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Audible Justice I
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If It Helps You To Sleep
by John Justice these life altering psychological exercises and
reduce their time developing far less e ective
I am so overwhelmed by the severity of the pharmaceutical alternatives.)
situation I now nd myself in. It damages my If repeated practice can have such a deep
calm so much that I’m running away. Actually, a ect on our peace, our happiness, and our
I’m racing away, as fast as my car can take me. mental endurance, invoked from only the nat-
ings feel bleak. I analyze the situation from ural and simplistic sound waves of a pocket-
a billion angles, but it’s no use. I can’t gure this sized bell, how vast are the treasures waiting
one out. I can’t even hear myself think. I have to be unlocked amid the nal “mix-downs” of
to slow down. I take three deep breaths, put our favorite recordings? What cerebral riches
on “Rubber Soul,” and suddenly I realize… are yet to be discovered inside their innumer-
I’m already home. And things seem a li le less ous vibrations and the complexities they cre-
bleak. ate as they collide together through the void
Even on my worst days, between speaker and ear?
I think it’s time we stop overlooking the
I’ve proven time and again power of our own mind as well as the phe-
that music is my most pow- nomenal enhancement of that power available
erful remedy. It is an un- to us through music. How much more con-
tent would we be if our great times were even
shakable mountain ready greater and our not-so-great times weren’t re-
to bare the weight of my ally that bad a er all?
heart at any moment. It can Music is my immediate
stop me dead in my tracks and transport me alleviation from stress. It
through time and space. Even a few seconds of
my favorite albums will bring me straight back is my unwavering calm in
to the present moment, just as it is; objective constantly changing winds.
and without illusion. I nd this connection be- It boosts my energy faster
tween mind and sound so incredible, and yet
so o en unnoticed. than any digestive process.
One of my new favorite authors, the Noble It amplifies any activity
Prize-nominated ich Nhat Hanh, has been and accentuates the often
known to go into great detail about an ex-
tremely powerful mental technique known as unnoticed levels of beauty
“Bell Meditation.” In this traditional practice, in my peripheral view. It paints
Buddhists monks positively exploit the mind’s the most enthralling murals in my imagination
innate ability to subconsciously recognize and it weaves an enveloping tapestry for my
and respond to repeated sounds. (Students mind’s eye. It is truly my daily medication.
of science might equate this to Pavlov’s Clas- “There’s a song that they
sical Conditioning. But I believe it goes much
deeper than training dogs to salivate on com- sing when they take to the
mand, or Dwight’s unexplainable desire for a highway, a song that they
breath-mint.)
rough intimate and continued time sing when they take to the
spent observing the sound of a bell, even a sea, a song that they sing
small bell, accompanied by entering a peaceful of their home in the sky,
state of mind, we can train ourselves to instan-
taneously return to that place of mental tran- maybe you can believe it if
quility every time the bell sounds. Again I nd it helps you to sleep, but
this unbelievably miraculous and yet so over- singing works just fine for
looked in our part of the world. (I wish West-
ern science would spend more time validating me.”