Sound can have a Profound Effect on You and Your Practice
Sound, whether it’s music you play during yoga sessions or chanting with the voice, has a powerful effect on you and your clients. 
Raising your awareness about the effect of sound and music can have a profound impact on your practice as a Yoga Practitioner.
“Sound is like air. It is always there. We breathe air all the time and hardly ever notice it. We naturally assume that we listen with our ears. The fact is we listen with our entire body. We listen from the inside out all the time. We just aren’t aware of it.”
(p. 5 Listen from the Inside Out by Sharon Carne)
Another thing that is always there and we hardly ever notice (at least consciously) is the sound of our own voice. We are more focused in sending the sound of our voice out to tell someone about something, to give instructions or to sing.
Does Your Voice Nurture You?
The truth is that the sound of your own voice resonates every cell in your body. Sound travels 4 and ½ times faster through your body and 12 times faster through your bones than it does through the air. Your breath vibrates your vocal cords and your tongue and mouth form the right shapes to make the correct sounds for the words you are saying. Your throat, skull and rib cage act like amplifiers so that your voice can be heard.
Can you feel how your voice resonates your bones when you speak? Put your hand on your throat or on the centre of your chest as you say something and feel the bones vibrate. That sound touches every cell in your body.
Sound is a nutrient for the body, mind and spirit. It is food. Like any food, there are sounds that are like junk food and there are sounds that provide us with healthy nutrition.
An example of junk food sound is traffic noise. An example of nutritious sound is bird song or bubbling water from a stream.
The sound of your voice feeds your body by resonating its cells. One of the questions I pose when I speak before a group of people is, “What is the nature of the sounds that you make with your voice?”
Because sound goes through you faster than it goes through the air, every sound you make with your voice has already vibrated every atom of your being, before the sound even leaves your mouth.
When I came to this realization years ago, it made a profound impact on how I chose my words and tone of my voice. Because now I know that everything I say impacts me before the sound leaves my mouth, I choose what I am going to say and how I say it with more discernment.
Sacred Sound as the Ultimate Nurturer
Sound is vibrational energy and words carry vibrational energy especially when they are spoken aloud. Feel the difference in your body between saying the word fear and the word love.
Special vocal sounds used since ancient times carry with them huge fields of sacred energy that you bring into your space when you say them. Especially when you continue to say or chant them for a while. This is the most nutritious sound food for the body, mind and spirit.
Sounds like OM, AUM, AMEN, SHALOM, ALLELUIA, HALLELUJAH or MA.
As you explore these sounds in your practice and with your clients, become aware of the effect it has. Yoga has profound effects on the human being. Sacred sound also has profound effects. When you use them together you multiply the effects.