Christine:
Hello and welcome to our podcast series created by us here at Broadword called Be Listening. Today we are talking about a very interesting topic and very interesting experience with a very interesting person. We'll discuss about the power of sound, meditation and how vibrations help to relax and rebalance the body with our lovely guest, Mark Smallman. Thank you for joining us.
Mark:
Hello there. Hello. Great to be here. Thanks for the invite.
Christine:
Can you please introduce yourself and tell us how you became involved in the practice of sound meditation?
Mark:
Yeah, so it's great to be here. My name is Mark Smallman and I was first introduced to Gong Baths or sound meditation through my sister who did a lot of yoga, still does. Personally, I'd always been interested in ambient music and the power of music and sound to have an impact on us.
And yeah, the first time I did a Gong bath, there was a yoga studio over the road from where I worked at the time. Didn't really know what I was letting myself in for or what one entailed to be honest. I just signed up for it randomly, popped in there in my work shirt, you know, at lunchtime. And literally I walked out of there 45 minutes later and it felt like I'd had seven hours sleep. I probably did drift in and out of sleep during the session, but...
I walked out of there and I felt like my brain and my body had had a full night's sleep. I felt fully refreshed, fully, I was shocked really at the power of this, this metal disc really to induce effortless meditation and deep rest. So from there, I, I did a few more sessions, got a little deeper into the practice and then took part in a, yoga teacher training course on non -
Nard yoga, which is basically the yoga of sound. So since then I've been leading Gong baths, sound meditation sessions for corporate audiences. I do regular public sessions. We do online sessions. So yeah, it's a kickstarted an interest and a passion really for positive impact of sound on people.
Chrisitne:
Can you explain what a gong bath or sound meditation is for those who might be unfamiliar with it and what might some benefits be?
Mark:
Yeah, absolutely. So a gong bath or sound meditation is basically an experiential wellness practice where participants are basically bathed in the sound waves and the vibrations produced by gongs and other instruments.
So it's called a Gong Bath, but there's no water involved. There's no need to take your clothes off. There's no nudity. It's called a Gong Bath because the sounds basically just fill the space with an omnidirectional sound. So if you imagine the sounds bouncing off the walls, it's reverberating around the room. So your whole body feels like it's immersed in these deep resonant sounds, which is, you know, a really, really pleasant, pleasurable experience. So some of the benefits that people can experience, they do vary quite a lot. Everyone has a very different experience, even from the same gongs, from the same practitioners, but there are various physical and mental benefits. So a lot of the time we hear things around stress reduction, enhanced clarity, better focus, improved sleep, or a really interesting one is improved creativity.
And that often arises due to a shift in our perspective. So that's kind of what these sessions offer us. We're often in our thinking minds, our regular patterns of thinking from day to day. And by taking time out, basically, by taking part in one of these sessions, we shift the way our thinking occurs. And we can often see solutions to problems or just allow our subconscious to do their work on our behalf.
And so that, yeah, we get that insight and the creativity. But on a physical level, there's also lots of physical benefits. So what we're doing here is creating the space for the body to self -heal. So listeners are probably familiar with the fight and flight or the rest and digest responses the body has. And when we spend time in that rest and digest state, I kind of liken it to the body enters a maximum maintenance state.
And this maximum maintenance is partly where the term sound healing comes from. So the sound is just enabling your body to do its thing, to do its admin, to tune itself up, to catch on its digestion, optimize things. All this happens when we're in the parasympathetic state.
And modern lives can be really stressful. So the good news is here that people can learn to trigger their parasympathetic nervous system to immediately reduce that sense of anxiety or stress that modern lives create. And activities like gong baths, like breath work, like meditation, yoga, even spending time with animals or nature can just bring that balance to our lives and provide that essential time in the parasympathetic state, which as I say, just allows the body to do what it is very capable of doing, which is self -healing and restoring itself.
