Our fourth session fell on Valentine’s Day. I don’t know if that was coincidence or design, probably a bit of both. What I do know is that Ethan arrived to this session a different person than the one I’d met a few weeks earlier. Not unrecognizable, he was still Ethan, but something fundamental had shifted in how he carried himself.
The Progress Report
In the week since session three, Ethan had written fifty pages. Fifty. He described the writing as “unusually easy”, the words flowing in a way they hadn’t for months. For someone whose ADHD and chronic fatigue had been conspiring against his creative output, this was remarkable.
He mentioned some pain returning a couple of days before our session, but he’d traced it himself. He’d been out with his girlfriend and had overdone it, drinking, pushing his body too hard. He was starting to notice the connection between specific behaviors and symptom flare-ups. That kind of self-awareness doesn’t happen when you’re just trying to survive the pain. It happens when you have enough space from it to observe it. The sessions had given him that space.
Over the past three sessions, the arc was clear. An emotional release he hadn’t expected. Fourteen hours of the best sleep in years. Coffee intake dropping from seven cups to one without effort. Tai-chi picked up again. Healthier boundaries set. Creative productivity surging. Pain levels dropping from an average of 8 to something manageable and, importantly, becoming something he could correlate with choices rather than something that just happened to him.
Session 4: Closing the Container
I assessed his energy field one final time. His solar plexus was overactive again, it had been a persistent pattern and his third eye was depleted. But his heart was normal. After being depleted in sessions one and two, overactive in session three, it had found its center. That single data point told me the most important story of this case study: the heart was back.
By this session, I had developed a technique for remote work that I want to share, because it made a profound difference. Before connecting with Ethan, I used a mirror to create what I think of as a doorway. I invoked Hekate, keeper of thresholds, holder of keys and traced a door on the mirror’s surface three times clockwise, speaking Ethan’s name. Then I unlocked it with a consecrated key and opened the door. The moment I did, the room changed. It felt as if Ethan had stepped in.
This isn’t stagecraft. It’s a technique I developed through practice, and it serves a practical purpose: it establishes the energetic connection firmly before the session begins, and, equally important, it gives me a clear way to sever that connection afterward. At the end of each session, I close the door, lock it, and retrace the lines counterclockwise three times. The mirror gets cleansed with the instruments. This way, the healing cord is established and then safely released. Neither of us carries the other’s energy beyond the session.
Ethan’s intention for this final session: “I complete my work with excellence and ease. I enjoy and experience my days with comfort and ease.”
I began with the grail and the ocean drum again, that combination had proven itself in session three. The drum’s oceanic quality grounded us both, and I used the counterclockwise motion to clear residual energy before moving into the precision work.
Then the E bowl, targeting the solar plexus one more time. Tapping to the left, working through the familiar progression: minor second, major second, minor third, major third. Each session, these intervals had done their work. Each time, the release came a little faster, a little cleaner.
For this session, I was guided to the E major triad, a brighter, more resolute harmonic structure than the minor triads of previous sessions. The affirmation was: “Balance. I see the light.” I played it for several minutes while holding a visualization of golden light flowing from the solar plexus, transmuted and clean, replenishing his third eye, then streaming down through his entire body to his feet and into the earth.
From there: the fourth (E-A), grounding. The fifth (E-B), with Ethan reciting his intention three times — “I am able to complete my work with excellence and focus. I enjoy and experience my day with comfort and ease”, pausing between each repetition, breathing, letting the words settle into the harmonic field.
The rainstick. A final spoken intention. And silence.
What Ethan Felt
He came back from the silence and told me his pain, which had been present when we started, was gone. Not reduced, gone. He felt lighter and “very fuzzy energetically.” I’d heard him say lighter before, but fuzzy was new. It suggested his energy field was still actively reorganizing, still in motion even after the sounds had stopped.
I gave him his final recommendations: continue the bija mantras, 108 repetitions of Ram for the solar plexus and Om for the third eye, once daily. Visualize the golden light with each chant. Silent meditation before the mantras. Keep journaling. Keep breathing.
The Bonus Session and What Came After
Because of the audio quality issues in our first two sessions, the learning curve of getting Zoom to properly transmit crystal bowl frequencies, I offered Ethan a bonus fifth session. Before we began, I did one more energy assessment and was pleased to find him in balance. He told me he’d been chanting the bija mantras regularly and using his shruti box to accompany the chants with corresponding notes. He was doing the work. Actively, creatively, in his own way.
During the bonus session, we toned together using Jonathan Goldman’s chakra sounds. Ethan said it was incredibly powerful, the most powerful part of all the sessions. Something about co-creating the sound with his own voice, not just receiving it, hit differently. I think this is the direction my practice is moving. The client isn’t just a recipient. They’re a participant. When two voices meet inside a harmonic field, the healing belongs to both of them.
The Full Arc
When I look back at Ethan’s case study, what I see is someone’s body remembering how to be well. Not cured, but reorganized. The chronic pain didn’t vanish forever, but it dropped from an 8 to something livable, and more importantly, it became something he understood instead of something that just happened to him. The fatigue lifted enough that a writer who’d been struggling to focus was suddenly producing fifty pages in a week. The emotional holding patterns shifted enough that he could set boundaries, cry when he needed to, and open his heart to an affirmation he initially couldn’t say.
What I Learned
This case study changed me. It was my first sustained remote healing series, and it taught me that distance is not a barrier when the connection is real. Five thousand miles, a screen, and a pair of headphones, none of it diminished what was possible. The sound found its way because the intention carried it.
I learned that triads with affirmations are one of the most powerful tools I have. Not just for releasing but for transforming. When Ethan struggled to say “I love myself” and then gradually found it in his voice, that wasn’t me healing him. That was him healing himself, with the sound holding the space for it to happen.
I learned that co-creating sound, toning together, chanting together, is where the deepest work lives. In the bonus session, when we toned the chakra sounds together, Ethan said it was the most powerful moment of all five sessions. I believe him. And I think more toning, offered when the client is comfortable, will be a central part of my practice going forward.
I learned to trust my intuition. There were moments across these sessions, choosing the fire koshi to match his excitement, playing the A bowl to the right for replenishment, sensing when the E minor affirmation had broken through, where the guidance didn’t come from my training manual. It came from somewhere quieter. These sessions helped me hear that voice more clearly.
And I learned, again, to take care of myself. The sessions are nourishing for me too, but they don’t replace my own practice. I’m at my best when I’m also doing the work on myself, all the ways, in all the layers. The healer has to heal, too.
Ethan’s story isn’t over. He told me he’s hoping to continue working with me. I’m hoping so too. But even if these sessions were all we ever did, what happened was real. The sound traveled. The healing landed. And a writer in England is walking easier, sleeping better, and filling pages with words that flow.
This is the fourth and final post in a series documenting a real client case study. The client’s name has been changed for privacy, and he has given permission for his testimonial to be shared on our testimonial page. If you’re curious about sound healing , whether in person, or remotely, you can learn more about working with me on the SoundMend website.
Read the full series:
- Part 1: Across the Ocean — A Remote Sound Healing Journey Begins
- Part 2: What Changed Between Sessions
- Part 3: The Reversal
- Part 4: Across the Ocean, Into Himself