"But what music am I going to listen to!?"
When I first started meditating, having the right music was one of my favorite excuses to NOT meditate. I would spend so much time skipping through songs that before I knew it, all the time I had allotted to meditate was gone and 'oop! Guess I'm not meditating today!'
Having the right music at any given time is important to me, it creates a mood, allows for flow, release, creation. Music is vibration after all, and vibration is a primary mode of universal communication. So the music we listen to, the frequencies we expose ourselves to affects us, especially during meditation when we are opening ourselves up to reach for our higher selves.
Now, having been teaching meditation for several years, I tell my students the only wrong way to meditate is to not meditate. I don't care where or how you sit, what you do or don't listen to; just sitting, being still, and emptying your mind, for any period of time (even 1 minute!) is enormously helpful to your overall state of being.
But, if you have some really good music that helps to calm the body and quiet the mind, that can make it all the more easier. So, I've compiled a list of some of my favorite mediation and healing albums. They vary from really deep meditative sounds to more light, healing sounds I use for my energy healing sessions.
I also feel the need to add that not all "spiritual" or "high vibe" music has to sound like someone playing a flute nearby a bubbling brook. There's plenty of songs out there that are NOT THAT and have produced very profound and moving spiritual experience for me.
(cue Stairway to Heaven)
So, here goes...
10. Enya.
Yup, that's it, just Enya. Literally anything by Enya. I don't even feel the need to pick a specific album. Enya's music is so magical, it feels like the very Gates to Heaven are opening up when I listen to her music. I don't necessarily listen to her when I'm meditating because I generally don't like to hear words when I'm meditating, even if they're from Middle Earth or whatever language she's speaking. I keep Enya in heavy rotation because her music is soothing, pure and uplifting. I feel like this is what Elves listen to. Maybe Enya is an Elf. #notkidding
9. Liquid Mind - Liquid Mind VI: Spirit
Ok, albums, right, I said I was going to give you albums. Liquid Mind has a lot of albums. And while they all pretty much sound the same, I definitely like some better than others. I don't know exactly why, but as someone who's spent many cumulative hours perusing lots of meditation music, this one is definitely my favorite by him. I mean, just look at that cover art, you don't get any more to the point than that! It's calm and wondrous without being intrusive or sounding too much like the music you would hear in a spa chain. #ifyouknowyouknow
8. Ashana with Thomas Baroque - Jewels of Silence: Meditation On the Chakras for Voice and Crystal Singing Bowls
This is the first mediation/healing album I really fell in love with. This is one of Ashana's earlier albums and I haven't liked any of her other releases nearly as much as this one. This one feels very raw and pure. I love the feminine softness of her voice, the low earthly tones of the bowls. This was an album felt like it could be the soundtrack to my own healing process. I still really love this album when I'm relaxing and doing self care at home. I also play this album a lot during my initial healing consultations, when I am first welcoming clients into my space or when I know I have a client who's ready to move through something big and will need a little extra comfort. #whoneedsahug
7. Crystal Voices / Deborah Van Dyke & Valerie Farnsworth - Sounds of Light (pure tones of crystal singing bowls
This is also one of the first albums I really fell in love with for meditating and is still one of my go-to's. Sound of Light really is pure tones of crystal singing bowls; no flutes, no synthetic fillers, just singing bowls and a few chimes here and there. I think that's where the magic is. You can really feel the vibration of the bowls coming through the speakers and slowing down your brain waves. I love it's simplicity, its almost drone-y, which I find really helpful for deep meditation. Time just kinda stops when I'm listening to this album, which is exactly what you want for meditation. #yeaitslikethat
6. Deuter - Garden of the Gods
I. Love. This. Album. It literally has everything: slow meditation vibes, ecstatic drumming, celestial voices. I love all of it. A lot of Deuter's stuff is good. The album Empty Sky is excellent for meditation, and I debated which one to put on this list, considering this is a Meditation Music list. But, I simply couldn't put anything by him if it wasn't this album. I like it THAT much. Because of the diversity, its not something I necessarily listen to for meditation, but like Enya, it's on heavy rotation because the sounds are so holy, so beautiful, so sacred. #soundgasm
5. Entheo - Lucid Surrender