Christine:
I find it quite interesting. I've looked into more on the negative side of things, like how, say, getting on a tube, the certain vibrations can make you anxious or even how people use it in movies like horror films to actually make you feel kind of worse. So it's interesting to hear the actual benefit sides of vibrations and sound.
Can different types of sound instruments contribute to the overall experience during a gong bath?
Mark:
Yeah, absolutely. So we use in our sessions, we use lots of different instruments, but they broadly fit into a couple of categories. So gongs, singing bowls, crystal bowls,
You might have heard Shruti boxes, which is an Indian sounding drone. All these things can lull the mind into a more meditative, relaxed state. So using those instruments, we might drift off to sleep or people might be in and out of consciousness or experience some lucid dreaming like states as the mind gets preoccupied with that drone and yeah, lulls itself into a meditative state.
But then in the opposite camp, we've got things like shakers, like rattles, like ocean drums, even wind chimes, etc. These can be a little bit more grounding. So they help participants become slightly more aware of their surroundings, slightly more aware of their body. So we use those towards the end of the session to kind of bring people back.
But my voice that I'm using now is in itself an instrument. So during the session, I'll slow my voice down. I'll use nice relaxed tones. And that in itself is a tool, an instrument to kind of bring people down to a nice calm, chilled, relaxed level.
I also like to pair things with ambient music. So I often introduce a session with a bit of breath work. So we'll have some ambient music playing there. All these things are different tools to help people come to a nice, calm, relaxed place. Are there specific venues or settings that are really well suited for hosting these sessions? Actually, yeah, there's, I've done Gongbat in all sorts of settings and some
Some of the most ideal settings I've found are actually churches. So they've got great acoustics. I do a session in a church which has got a heated floor, which is beautiful for participants. They usually set back a little bit so you don't get all the noise pollution. But from an event organizer's perspective, there's also some terrible places for them. So I've done them at exhibitions, which are generally, you know, there's so much noise exhibitions from surrounding exhibitors and all the visitors etc.
But again from the event perspective I've done some great ones at conferences where they utilize breakout rooms for optional activity. Similarly on main stages they can work quite well. If you've got people sat in theatre style they're usually a little bit shorter but again you've got some nice PA's in there and you can amplify the sound and make it a really nice environment for attendees.
But generally we see them in yoga studios and functional spaces like that. Another terrible venue actually is offices. So I've done a lot of corporate gong baths in the office space, which is just fraught with, you know, the dishwashers kicking off at 6 .30, the cleaners coming in, the phones are going. So yeah, I find the studios and churches are generally pretty well set up for these things.
Christine:
Would you be able to walk us through a typical gong bath session?
Mark:
Absolutely. So in terms of what people can expect, as I say, there'll be a venue and people will arrive to some nice mellow chilled music. They'll create themselves a little nest. So they'll lie down on yoga mats with blankets, with pillows, with eye masks, anything they've got to create a nice cozy environment. Body temperature does drop when we do these sessions, so it's nice to wrap up warm.
So then I'll introduce what a Gongbath is and what some of the benefits are. So for many people it'll be their first time. So I maybe spend five or 10 minutes just explaining what's going to happen, give them some idea of what to expect. People then close their eyes as some beatless ambient music starts to play.
And as people close their eyes, I just enter a short guided meditation just to bring everyone down to a nice calm chilled level, bring their awareness and their attention to an inward rather than an external gaze, we bring it to an inward gaze. So just start to notice how the body feels, where our energy levels at.
I might do some yoga nidra style body scans, a simple bit of breath work. So extending the exhale. So again, we just calm the mind, calm the nervous system and breath work in particular is a really potent way to prime the body to lie still for the next hour, hour and a half. So the gongs start to play and there's nothing people really need to do during a gong bath. The sound just washes over them.
