Vocal Toning: Discover One of Your Power Tools

Vocal Toning: Discover One of Your Power Tools

If you had an easy-to-use tool that could quickly and effectively center and balance you, align your awareness with your God-nature, heal your body, release blocked emotional energy, accelerate your spiritual growth and transformation, assist in manifesting your dreams and much more, AND—it was always with you—you’d use it, wouldn’t you?

Well, you do have this “power tool,” and if you’re not using it, it may be time for you to start! It is part of the basic equipment you were issued when you accepted your assignment on Planet Earth. It is your voice—or more specifically, the sacred sounds you can make with your voice.

Toning, as I define it, is the practice of using your voice to beneficially influence energy patterns. It is closely related to chanting but is different in form. Whereas chanting is the rhythmic repetition of a word or series of words, toning is a sustained note, most typically a vowel sound, interrupted only by the need to breathe.

Perhaps the most powerful tone you can vocalize is your own personal note or “signature tone.” Each of us resonates most fully to a single tone (or narrow range of tones) that is very natural and easy to sound. I believe it is the sound from which your body came into being. Your signature tone can be used for healing and transformation at every level. Some examples include:

For centering and balancing—Sound your tone and almost instantly you will sense your physical, emotional/mental, and spiritual bodies align and your chakras come into balance.
For meditating: Toning as meditation is simple and powerful. Toning as a preparation for meditation ushers you effortlessly into an altered state.
For visualization and manifestation: Empower your visualizations with your signature tone. Sound is the bridge between the faster vibratory rate of thought energy and the slower vibration of matter, providing an energetic pathway for the birth of thought into form. Caution: Don’t visualize anything you don’t want while sounding your tone!
For physical healing: Your signature tone provides a vibrational interpretation of the blueprint for your body’s original perfect design. Sounding it on a consistent basis influences the molecules of your body to “remember” this blueprint and conform to it. Toning for another person, either present or absent, is also extremely effective. Their body uses the tone to activate its own blueprint. Toning works healing wonders on animals as well.
For first aid: Toning has an amazing effect on trauma. Whether toning for yourself or another person, it calms and soothes like nothing else. I have experienced and received many reports of remarkable results when minor burns or scratches are toned to. It is necessary to begin as immediately as possible and continue for a sustained period—a minimum of a few minutes. (Use your intuition.) It is likely that no pain, redness or swelling will remain. (Of course it is important to take whatever other first aid measures are appropriate.)
For emotional healing: Emotional pain is caused by energy that is “stuck” in your body. By using tones/sonic patterns that resonate with the stuck energy (use your intuition to find the right sounds), these blockages can be shattered. Then, your signature tone can clear and “smooth” the energy as it is released into circulation.
For inspiring crystals and water: Imprint your energy into a crystal or into water by sounding your signature tone into it. Coupled with visualization, you can inspire them to hold and amplify your intent at a vibrational level, making it a powerful tool for healing and manifesting.

Finding Your Signature Tone

Discovering your own tone is an experimental process. The following approach is almost deceptively simple and its success depends on not trying too hard.

Sit with your spine straight and take several deep, full breaths. Then, fill your lungs with air, form your lips to make the word, “who” and exhale while “singing” the “who-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o” in whatever note naturally comes out. If this feels good and natural to you, and is easy to tone, you may have found your signature tone. (In general, signature tones for women are in the upper vocal register and for men, in the lower register.)

Repeat the process using the same tone if it feels right, a different tone if it does not. Allow the sound—don’t force it. It should seem as if you are merely providing a channel for a sound that is already there—not generating one. Continue to experiment until you find a tone that seems effortless to make and gives you the sense of “coming home.” One good sign that you have found it, is that it seems that you can tone it for an abnormally long period of time without needing to take a breath.

If you find it a challenge to find places where you feel free to tone, don’t underestimate your car as a toning chamber! Small, enclosed spaces seem to amplify the effects of the sound, giving you the sensation of being surrounded with it. Shower stalls and bathrooms are good in general and tiled ones are really effective. Probably the most interesting place I’ve ever toned is in a cave—but anyplace you find to tone is great. After awhile, you’ll be so comfortable with it, you’ll be fine with toning just about anywhere, including in front of people. After all, it is one of our power tools!

Julia Rogers Hamrick has been a spiritual-growth facilitator for over two decades, a teacher of toning since 1987, and is the author of Recreating Eden: The Exquisitely Simple, Divinely Ordained Plan for Transforming Your Life and Your Planet.