On many Saturday mornings during college, I found myself with 3 other guys in a stairwell. We - the Hilltoppers Barbershop Quartet - had a favorite stairwell in the music building that was something of an echo chamber. After our weekly rehearsal time, we’d gather there to seek out musical exhilaration after the mundane work of learning and refining our repertoire.
Each member of our quartet would find our note in a 4-part chord. We’d minutely alter our pitches until the four notes hit a sweet spot.
And then it happened.
Out of nowhere, a 5th note would flower forth, a note that was purer and an octave higher than any of us was singing. It was an overtone, and it would send chills down our spines.
A musical overtone happens when there is a harmonic resonance so precise it generates a higher vibrational tone. A single singer can’t create an overtone. It takes a group, and one that is precisely aligned.
Not all overtones are musical. Yet all overtones are energetic. Groups reach harmonic resonance in many different ways, and when they do, they can feel a powerful, higher vibrational frequency flowering forth.
This overtone happens when people meditate together. It happens in yoga classes, church services, deep-diving book clubs, reunions with dear friends.
We often minimize its significance by thinking of it as a good feeling, or as a special time. It is both, and yet so much more. When we connect deeply with a group, there is a chemical and energetic restructuring in our brains and nervous systems.
The resonance activates heart emotions and bodily sensations that often go unnoticed. It unleashes levels of thinking and intelligence that are greater than any individual can manage. Deep feelings, a sense of belonging, new insights – these overtones come to us when we find a resonant connection with a group.
Another name for all of these transformations is healing. When we are a part of groups that have substance and meaning for us, we are healed. We are made a little more whole.
This is important because we so easily align with dissonant energies and issues. We get wrapped up the fear and anxiety of political, personal, or work issues and our thoughts, feelings, and nervous system are taken for a ride.
Recently I was reading a powerful section from Cynthia Bourgeault where she referred to “cosmic dialysis”. This is spiritual work we do alone and with others this an intentional realignment of awareness and energy.
This realignment creates overtones, it shifts our perspective, and it provides an energetic cleansing for us, our world, and our universe. This subtle work helps remove “the toxins generated by fear, greed, violence, vengeance, and shame.” (Eye of the Heart, p. 146)
When I facilitate groups, I start with a centering time and some form of check-in. This is a way for participants to find their own pitch and to add their voice to the musical chord that is growing in the group or the session. We set ourselves up to experience powerful overtones of healing as we explore our spiritual journeys together.
I encourage you to seek out groups in which you can find deep resonance. In fact, I have a few coming up that you might consider. I encourage you to tap into the healing and wholeness that flowers forth in these groups. And of course, as you heal, you become a source of dialysis, carrying a higher resonance into the world, helping the rest of us in our own healing.