“The light takes us as we are, broken and uncertain as we are. The light does not judge us as we judge ourselves. It seeks us, and it blesses everything it touches.” Tracy Cochran

 Please note: This reflection is dedicated to Candi Maio, for I love her song of Love.

Music travels on a prism of  light, as  Spirit connects our heartbeat with the pulse of life. Listening to a melody can enliven our experience and transform the ordinary into a transcendent moment. One such twinkling lives in my memory.

 It was a grey shrouded day and the rain was releasing her pent up anguish. I was driving and weaving my way through traffic and flooded streets towards my destination.  I arrived late at my next patient’s house due to the less than ideal weather conditions. As I pulled up to the curb a torrential downpour ensued.

While I sat waiting for the rain to lift, I noticed the tension in my body and my hassled mood. When suddenly one of those peak moments took me by surprise. My senses were overcome with the most exquisite sounds of classical music opus that I was hearing for the very first time. I sat motionless and listened in sheer bliss.

Physician author, Oliver Sachs has studied and written about his experiences helping  patients with  the healing power of music. He has observed an innate affinity we  humans have for music and  studied how our auditory and nervous systems are finely tuned with  music.

In the video below, we get to witness a remarkable transformation in an elderly man who on the surface might seem to be only a shadow of a person. Yet, with music his spirit comes alive and he shares his  profoundly beautiful truth.

Most often we look for medications to ease physical, emotional and spiritual suffering, yet music can connect us with our soul in a miraculous way.

Liz Sorensel Wessel

Watercolor polyprint by ~liz

Note: readers might also enjoy Erie Chapman's recent essay "Days 356-360 Music and the Soul" (Dec 23, 2013 ).