A question we hear often is, “What is it that makes your pain-relieving lotion so much better than anything I’ve ever tried?”
That question always brings a smile to our faces, because there isn’t just one answer. There are a number of things we do differently at Resonant Botanicals, and over the next several posts I’m going to share some of them with you.
But I thought the best place to begin was with the first word in our name:
"Resonant"
Why Resonant Botanicals?
The answer goes back much further than the company does. In fact, it goes all the way back to when I was 15 years old.
At 15, I joined the musicians union in Canton, Ohio — Local 111 — and got myself onto the “at liberty” list. That was the rather fancy way of saying I was available to play when someone needed a musician for a particular date.
At the time, Canton and nearby Akron were stopping points for musicians traveling between the major music centers of Chicago and New York. A number of those musicians eventually settled in the area, and as a result, there were a lot of very good working big bands around.
I was fortunate enough to play with many of them.
And I learned something during those years that has stayed with me for the rest of my life.
Music changes a room.
From the bandstand, I could watch it happen.
A group of musicians would begin playing and people would start moving. Dancers responded to the rhythm. Faces changed. People smiled. A room full of individuals suddenly shared an experience.
You didn’t have to explain it to them.
They could feel it.
The music quite literally resonated with people.
At 15, of course, I wasn’t thinking about any of this in scientific terms. I was a young musician who loved playing music and loved seeing what happened when the right musicians, the right notes and the right audience came together.
But that experience planted a seed.
From Music to Science
A little later, my interests took me in what might seem like a completely different direction: science.
I pursued biochemistry in school, and the more I learned, the more fascinated I became by the extraordinary complexity of the human body.
But I never stopped being a musician.
After graduate school, I was fortunate enough to perform for several years with Doc Severinsen.
Music and science continued to coexist in my life, and over time I found myself increasingly interested in places where those two seemingly different worlds might intersect.
Michael with Doc Severinsen, 1992
Music had already taught me that vibration and frequency could have a profound effect on our experience.
Science taught me to keep asking questions.
Along the way, I also became curious about approaches to health and wellness that existed outside the conventional paths I was studying. While still in school, I met a homeopathic practitioner who introduced me to the way frequency was viewed and used within that discipline.
I was fascinated.
And since my college job happened to be in the library, I had a convenient place to start reading.
I read everything I could get my hands on.
Some ideas made sense to me. Others raised more questions. And some simply got filed away in the back of my mind for another day.
That habit — curiosity first, questions second — has stayed with me.
A Word That Kept Coming Back
Years passed. I continued making music. I continued studying science. I continued learning about botanicals, formulation and different approaches to helping people feel better.
And the idea of resonance kept appearing.
In music, resonance is something you can hear and feel.
In science, resonance has very specific meanings.
And in everyday life, we use the same word when something connects with us in a way that goes beyond the surface. An idea resonates. A person resonates. An experience resonates.
Eventually, when it came time to put a name on what we were creating, Resonant felt right.
It connected two parts of my life that had never really been separate.
The musician in me had spent years watching how something invisible could change the way a room full of people felt.
The scientist in me wanted to understand why things work, how they work, and whether we could use what we learned to make something better.
And Resonant Botanicals grew from both.
Still Asking Questions
One of the things I hope to share through these posts is that there isn’t one secret ingredient or one magic trick behind our products.
There are herbs.
There is chemistry.
There is a great deal of formulation work.
There are years of observation and experimentation.
And there are also some things we do that are decidedly unconventional.
We’ll get to those.
In fact, in the next installment, I’m going to introduce you to a rather unusual frequency generator I acquired from a retiring homeopathic practitioner — along with the books and materials that came with it — and tell you why that machine eventually found a place in the way we make our products.
I suspect some of you will find that story fascinating.
Others may be skeptical.
That’s okay. I think curiosity and skepticism can be very good companions.
For now, though, the next time you see the name Resonant Botanicals, you’ll know where that first word came from.
Long before there were lotions, herbs, formulas or bottles, there was a 15-year-old musician standing on a bandstand in Ohio, watching a room full of people come alive when the music began.
Perhaps I’ve spent much of my life, in one way or another, trying to understand that experience.
And maybe even trying to figure out how to put a little bit of that joy into a bottle.