Client intake and contraindications
This is the only lesson in the course that does not come from Sunita's notebook.
Her training happened in person, with a teacher standing beside her, and the things covered here were absorbed rather than written down. Published on a website and read by people we will never meet, they have to be written down — because a course that teaches you to work on other people without them would be incomplete in the way that matters most.
By the end of this lesson you will have an intake conversation you can actually use, know which conditions mean modifying or declining a session, and know what to say when someone asks you to treat an illness.
Why intake matters
Someone is about to lie down with their eyes closed while you stand over them making sound. Most of them will be more relaxed and more suggestible than usual, and some will be more vulnerable than they appear.
Five minutes of conversation beforehand does three things. It tells you what to avoid. It tells them what is going to happen, which is most of what makes a person feel safe. And it establishes that this is a considered practice rather than something you are improvising.
The intake conversation
Not a form to be processed. A conversation, five minutes, before anything is set up.
- What brings you here today? Let them answer without steering. This tells you Vedic or Tibetan, and up or down.
- Have you had a sound session before? If not, explain what will happen in plain language.
- Is there anything going on with your health I should know about? Open, unhurried. Then the specific checks below if they say no.
- Are you pregnant, or could you be? Ask directly. People do not always volunteer it.
- Any pacemaker, implant, recent surgery or injury?
- Any problem with your hearing — tinnitus, sensitivity to sound?
- Are you comfortable with me placing a bowl on your body, or would you prefer I keep them beside you? Ask this every time, including with people you have worked on before.
- Is there anywhere you would rather I did not go? They do not have to explain why.
Then tell them the two things that matter most: you can open your eyes or ask me to stop at any point, and you do not need a reason. Say it out loud even if it seems obvious. Especially if it seems obvious.
When to modify, and when to decline
| Situation | What to do |
|---|---|
| Pregnancy | Do not place bowls on the abdomen or lower back. Keep everything quiet and short. Many practitioners avoid direct placement entirely, particularly in the first three months. Sound from a distance is fine. |
| Pacemaker or implanted device | No bowl placed on or near the device. Sound in the room is not the concern; direct vibration against the chest is. |
| Epilepsy or seizure disorder | Avoid sustained rhythmic pulsing and anything resembling entrainment. Ask them to check with their doctor first. If in doubt, decline politely. |
| Recent surgery, fracture, wound or acute injury | Nothing placed on or near the site, and nothing at all until it has healed. Sound from a distance only. |
| Tinnitus, hyperacusis, hearing conditions | Quiet bowls, played gently, and check with them partway through. Some people find bowls soothing and some find them unbearable. |
| Serious mental health conditions | Deep relaxation is not neutral for everyone. If someone has a history of psychosis or dissociation, this is not the right setting. Decline kindly and suggest they speak to their own clinician. |
| Under 18 | A parent or guardian present, and their consent as well as the young person's. |
| Fever or acute illness | Reschedule. They should be resting. |
| Alcohol or drugs | Do not proceed. Consent is not meaningful and neither is the session. |
| Recent bereavement or trauma | Go gently, offer the option of keeping eyes open, no touch, and shorten the session. Sound can bring things to the surface faster than people expect. |
Stop immediately and encourage medical help if someone describes chest pain, difficulty breathing, sudden severe headache, or thoughts of harming themselves. None of these is a sound healing matter, and recognising that quickly is one of the most useful things a practitioner can do.
What to say when someone asks you to treat something
It will happen. Someone will ask whether you can help with their back pain, their thyroid, their fertility, their cancer.
Have an answer ready, because improvising under that kind of hope leads good people into claims they never meant to make.
I can't treat that, and I wouldn't want to say otherwise. What this does do is help people relax deeply, and a lot of people sleep better afterwards. You're very welcome to have a session for that reason, alongside whatever your doctor is doing.
That sentence is honest, it is kind, and it does not send anyone away. In our experience it also earns more trust than a bolder claim would — people are used to being oversold, and they notice when someone declines to do it.
Never suggest that anyone reduce, delay or stop medical treatment. Not as advice, not as a hint, not as a story about someone else who did.
During the session
- Say what you are about to do before you do it, at least the first few times. "I'm going to put a bowl by your feet now."
- Ask before any touch. Every time.
- Watch their face and hands. A tightening jaw or clenching fingers means back off, whatever they said earlier.
- Keep it quieter near the head. Always.
- If someone becomes distressed, stop the sound, stay in the room, keep your voice normal, and let them come back in their own time. Do not press on to finish the sequence.
Notes and boundaries
Keep a short record for each person: date, what they came for, what you did, anything they mentioned. It helps you and it demonstrates that you are working carefully.
Store it privately and do not share it. What people tell you in intake is told to you in confidence.
And check your own country's rules if you intend to charge for this. Requirements on touch, on insurance, on health claims and on record-keeping vary widely, and nothing in this course overrides them.
Practice
- Write your own intake questions on one side of a card. Use the eight above or your own version.
- Ask a friend to sit through the whole intake with you, properly, out loud.
- Notice how long it takes. Most people find it is under five minutes and considerably less awkward than they feared.
- Then write out your own version of the "I can't treat that" answer, in your own words, and say it aloud until it sounds natural.
That last one is the exercise most worth doing. The words you have practised are the ones that arrive when someone is looking at you hopefully.
Common mistakes
- Skipping intake with friends and family. They are the people most likely to have something you did not know about.
- Assuming consent carries over. Ask again each session.
- Softening a refusal into a maybe. "It might help" is heard as yes.
- Diagnosing. You are not qualified to and it is not what this is.
- Pushing through distress to finish the sequence. The sequence is not the point.
- Treating the paperwork as the safety. The conversation is the safety.
How do you know you got it right?
You have an intake you can do from memory, and you can say your version of the "I can't treat that" sentence without stumbling.
And you can name at least six situations where you would modify or decline. If that list feels long, that is the correct reaction — most of what a practitioner does is decide what not to do.
Something to sit with
The most valuable thing you can offer someone may be telling them plainly that you cannot help with the thing they came for.
How comfortable are you with that, honestly?