Music, the language of healing

By Surya Vishwa 

At a recent personal coaching related forum connected to psychology, psychiatry and counselling the word ‘healing’ was used several times and the person seated next to me whispered ‘I am really trying to understand what this word healing really means and who is exactly a healer.’ 

Good question. Who is a healer? Is it an individual who has a particular title and access to a range of medications and the process of administering it? Is it a guru with special powers who can wave a benign hand and declare a person to be healed from whatever emotional, physical or mental condition one can be afflicted by? Or is it someone with academic titles deemed as prestigious and acquired from world renowned institutes who can ‘heal’ a person and indeed as asked in our opening sentence, what exactly is healing?

We will look at the question mentioned in the opening lines of this article from the lens of arts as we remember that 21 March is recognised as World Down Syndrome day.   The human condition is diverse. Each human is a micro-universe with a unique ecosystem. We are so used to labels such as ‘normal’ that our minds have taken premature retirement from the fact that no one can be really confined to the six letter word – ‘normal.’ Just on a side note even the man who thought he had traversed the length and breadth of the mind – Sigmund Freud, died in a state that could be described as ‘unstable.’ 

Every human being is born with a mind. And if a human being has a mind – there is hope – not because one can cram a range of intellectual stuff into it – but rather because the mind is the machine that can plough the fields of awareness.

“I use music as a tool for happiness with hundreds of persons categorised as having the Down syndrome and also autism. This is not a medical application. This is an artistic tool. The result is amazing,” says musician Nadun Hettiarachchi with over two decades of harmonising the lives of differently abled children, youth 

and adults. 

“Music is a language of healing and energising. It can be interpreted by any mind, in any condition. At a general level every human can access a sublime or energetic or sentimental state if the music is chosen accordingly. International scientific research has shown how atmospheric changes occur with the use of music in different frequencies and thereby influences the energy of matter,” he points out. 

Nishini Vishwanthari is a young speech therapist passionate about transforming lives and with Nadun Hettiarachchi she has been working on using music to help differently abled humans to optimise their potential in the world.

“A medical condition such as the Down syndrome or autism may remain in general but the effect of this condition on everyday life could be changed to a very large extent when music is used for the person concerned to engage with groups and dispel the feeling or isolation or desolateness. It can be used to empower the mind to diverse levels,” says Nishini who uses singing based therapy as a component of speech and music therapy together with Nadun. The healer she points out, then happens to be the individual concerned. 

“The scientific and neurological impact of music has been well researched. There are diverse work being done on the sphere of medical-musicology. What we have seen in our work where we use music for recreational and therapeutic purposes of differently abled humans is that they relax and communicate better with others. The ability to interact with others confidently is needed for all humans. Some differently abled persons we work with are employed and also function either as entrepreneurs or artistes,” says Nadun and Nishini. 

Note: The Harmony page is committed to the cause of mainstreaming arts and artistes into the socio-economic sphere. We will be carrying out a detailed interview with Nadun Hettiararchchi and Nishini Vishwanthari in our upcoming editions to get their views on better integrating arts into social upliftment based on their wide scale work exposure.