The harp is one of the Gifts of the Sidhe, the guardians of the ancestral mysteries of Ireland.

The harp is a healing instrument – once it has been installed in the energy field, via energy transmission. It has multiple uses: one is for personal healing and the other is environmental. It is one of three musical instruments of the Sidhe. The other two are the Drum and the Pipe.

For years I have known it as an energy line, laid in certain places to act as a resonant healing point, or as an energy which covers large areas, but what I didn’t realise was that it was also used in the body.

After doing some sound healing with one of my daughters, I was sitting at the table listening to my father argue with the BBC 4 newscaster on his phone. My hand went to my throat and it was as if I was plucking a red harp string of an energetic harp in my body. I had been given this harp by my Tuatha De Guide many years ago.

I could see the harp clearly but wondered why I was plucking it.

Ten minutes later, I found out!

My father became a solicitor years ago and is interested in anything of a legal nature, including items on the news. He also has very negative beliefs about women. On this occasion, a news item came up which he immediately commented on, blaming the woman for something abusive that had happened to her. As soon as he said the words, I felt a ripple of energy through me, like someone had thrown a handful of gravel onto the water of a still lake. A minute later I had the strongest emotional eruption I have had in years. I burst into tears and told Dad the effect his words had on me and how difficult I found it when he blamed women for things that happened TO them. His constant verbal battering had taken its toll and I told him of something that had happened to me when I was thirteen but which I had never shared with him before. After expressing these long pent-up feelings and the distress I felt, I was emotional for days but recognised it as a healing opportunity so stayed with it and worked it through.

At the time, I didn’t quite recognise that the twanging harp string had somehow made the emotion activate – until it happened again yesterday!

This time, I had listened to a sound healing meditation by Tom Kenyon, before listening to one by Jhadten Jewell, which was very different. I listen to Jhadten’s meditation as it is connected to a recent workshop I had participated in with him, but my guides suggested I do a Tom Kenyon one first. I chose the Trilliums meditation and then did the Jhadten one.

The following day, back in Dad’s, and once again at the table, my hand went to my throat and again I plucked that red cord. Then I remembered the last time I twanged it. This time, while I was trying to explain something he had asked me about, he shut me up in a passive-aggressive way and I was triggered. No explosion this time because his words had well and truly brought the shutter down with a bang and I was stunned into silence.

The harp-string resonated, or activated through sound, the issue that needed to be brought to my attention. I realised that in plucking that red cord, I had effectively created a healing intention, something that needed to be vibrated out. Needless to say, it was not the conscious ‘me’ that had initiated this, but the Soul part of me that knew what I needed.

When I first came back to the UK, this time three years ago, while out on a walk along a prehistoric track along the South Downs, a large, well-built Celt appeared holding out a large harp to me. He asked me what string I wanted to work with. I chose the red one, or at least the ‘other me’ chose it. At the time, I thought it was for working in the landscape. It never occurred to me that it might be for personal healing.

Before I came to look after my father, and while Chris and I were doing earthwork in Micheldever Woods, the Celt again appeared behind me as I walked through the trees. It felt like he ‘had my back’ and I saw the harp in my arms. I still didn’t twig! I still assumed it was for a job of healing in the landscape, something I needed protection for. A few days ago, before I had twanged the harp string for the second time, I had gone for a walk on an old drove road near Crawley village and I felt ‘someone’ behind me. I mentally asked who it was and heard back, ‘The Guardian of your Soul’. Although grateful he was there, I was also curious, and a little nervous. What was happening that he needed to be around? After the second emotional issue with my father, however, I understood that he was there to support me, for which I am grateful.

Sound is a powerful healer and the harp-energy vibrates old stuck energies out of the body and energy-field. It can be used for personal healing and for healing the landscape. I have left little versions of this harp in sacred sites for other people to access, perhaps people who use sound as a healing modality, or to open up their voices.

The voice also uses sound, and words, to carry the vibration and intent of the speaker. The vibrational cord of the harp activates when it matches the vibration of another sound, triggering an emotional response. But the effect is one of healing rather than harm and so whatever is triggered offers an opportunity to explore the emotion which is still stored inside, allowing us to let it go – finally.

Healing is such an important part of energy-work as you are connected to the earth, and its energy field, and therefore you heal for the whole not just for yourself. The harp helps you move stuck energy out, in a way other things cannot. It is a powerful modality and a wonderful instrument of healing.

Although I cannot honestly say I am looking forward to the next time it is suddenly plucked…