Is Listening To Music Good For Your Health?

Even if you already know how awesomely powerful music can be, now you can explain it with sound science. A 2015 study compared the effects of music therapy with a therapist versus music medicine among people with cancer. Even though all music listening showed positive results, 77% of patients preferred music therapy sessions to just listening to music on their own. Contemporary research suggests music has significant power to help reduce stress and anxiety, relieve pain, and improve focus among many more benefits.

When you feel good, you’re more likely to relax and let go of your stress. This then helps you to deal with stressful times in a more calm and organized fashion. Listening to soothing music is a great way to help you wind down and relax before slumber. Sleep quality can also be boosted as wake up times during the night become less. You will wake up feeling much more refreshed in the morning as your body remains calm throughout the night.

Johns Hopkins researchers have had dozens of jazz performers and rappers improvise music while lying down inside an fMRI machine to watch and see which areas of their brains light up. The advice “take a deep breath” may seem like a cliché, but it holds true when it comes to stress. For centuries, Buddhist monks have been conscious of deliberate breathing during meditation. Getting your blood moving releases endorphins and can improve your mood almost instantaneously. Exercise doesn’t necessarily mean power lifting at the gym or training for a marathon. A short walk around the office or simply standing up to stretch during a break at work can offer immediate relief in a stressful situation.

Nothing’s quite as validating as your tunes echoing through the food court or down the baked goods aisle. That’s part of how music is calming and can help you relax, pump you up during a run, or even help you focus at work or school. If you're feeling stressed, essential oils may help you relax or recharge. Music is certainly not a magical cure, nor is it a substitute for therapy, medication, surgery, or sleeping music any other medical treatments. But music can be an important element of your well-being and self-care on a daily basis, as well as a helpful partner in dealing with more acute health conditions. Musicians, researchers, and music therapists have actually claimed to create “the most relaxing” song ever, called “Weightless.” But you’ll have to decide for yourself.

I love how you mentioned that music can be used as a stress management tool. For the past couple of weeks, I have been dealing with a large workload at school and it has been causing me a lot of anxiety. It seems like it would be a good idea for me to find a couple of artists that I like so that I can have something to listen to as I do my homework. Music has a unique link to our emotions, and research has found that it can be used as an extremely effective stress management tool. Those with the greatest amount of musical experience did best on these tests of mental acuity, followed by those with less musical study followed by those who never took music lessons.

Music can make you want to move — and the benefits of dancing are well documented. Scientists also know that listening to music can alter your breath rate, your heart rate, and your blood pressure, depending on the music’s intensity and tempo. Additionally, mental health practitioners can bring music therapy directly to a person, such as if they cannot get out of bed or are unable to get to a therapist’s office. Enjoying music therapy at home can also benefit children who want to be in a familiar environment during their sessions. Stress Relief –Playing music puts your energy and focus on positive activity, which can help alleviate stress.