On a rare blue-sky day in January, I enter The Healing Studio, tucked a few doors down from the iconic Chagrin Falls Popcorn Shop. Crystals hang in every window, catching all the sun they can get while it lasts. As I shop the array of crystals and jewelry personally curated by founder and owner Mimillia Eisner, I am introduced to a regular customer, who I discover will be joining me for today’s sound bath class. After our interaction, I overhear her tell an associate how this studio has changed her life for the better.
That’s all the marketing I need.
Upon joining the Chagrin Falls shopping district in early 2024, The Healing Studio had only two class types: Reiki and sound therapies. Its offerings have since increased to 14 unique services, including “Human Design” workshops, psychic readings and meditations centered around crystals and cacao — but the sound bath remains at the core of the studio’s purpose.
The sound bath is offered in three variations: a 60-minute evening class, a 30-minute children’s class and a 20-minute session part of a larger Harmonious Healing class — which also includes 20 minutes of breathwork and yoga.
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For a well-rounded afternoon, I’ve opted for the Harmonious Healing class. The breathwork and yoga is low-effort to keep the energy relaxed.
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As we reach the culmination of my class, I lay flat on my mat with my head propped on a pillow, eyes closed. After a moment of silence, instruments begin to fill the room — primarily Himalayan brass bowls sourced from Nepal and crystal bowls. Other instruments include gongs and chimes.
It feels therapeutic — and it is. Some doctors, like Dr. Angelique Foss, a clinical music therapist at University Hospitals Connor Whole Health in Beachwood, offer sound baths in their practices. Foss hosts both one-on-one and group sound baths at the facility and knows firsthand what benefits this experience may reap.
“The energy centers are affected,” she explains. “With that effect comes a stimulation of the parasympathetic nervous system, which is our ‘rest and digest’ response where we promote a relaxation response, which is opposite of our ‘fight or flight or freeze’ response. In return, you get the effects of stress relief and anxiety reduction.”
Foss also notes potential links to pain reduction, lower cholesterol, improved mood and better sleep, but she advises that studies on the health effects of sound baths are still ongoing. Sound has been utilized as a healing agent since ancient civilizations, but modern music therapy wasn’t popularized in the Western Hemisphere until the 20th century.
“The sound bowls, they have a very strong frequency they're set to,” Rosen explains. “Our energetic fields are very chaotic and unstable. So when they're around the frequencies of the bowls, it helps the energetic frequencies of our bodies align with those.” Foss and Rosen identify this phenomenon as “entrainment.”
Rosen’s class employs a frequency of 432 hz, which she says promotes harmony and balance. Dr. Foss concurs, saying it’s thought of as “the natural frequency of the universe” and therefore the most common for sound baths.
Alternatively, Foss’s class employs 440 hz — the international standard for orchestral tuning — because she uses instruments like drums, guitars and keyboards. The more energetic frequency helps Foss meet patrons in a more active state, and they can ease more organically into a meditative state.
However, there is no scientific proof whether the different frequencies have different healing elements.
Inside Rosen’s studio, at moments, it’s loud, but not in an intrusive or annoying way. Other moments are calmer, letting a lingering echo die down. Every crescendo is intentional as I feel it ring through my ears and my core. Rosen immerses us in the sound, walking around the room with her instruments to get frequencies going from the front, sides and behind our heads. Sensing the sound from a new direction sends electric chills through my body that mellow out as I get more acquainted with it.
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While I wouldn’t say I felt my life change after those 20 minutes, I did sense a significant lightness inside as I carried on with my day. When the stress of traffic, work and other routine tasks came about, the heightened emotions felt more manageable. I didn’t feel as bothered.
It’s an inner feeling worth getting used to, hence why many make a class at The Healing Studio part of their weekly schedule. While the experiences are open to anyone, they strive especially to cultivate a safe space for the local community of women and people of color.
“Our intention from the start was to create this community where people can come and learn about the different healing modalities that you don't hear in everyday life,” Eisner says. “And to just come and talk about the real stuff in life and be supported in that.”
“Embodiment is such an important thing that a lot of people are lacking,” Rosen says. “So just dropping out of the mind chatter and into the sensation of the body is one of the most healing things for the nervous system. I'm really grateful to be able to give that to people.”
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