making anxiety a growing public health concern. Long-term anxiety may harm one's overall health, even though anxiousness before an important event is natural. As a result, we must take care of our anxiety and find strategies to reduce it. Sound therapy is an effective complementary therapy for anxiety, chronic stress, and other associated problems. In truth, you may quickly and successfully get through these problems with the assistance of an expert sound therapist. Therefore, this article discusses how sound therapy can help reduce anxiety and stress. So keep reading to learn more about sound therapy and how it can help your mental health and not only.
What is sound therapy?
A long-forgotten technique called sound therapy is regaining popularity. Sound therapy relies on soothing noises to improve your mental and physical health. It has the power to alter brain activity and can potentially be used to treat various mental health issues, including depression. Sound therapy aims to use calming sounds to create harmony and balance in your life. It can be incredibly beneficial, and methods include chanting and listening to music and nature sounds.
How does sound therapy work?
Many studies have been conducted on using music to induce pleasant feelings and eventually relax. These researches have focused heavily on using music to ease various diseases and lower emotions of stress and anxiety. The results showed that our brains release chemicals in response to music. The brain releases the joyful and pain-relieving hormones dopamine and oxytocin when listening to pleasant sounds, resulting in a feeling of well-being. Dopamine is required to feel energized when you are tired. Similarly, oxytocin release can reduce pain when and if it occurs. Therefore, listening to music and other soothing noises might improve your mood and relieve you of pain, stress, and anxiety.
What to expect from a sound therapy session?
Most participants in sound therapy sit or lie comfortably, usually with a blanket or an eye mask. A good sound therapy session starts with basic breathing exercises, which help you relax the mind and emphasize listening. Most sessions last from 20 minutes to an hour. Furthermore, several instruments are available for sound therapy, including tuning forks, gongs, crystal bowls, and chimes. However, one may only fully benefit from sound therapy when the appropriate tool is chosen, allowing the patient to experience the best possible results. Also, the practitioner often uses other holistic practices during a sound therapy session, such as using healing crystals. That can enhance the healing powers of sound therapy and benefit you even more.
How sound therapy can help reduce anxiety and stress
Stress is the leading cause of anxiety, as anxiety can result from persistent, untreated stress.
For instance, if you are about to relocate to a new home, you should know about some common causes of stress during such an important event. You might feel physical or mental stress or even have worries about your budget and organizing abilities. The more you think about them and don’t do anything to relieve them, the more they will burden you and cause anxiety.
Therefore, the first step to reducing your anxiety is to reduce stress. And because of its capacity to affect delta brainwaves and alter mental states, sound therapy helps improve emotions of relaxation and serenity. The theory is that it lowers stress hormones by establishing a constant frequency in the brain. That improves relaxation responses and calms the physiological symptoms of stress, such as a fast heartbeat or restlessness, by reducing intrusive thoughts and worries.
So, know it's only normal to feel stressed and anxious if you are about to relocate. But also
know that you can do something about it and make your life easier during your move with a few sessions of sound therapy.
Other benefits of sound therapy
Many other conditions are related to increased levels of stress and anxiety. Fortunately, sound therapy can help you treat them. Here are a few examples of things sound therapy can help you with:
Treat your insomnia
Overactive brain activity you can not control is the most common cause of insomnia. Although sound therapy helps restore the brain for activity during the day, it also has a relaxing impact that almost always allows the listener to fall asleep swiftly and effortlessly. While sound generally stimulates the brain and neurological system, this does not cause a hyperactive state. Instead, it creates an active tranquility that facilitates deep sleep. You can also treat anxiety- related insomnia with the help of sound therapy.
Increase your energy levels
The impulses your brain transmits throughout your body are primarily responsible for your
feelings. One of the primary organs that influence stress levels is our ears. A body under stress feels exhausted and worn out. Therefore, the brain is fed with stimulating noises during sound therapy, encouraging it to release stored energy.
Fight your depression
Chronic anxiety raises the possibility of depression. You begin to doubt yourself, which lowers your self-esteem. However, you can get rid of depressing thoughts by seeking the assistance of a sound therapist. Sound therapy will eventually increase your self-confidence and help fight your depression.
Relieve headaches
Many patients turn to sound therapy to treat migraines and recurrent headaches, as it can deal with the leading causes of many headaches, such as stress and high blood pressure. According to research, persons with migraines saw symptom alleviation after two weeks of sound treatment.
Final thoughts.
It is indisputable that sound therapy can help reduce anxiety and stress. According to research, sound therapy can lessen anxiety symptoms by easing mental health issues and lowering stress. When sound frequencies are utilized to alter brainwaves, reduce stress hormones, and induce a sense of tranquility, persons with anxiety can feel all the benefits of sound therapy. So if you are struggling with stress and anxiety, don’t hesitate to schedule a sound therapy session alone or in a group. You will be able to prevent potential complications that arise due to your condition.
Thanks so much Tanya for the information.