There's various peaks and troughs. The gongs create actually a surprising amount of variety. So sometimes it might feel intense and scary, sometimes it might feel beautiful and serene, but we take the participants through a range of different sounds, different textures. At the end, they'll have, we'll have a period of just absolute silence or as close to silence as we can get. And if you, if you do yoga, the silence is kind of like the Shavasana at the end of yoga. So I usually leave maybe eight-10 minutes of just pure silence. And this is really where a lot of the good work happens within the body when their participants are in a really deep, relaxed state. So after that silence, I'll create some really gentle, soft sounds, maybe some little wind chimes, some just nice, beautiful sounds.
some ambient music will start to rise and then eventually I'll bring my voice back and just invite participants to maybe wiggle the fingers, wiggle the toes and just bring some awareness back to the room, back to the body.
How do Gong Baths differ from other forms of meditation?
That's a really, really good question. So I like to think of it as, you know, passive versus active participation.
So traditional meditation techniques often focus on the breath or focus on bodily sensations or visualizations to guide the mind into a state of relaxation, state of awareness. And this is quite active, you know, you need to actively focus on the breath or actively have a focal point there.
In contrast, Gong Baths are generally more passive, so participants will lie down, they're relaxed and just allow the sounds to wash over them. So I think a bath can be quite engaging for people who find silent, seated meditation challenging. I've got a few friends who said, you know, they just say they can't meditate, they're too, and the minds are too busy. And obviously that is the practice, but this is a tool, a gateway, if you like, into finding that kind of state with no practice and best of all, no effort. I guess the other thing to mention as well is, the vibrations from gongs that you experience in a Gong bath, they are actually physically felt, which which also sets Gong baths apart for more traditional quieter forms of meditation.
Christine:
How do you work with event planners to customize Gong bath experiences for different types of events or audiences? You kind of mentioned what's kind of good and bad, but like, what logistical considerations should actual event planners keep in mind?
Mark:
Yeah, so, Dead straightforward really, Gom baths is not dissimilar to a yoga class. It does involve people lying down on yoga mats, possibly with blankets and eye masks. So there is that element of sourcing yoga mats, sourcing eye masks, but most of your practitioner can actually source these on your behalf. It is really nice to have blankets and pillows. It makes a big difference to the experience.
I guess a consideration for event planners is the experience doesn't work too well after alcohol. So if it is an away day or if there's alcohol involved, it's best to do these kinds of sessions before the drinks take place. But with organisations, with event organisers and corporates, they're mainly showcased as a tool for managing stress. But going back to my point earlier about this practice being a tool to shift our perspective.
In the workplace, there's often a need for that, for people to shift their perspective. Maybe, you know, executives need to think more like staff just to understand where they're at, or maybe staff need to think more like executives. Perhaps you've got engineers that you want to think like designers, or designers you want to think like engineers. Whatever that shift of perspective is, that's what this headspace, this time out of normal thinking patterns can really offer.
So, you know, sometimes psychedelics are used in the same way for creative thinking to solve problems or just to approach things in an innovative way. And what we're offering here is not dissimilar. By spending time in these slightly altered states, we can get those moments of clarity, we can get aha moments or just get different sort of creative solutions to problems we might be looking for solutions for.
Christine:
It almost lets you get into a place where you can be mindful.
Mark: Absolutely. Absolutely. Without any practice or without any effort, which is the beauty of it really, the beauty of using gongs and sound as that tool to get into a more meditative state.
Christine:
Since we are coming to the end of this episode, is there anything else you would like to share with our listeners today?
Mark:
Just if you're interested, if you're curious to find out a little more, if maybe you've never taken part in a Gong bath before. You can head over to aboutgong.com, which is where we have all our information. We have public sessions all around London. We do corporate sessions for the likes of TikTok, Meta, Tesco, et cetera. So they're quite a popular wellness activity for corporates at the moment. And yeah, if you head over to aboutgong.com, you can find out more.
Christine: Thank you so much for coming on the podcast today and sharing your thoughts and expertise with us.