When the music stops, it isn’t long before most of the residents retreat back into their Selves. But the frail little lady continues to hum - she’s remembered a tune on her own now, and hums the melody to "Liebestraum" until she, too, fades back into her own world. It was only for a short while, but the music gave these lonely patients a few moments of connection, happiness, and memory.

Everyone from tiny infants to octogenarians experience little miracles like this every day. Some are healed, some are given a few moments of relief from pain, still others are comforted in their passage to the beyond. It is the power of music which makes these little miracles possible.

Unfortunately, much of the western medical establishment refuses to acknowledge the incredible benefits of music. It is not employed regularly in most hospitals and medical practices, and is not covered by insurance. Despite the overwhelming amount of anecdotal evidence that music heals, the medical establishment will argue that there is no "proof" of the efficacy of music - nothing which meets the rigorous requirements of the scientific method.

But healing isn’t about science. Healing is about people. And real people are experiencing very real results from the healing power of music, often through the efforts of volunteers, in hospices, senior centers, and in cancer and children’s wards. Stress is the number one indicator of the likelihood of having a heart attack or stroke. More than diet, more than family history, more than weight. Stress kills. Music offers us relief from stress in many ways. It helps us to open ourselves emotionally and let loose with feelings that may be causing disease. It inspires us to examine ourselves, our lives and our relationships. Through our mind and emotion, music can reduce stress.

Music also has measurable physical effects on the body. Certain kinds of music actually lower blood pressure and heart rate, regulate breathing and lower cholesterol. For individuals with hypertension and related conditions, music can be much more powerful (and safer) than many prescription drugs.

We were given instructions by the Creator on how to live life, called a Lifeway. These instructions were very specific, yet very simple to follow. We were to live by the natural law of mother earth, and by her life giving properties in their natural form. She had all we needed. Food was available to us, materials were there for shelter and clothing, water was abundant and readily available. We just had to live by her natural ways. We could not manipulate her in any way as to take away her natural form. There was no need to do so because all we needed was to stay alive and walk in the beauty of our earth mother. After all, she was a living being and a supreme caretaker; there was no need to change her in order to get more from her, she had all we needed.

But, somewhere along the way, probably about 1500 to 3000 years ago, we decided she was not enough for us, why I do not know. We slowly began to sever our connection with the earth mother as the earth mother. And as this connection to her was lost so in turn was our connection to each other lost because she was the reason we stayed connected in the first place. In short, we moved from living an outwardly functioning spiritual life to a life geared towards non-dependence on spiritual ways. Now that we were not connected anymore we began to view the earth in a totally different manner. We were now alone in our effort to survive. Our common purpose to perpetuate living in beauty with mother earth had turned to an individual purpose to survive and beauty, except for that of our own making, no longer had anything to do with living.

It is important to avoid a sarcastic tone about this change we went through. It is a change and nothing more. If we, having free will, choose to live apart from the earth and each other it is our right to do so. After all, there is an advantage to making this severance. In certain ways life does become more interesting. Not having a collective to worry about allows us to explore all sorts of fascinations, and we surely did, as you now can see in the 21st century.