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Trauma-Informed Sound Healing
Karen Hebert, Ph.D. offers trauma-informed sound healing through Desert Sound.
These sessions support nervous system regulation, stress reduction, emotional healing, balance, and reconnection to innate harmony. Blending modern neuroscience, contemplative practice, and holistic healing, Dr. Hebert creates grounding sound healing experiences designed to support whole-person wellness, trauma recovery, relaxation, and emotional integration through the transformative power of sound.
Desert Sound offers online sound healing experiences as well as in-person sessions, retreats, and events in places including Santa Fe and Atlanta.
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Mission
We provide trauma-informed sound healing to support whole-person wellness through nervous system regulation, balance, and reconnection to innate harmony. Through the transformative power of sound, these experiences help cultivate relaxation, integration, emotional healing, and deeper connection to the Self. At the heart of this work is a commitment to wholeness — weaving together ancient contemplative practices including yoga, meditation, and sound healing with modern neuroscience, trauma-informed care, and reverence for each person’s unique healing journey. Sound is more than vibration; it can serve as a pathway for restoration, presence, and transformation. This practice honors the body’s innate intelligence, the mind’s capacity for integration, and the human ability to heal and evolve. We create grounded, supportive spaces where sound becomes a bridge between mind and body, science and spirituality, and individual and collective healing.
About Dr. Hebert
"When I am silent,
I fall into the place
where everything is music."
-Rumi
Karen Hebert earned her Ph.D. in Depth Psychology with an emphasis in Integrative Therapy and Healing Practices from Pacifica Graduate Institute. She also holds a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Wake Forest University and a master’s degree in Marriage and Family Therapy from Richmont Graduate University. Karen founded her private practice, Sweetwater Practice, LLC in 2016.
Meet Karen Hebert, Ph.D.
Karen earned her Ph.D. in Depth Psychology with an emphasis in Integrative Therapy and Healing Practices from Pacifica Graduate Institute in 2022. She also holds a Master’s degree in Marriage and Family Therapy from Richmont Graduate University and a Bachelor’s degree in Philosophy from Wake Forest University. Karen founded her clinical private practice, Sweetwater Practice, in 2016 as a space dedicated to whole person healing and transformation.
KarenHebertPhd.com
Why Sound Healing?
From ancient Eastern traditions to modern physics, everything in the universe is seen as energy vibrating at different frequencies. If everything is vibration—including our bodies, organs, and emotions—then sound can be used to influence or “retune” these vibrations when they’re out of balance.
On a physical level, sound healing works through the principles of resonance and entrainment. Resonance understands that each part of the body has a natural frequency. If an area is out of harmony (due to stress, illness, etc.), sound can help bring it back into alignment. Through entrainment, rhythmic sounds (like drumming, chanting, or the specific frequency of a tuning fork) can synchronize brainwaves, heart rate, and breath patterns—promoting relaxation and coherence.
Civilizations across time including the Egyptians, Greeks, Chinese, and Indigenous peoples have used sound in temples, for religious ritual, and as medicine. For example, Pythagoras believed music could heal the soul. Ayurveda and Tibetan Buddhism used mantras and instruments to align the mind and body.
Sound bypasses the logical mind and speaks directly to the body through the subconscious, which can help release stuck emotions, access memories or insights not readily available to the conscious mind and induce deep rest or altered states for healing. Sound healing encourages mindful listening, which can calm the nervous system, increase present-moment awareness, and deepe meditative or altered states of consciousness.
Many sound healing systems draw from ancient teachings that include chakra systems, meridians, or energy fields. Instruments like crystal bowls, tuning forks, and voice are believed to help clear and balance these energetic systems.
Group sound healing (e.g., sound baths, yoga classes, or group meditation) fosters a sense of unity, shared vibration, and collective healing. Research has shown that this social resonance has therapeutic benefits for the individual participants and the greater community where the sound healing is occurring. In a world often disconnected from the rhythms of the earth, the felt experience of being in a body, and the connection with the inner Self, sound offers a direct path back to presence, embodiment, and coherence.
Services
Services
Client Stories
Client Stories
"Karen was very warm, accepting, caring, and compassionately inviting. The space created was welcoming and serene. The sound bath was large enough, but still intimate. Karen is an incredible conduit. The sound bath was very powerful for me."
- CM
“Karen's voice is so soothing. She was really good at using the sound bowls to make powerful, potent frequencies that were not too intrusive. I had a powerful experience & felt the frequencies through my body and out of my feet, which felt like a great release of energy."
- NS
“I love how Karen tunes into me in our one-on-one healing sessions. She brings all of her attention, knowledge, experience, and intuition to sense and move the energy in my system to provide what I need that day. Very personal, prayerful, and powerful!”
- AB
“Karen's voice is so soothing. She was really good with using the sound bowls to make powerful, potent frequencies that were not too intrusive. I had a powerful experience & felt the frequencies through my body and out of my feet, which felt like a great release of energy."
- CM
We'd love to stay in touch.
