SHOULD YOU TRY A SOUND BATH?
Some practitioners make broad health promises about sound baths, claiming they can aid depression, lower blood pressure and, more fancifully, even repair DNA.
These benefits can’t be proven without scientific trials, said Dr David Silbersweig, a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. And it’s difficult to know whether the effects people do report come from the sounds themselves or the relaxing environment in which they’re played, he added.
Some instructors are careful not to oversell their work. Bechtold, a sound bath teacher and gong player of 20 years, said she saw sound baths as a part of an overall wellness routine. They can give participants time and space to process emotions, Bechtold said, “and at the same time learn to more deeply relax the body.”
Perhaps that’s one key to their appeal.
Alejandra Davila, 29, who attended the beach sound bath in Santa Monica, said she was drawn in by posts on Instagram.
“I kept wanting to try yoga,” Davila said, “and this just kind of seemed more Zen and more relaxing.”
By Nicole Stock © The New York Times Company
The article originally appeared in The New York Times.
