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The Healing Power of the Drum
Robert Lawrence Friedman
The
hand drum has been used for thousands of years in celebrations,
rituals and ceremonies. However, the merging of science with the
healing qualities of the hand drum is a relatively new
development.
Psychological and
Physiological Applications
Some of the psychological applications in which hand drums are
being used include assisting veterans to release the emotional
pain of post-traumatic stress disorder, releasing the pent-up
anger and negative emotions of "at-risk" adolescents, and
promoting health in corporate executives through releasing their
day-to-day stress, in addition to many other applications.
In the medical
field, the hand drum is being used to help Alzheimer's patients
improve their short-term memory and increase social interaction
and to help autistic children increase their attention spans. In
some cases, it is not necessarily the hand drum that provides
positive changes in an individual, but a rhythmic device such as
a metronome or an audiotape which plays specific rhythms. Such
tools are being used to aid Parkinson's patients and stroke
victims to regain the control of movement or increase their
gaits.
As a drum
facilitator and psychotherapist, I have personally witnessed the
power of the drum to relax the tense, energize the tired, and
heal the emotionally wounded. I have also observed the hand
drum's extraordinary and consistent ability to create states of
euphoria, induce light trance, promote play, release anger and
promote feelings of community and unity.
My hope is that
through examining the breadth of work that is available we can
realize that the application of rhythm and its ability to heal
the body, mind and soul is boundless. Yet much more research is
necessary to confirm what many have experienced and studied
already-that rhythm in relationship to the body and mind has
many benefits-an idea that our society is just beginning to
grasp.
In this century,
when we seem to be moving farther and farther away from
ourselves and our deeper needs, the drum, through its
simplicity, effortlessness and naturalism, offers us a link back
to that which we knew before technology separated us from our
soul.
Through providing
a channel back to our deeper nature, the drum concurrently
provides those who use it with a link to others. The drum seems
to have the capacity to unite all individuals who choose to
experience it together. Despite race, religion, color, creed,
background, or ideology, all are joined together through this
ancient instrument's calling. The drum, therefore, becomes a
vehicle for transporting all who utilize it, across all
boundaries, to an experience of wholeness and community.
Alzheimer's Disease
As our life spans becomes longer and longer, mental problems
such as Alzheimer's disease and dementia become more common.
Many people with these diseases eventually require institutional
care. Nursing homes are required to provide activities for
residents which enhance the quality of their lives. Playing
drums has been found to be the ideal activity for people with
diminished physical and mental capacities.
Researchers have
found that because rhythm is so intrinsic to our nature,
Alzheimer's patients, even in the latter stages of the disease,
can copy simple rhythms played on a drum. This form of
interaction takes on great significance when all other forms of
communication have been diminished. Drumming seems to focus
Alzheimer's patients for a short time, and they seem momentarily
coherent. These interludes, however brief, are priceless to
loved ones.
Drumming and Stress
Management
Stress is basically a disconnection from the earth, a forgetting
of the breath...It believes that everything is an emergency.
Nothing is that important. -Natalie Goldberg
How does the drum
help to relieve stress? There are numerous ways this occurs.
When people drum, they are generally having fun. It is difficult
to be in a playful mode and be stressed at the same time. Also,
as described previously, the drum has the capacity to release
negative feelings-of which stress is clearly one. When one hits
the drum, he or she is placed squarely in the here and now. Some
of our stress is created from past or future thoughts of fear,
worry, or regret, but it is very difficult to be stressed and be
in the present moment.
Drumming increases
our Alpha brainwaves, those brainwaves associated with feelings
of well-being and euphoria.
In a recent interview, Dr. Barry Quinn, a licensed clinical
psychologist, described his results of working with drumming to
increase the Alpha brainwaves of his hyper vigilant (highly
stressed) patients.
"What I've found
in my clinical work over the past 11 years is that as least 20%
of the population does not have Alpha brainwaves. Alpha waves
occur when the brain relaxes lightly into an 8 to 12 cycles per
second brainwave pattern. Most individuals should be producing
this brainwave pattern when they close their eyes and relax
their mind. In a thirty minute ideal Transcendental Meditation
the brain spends approximately 20 minutes in an Alpha state and
10 minutes in the deeper Theta (4-8 cps) mental state.
"There are
benefits associated with Alpha waves, such as the ability to
relax and keep the mind on idle when it is not focusing on a
specific task. Alpha is associated with a general feeling of
well-being and euphoria. Individuals who have very high
amplitude of Alpha brainwaves have been found to be able to
experience more "lucid dreams." People with lower than normal
amounts of Alpha or no Alpha have much more mental stress than
other people.
"There is also a
category of people who don't have any Alpha waves and also have
low amplitude brainwave activity across all bands. I see this in
about 30-40% of the patients I treat. Neurologically, we refer
to these people as hyper vigilant. The definition of hyper
vigilance is someone who cannot turn off his or her mental
activity for any length of time. They must always be thinking or
focusing on something. They tend not to be able to let go of
emotional issues but rather obsess relentlessly about them. Many
with this brain pattern become alcoholics and highly addicted in
a way that makes stopping drinking very difficult for them. It's
very hard for them to relax and unwind. Therefore, they
generally have a lot of sleep disorders as well. Anything that
would increase their Alpha waves would be very beneficial to
them.
"In pain patients,
the amount of Alpha brainwaves a patient has is also an
indicator of how well the patient is managing his or her pain.
If patients are not managing their pain well, or are
over-focused on it, they will lose Alpha waves. On the other
hand, if a pain patient is having a good day, the Alpha will go
back up.
"Until recently, I
had never found anything that increased Alpha waves in people
that needed most to have more of them, and I am speaking
specifically of the hyper vigilant population. I tried
biofeedback, but it tends only to enhance the theta waves of
relaxation and didn't really affect Alpha much at all. I even
had some hyper vigilant patients who were transcendental
mediators, a group which typically has a higher amplitude of
Alpha than the general population, but these hyper vigilent
mediators had low to non-existent Alpha.
"It was suggested
to me that I do some research with drums and Alpha waves. What
first came to my mind were my hyper vigilant patients. Not
expecting anything really, I went ahead and took four or five
people and did an experiment wherein I got an Alpha wave
baseline from them, which was, of course, typically low (below
10 MV) and had them drum for half an hour. The instructions I
gave them were to drum a soft slow heartbeat type of rhythm. Not
everyone followed the instructions. A couple did some emotional
expressive drumming, and one or two might have had too much pain
or felt pain from holding the drum due to fibromyalgia, but I
found that 50% of the ones I tested got a normal Alpha wave
pattern after thirty minutes of drumming, which means that their
Alpha waves doubled. They went from 10 microvolts average to 20
microvolts just in the course of one drumming session.
"One of the
participants was a friend of mine. I had done 15 neurofeedback
sessions with him and gotten him into theta waves but had never
been able to get any Alpha waves from him. The drumming was the
first and only thing that allowed him to produce Alpha waves. I
was quite impressed. I was also impressed by the fact that the
Alpha waves occurred in these hypervigilant, high stressed
people after only 20-30 minutes. It wasn't after five sessions.
It was immediately after the first drumming session."
Robert Lawrence
Friedman, MA,
Remo artist, is author of "The Healing Power of the Drum",
psychotherapist, president of Stress Solutions, Inc
www.stress-solutions.com. He has appeared on The Today Show in
New York, Fox News and most recently on the Class of '75, a
Discovery Health channel series, sharing his philosophy of
drumming and wellness. The Healing Power of the Drum can be
purchased at www.wc-media.com, www.amazon.com and
www.bn.com. |
