To firm up your body, head to the gym. To exercise your brain, listen to music

Music listening is one of the most enigmatic of human behaviors. A wealth of new studies exposes the benefits of music on mental and physical health.

Music eases the heart when living dulls — pigmented gray — when the crests collapse when hopes and dreams wash ashore! Music offers redemption from everyday monotony. That liberating factor helps cushion the woes of life and journey to a realm of peace and happiness.

Emotions

Music conveys feelings; music lightens the mood; music helps us better understand our thoughts and emotions, indicating an essential role in achieving self-awareness.

The subjective experience of music has at least thirteen overarching feelings: amusement, joy, eroticism, beauty, relaxation, sadness, dreaminess, triumph, anxiety, scariness, annoyance, defiance, and sense pumped up.

I bob my head and dance in my seat most of the time. Now. Yes. As I am writing this. Often, I have no specific memories tied to the song in question. If you ask me why the music affects me, I might point to a particular guitar or vocal inflection, but mostly anything bass. Bass simulates heartbeat.

It brings the music to life with the vibration it creates to feel physically and deep in the soul. I like hearing the overtone sequence for the bass notes, the sympathetic harmonic frequencies that give a sound its character and texture. I like the feel of my brain filling in the root.

Bass defines music as a roadmap that keeps us informed about what is happening and what’s about to happen inside a musical composition. It adds structure, the binding agent for every part of a song. Turns chaos into melodic overtures, helping to make sense of the rest of the instruments.

The benefits

Music can benefit psychological wellbeing, too. Research from the University of Missouri published in The Journal of Positive Psychology found for the first time that upbeat music can have a very positive effect on our wellbeing.

I am a binge listener. When I love a song or track, I listen to it on a loop for days or weeks, at home, in my ears, in my truck. My truck has surround sound — nineteen speakers, one in the back of my head, an enclosed subwoofer, which run on fourteen amplifier channels. No amount of traffic can cause me discomfort while playing music at a high volume.

When I am working on my novel or anything else I write, I need my headphones and playlist, else my brain gets bored in an hour or refuses to think.

I also play music while working out. Experts from Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia, USA, say listening to music during exercise can help to release endorphins to increase endurance, boost mood, and distract from the discomfort during exercise sessions. 

Who hasn’t found it easier to run a little further or work a little harder to keep up with the tempo of the music?

Melodiousness as discourse and connection

Music helps forge social bonding and solidity. If we think about dance and ritual in general, it creates group coherence, and music stimulates that. When the world went into lockdown in March 2020, many people were surprised to see apartment dwellers on balconies playing music with one another.

To me, it made perfect sense: A discourse through music. We need sociality, bonding, and compassion in our lives, and music is one of the best avenues for getting at this need.

The concept of music as discourse originally stemmed from the realization that music stimulates the organs in the ear. In this regard, it fits the definition of discourse because it conveys information to a discerning listener. Music’s ability to enhance emotional states like serenity, regret, or exuberance has led some researchers to title musical discourse as the “music of the emotions.”

Most experts relate music to a discourse that is highly subjective and interpreted by culture, quality, and personal emotional composition.

For example, if a class of students listens to Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony, one may find it melancholy, be moved to tears of joy, and still, another can be compassionate. Studies also show that some people have a significant lack of musical listening ability, which, by all accounts, renders them deaf to music as discourse, as a blind person would be to the written word.

Music as therapy

The American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) reports that music therapy programs can be designed to achieve goals such as managing stress, enhancing memory, and alleviating pain.

Years ago, I was diagnosed with immunity misfunction, which causes my external extremities to contract during winter, resulting in frozen fingers. A diagnosis is called Raynaud disease.

My doctor stressed that I should do three things: breathe properly, to elevate my body temperature. Listen to music. And to obliterate stress from my life. I am a good student. Being mindful of mind and body for over thirty years, I eat the right food and lift weights, and I don’t take medication.

Music is a great part of my day. I can’t even imagine a life without music because it brings such joy and helps me communicate with myself in a totally different way.

The earbuds are in my ears as I sit here now and write, and I am listening to an elevated playlist, something that promotes happy feelings, the type of feeling that expands my heart and helps my creativity.

How your body responds while listening to your favorite song, tells you something about yourself. So, where does the music stand in your life? Which types of music trigger which emotions for you? Do your feelings and the types of music you listen to match?

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading this article.