TOP 5! This is one of my top most played meditation albums right now, but as we go down the list you'll see why I had to make Entheo #5 and not #1. (that's right, it gets better from here). Every track on this album is meditation gold. I play this for my own meditations, for meditation classes and even some healing sessions (depending on which one I'm doing). It combines that earthy drone with spaceship frequencies that I think are perfect for having a grounded and profound meditation. I haven't listened to a lot of their other albums cuz once you find something good, why keep looking? But some of their other stuff is actually more dance which could be really cool to check out. I'm not really an EMD-er, but if that's your scene you might really dig their other tunes. #raveyoulater
4. Constance Demby - Sanctum Sanctuorum
Ok, little backstory on this one. I was pretty anti-religion when I came into the spirituality game. So, I had a lot of ego to check when the word 'God' was being thrown around. I had to redefine for myself who and what 'God' is and my relationship with the Divine. This Constance Demby album is pure magic, but it was hard for me to reconcile at first because a lot of the tracks have a church-y sounding choir. The sound alone triggered a distaste for anything church related. But, I also couldn't ignore the pure and holy feeling I was getting from it (Sacred indeed). It reminded me of the way I wanted church to feel when I was little, I wanted so badly to believe in magic, a higher power, but I slowly realized that I wouldn't find it in those churches. So, I digress, but I think you get the point, this album is #straightmagic
3. Source Vibrations - Solfeggio Harmonics Vol. 1
Speaking of magic. Source Vibratoins is some deep sh!t. It's tuned to 528 hz, yeah we're going there. I can almost guarantee that if you meditate to this, you will knock out. Which, depending on what you got going on, might be exactly what you need. Sometimes you just gotta let the Light knock you out for a sec. #mamasaidknockyouout. But, stay sitting upright if you can, otherwise that's called napping. Nothing wrong with a nap, its just not meditating. This is a go to album when I'm meditating, flowing reiki or another deep healing session where I need to not be in my own head. I swear when I listen to this, I can feel my entire nervous system take a big exhale. #imbreathingareyoubreathing
2. Gudni Gudnason - Reflections from Water
Alright so, the first time I heard this album I was a little like 'WTF?' The sounds were a little too weird, a little too jarring at times, tacky and over processed at other times. But, I kept listening, because Gudni Gudnason is the Founder of the Modern Mystery School, the Lineage in which I am now a Guide, Teacher and Healer. But, when I found this album I wasn't any of those things, I was just an Adept Initiate. So, I kept listening, not while meditating, but while going about my day, and a little while later I realized, I had no thoughts. I was listening to this music in the background while I did chores around the house, but my mind was completely empty, I wasn't scattered and mentally pulled in a bunch of different directions. I was clear, calm and focused. So after that I had to give it a chance. And for a while this was the only meditation album I listened to. This album got me through some tough and beautiful healing meditations and I can continually count on it to provide the easiest, deepest meditation. I still listen to this on a daily basis and play it for my classes and definitely during healing sessions. #dontknockittilyoutryit
1. Dr. Theresa Bullard Ph.D. & Elias North - Kabbalah Chant
DRUM ROLL PLEASE!!!! This really is the granddaddy of all meditation albums. Dr. Theresa Bullard Ph.D. International Modern Mystery School Instructor, as seen on Gaia TV's Mystery Teachings tones energies of the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, produced by Award Winning Composer and Modern Mystery School Guide, Teacher and Healer Philipp Schardt.
Each track corresponds to a different Sephiroth of the Tree and induces it's own meditative and healing journey. This really is some next level jive. I don't even play this for my meditation classes because I know people will just fall asleep. #yougetwhatyoupaidfor I do however, listen to this almost every night while I sleep and definitely have noticed an effect. I also use this album as a tool to deepen my experience of the Universal Kabbalah Ascension journey. You can download the full album or individual tracks here:https://kabbalahchants.bandcamp.com/
And that's it! Those are my top meditation tracks of all time, or at least right now. Drop a link in the comments of your favorite meditation tracks of albums (I'm always looking to expand my repertoire) or let me know what you these suggestions!
Madison White, RN, BSN
The Light Center
Healer, Teacher & Guide
Certified by the Modern Mystery School
www.thelightcenterboston.com