To optimize your intelligence your brain needs to be charged. The ear’s role in this essential work is huge. Music can boost your brainpower but it is important to select the right kind.
Intelligence is broad. Most would agree that academic, artistic, sporting and interpersonal acumen are all aspects of intelligence. Most would also equate intellect with the brain. Many however, do not realize the need to charge or stimulate the brain.
The ear is the brain charging super highway
The primary role of the ear is to energize the brain. Two thirds of the brain’s cortical charge comes via the ear1. Cortical charge drives motivation, creativity and intuition, aiding study, work and relationships. Optimal cortical charge delivers better harmony and mental clarity, while reducing stress and fatigue so you can perform better and move forward with life’s challenges.
Active better than passive
Listening ability is established in the womb where communication first occurs between the unborn child and the mother. After 4 months of gestation, the ear is formed and begins listening. Listening uses the whole body to process sound which travels via air and bone conduction to the brain and entire nervous system.
So how do you get the 4.5 hours of cortical stimulation the brain needs every day? Since the ear provides the majority of the brain’s cortical charge it makes sense that good hearing and listening are essential to optimal brain functioning. Hearing is passive while listening is active, requiring conscious effort. Listening is the door to clarity, concentration and higher intelligence. Actively listening to sound, voices2 or music is the best way to give your brain the stimulation it needs.
Choosing the right music
Music is a great way to get cortical charge. Which type of music is best? This would be music rich in high frequency harmonics. Low frequency sound can actually discharge and drain the brain of energy. This means classical music, in particular Mozart, and Gregorian chants will work better than excessively loud heavy metal or techno.
The sound challenges of a modern world
In our technological world with an over-emphasis of low frequency sound, many people are losing their ability to effectively process sound.
The good news however, is that by retraining the muscles of the middle ear3, unheard frequencies blocked due to negative feelings such as trauma, missed developmental stages in the womb and ear infections, can be restored, enhancing your ability to process sound. This then leads to improved listening, faster foreign language learning4, better school grades, improved work performance and better relationships.
Music is also a universal language that can connect people across languages, cultures and nationalities. It can change mood, influence productivity and enhance cognitive ability. And it is fun. Something we can all sing about.
By Marsha Staubli
Marsha is a Senior Tomatis Consultant at the Tomatis listening center in Rolle, Switzerland.
1 L’Oreille et La Vie, Alfred Tomatis,
2 French Academy of Medicine 1957, The Tomatis Effect: “The voice only contains what the Ear can hear”.
3 Listening reeducation (usually 60 hours of listening to music) with the Tomatis electronic ear.
4 European Union’s Socrates program in 7 universities (Audio-lingua project 1993-1995). Accurate listening ability enables you to learn a language twice as fast.
Sylvie Nahum says
After having tried the method, our whole family can thank Tomatis for his work ! It helped us a lot. Many thanks to the Tomatis centre in Rolle that took care of us and to the writer of the article that led us there…
Tracy Black says
Based on research of the Tomatis method, this article nicely summarizes the important role that hearing, and more specifically, listening, plays in one’s well-being. May we all listen!
Anne Overseas says
Very interesting !
Betsy C says
Great description …Sounds like something everyone could benefit from!
Carol Palay says
This is a lovely article, well planned and presented. You explain your thesis in a clear, succinct manner.
Most interesting is your differentiation between hearing and listening, and the beneficial results of the latter.
Marita Boe says
A great explanation of how softly the Tomatis method leads the way to better listening and so to an improved feeling of one’s self and one’s potentials.