Sound Healing Adds Calm and Creativity to Meetings and Events
Skift Take
Employees often feel drained and overwhelmed in today’s corporate world, where multitasking and being on-call 24/7 are standard.
Meetings are no help, with endless, jam-packed agendas. Just the travel to and from a gathering can be stressful. Then there are the networking receptions where attendees often have to maneuver a room filled with strangers.
Enter wellness practices. They’re increasingly being integrated into meetings to support work-life balance. The best part: They also improve focus and foster better collaboration.
One wellness practice gaining in popularity for corporate groups is “sound healing.” Also called “sound baths,” they are holistic wellness practices that immerse groups in the sounds and vibrations produced by various instruments, such as crystal bowls, gongs, shamanic drums. They have been used for centuries in facilitating meditation and to help reduce stress.
Soothing Vibrations While Afloat
Caesars Entertainment gathered a group of 100 meeting professionals in Las Vegas in June for its inaugural Global Wellness Summit. It incorporated activities, food and beverage, and speakers from its Wellness Menu into the experience.
A highlight was a closing night sound bath at Caesars Palace’s Garden of the Gods Pool Oasis. Flickering candles, the distinct smell of burning sage, and a star-filled night sky set the stage.
Participants were on yoga mats as two local breathwork practitioners led the ceremony. Some could also enjoy the experience while floating in the pool on air mattresses.
Dani Kilpatrick, also known as the “Desert Moon Yogi,” and Shannon Rae Alvarez led the session.
Emily Nuzzo-Fouts, events and connectivity manager for Chartis, a healthcare consulting firm, attended Caesars’ inaugural Global Wellness Summit. She was so impressed with the floating sound bath that she is looking into incorporating it into an upcoming conference.
“The experience allowed me to totally relax and come to a mental state that was healing for me,” said Nuzzo-Fouts. “As a busy professional, my brain is constantly in motion and this was one of the very few times I have ever been able to quiet the noise and find some internal peace.”
Does Sound Healing Strike the Right Chord for All?
For some attendees of the Caesars Wellness Summit, sound baths were an unfamiliar concept.
“There is a stigma in the media about sound baths so I was confused about what would be taking place,” said Lisa J. Ribacoff-Mooney, manager of Interpoint Investigative Services, and seminar program chair for the American Polygraph Association and the National Polygraph Association. “The experience was not only eye-opening but mind-opening as well,” said Ribacoff-Mooney.
While she found the session beneficial, she remains unsure whether sound baths would resonate with everyone, particularly those in the polygraph industry.
“I would like to incorporate the sound bath into a future seminar, however, my concern is the way it will be received by attendees,” she said.
Her attendees are predominantly male with a government or law-enforcement background and she doesn’t feel they would be attracted to a sound healing session.
However, Ribacoff-Mooney expressed enthusiasm for including other wellness experiences from the Caesars menu, such as a morning hike at Mount Charleston or rafting down the Colorado River as a team-building activity.