8 Ways Music Can Help You To Calm Down and Fire Up – Part 1
Music has an incredible effect on people.
It can make you laugh, cry, angry, happy, sad, joyful, worried, frightened, energetic, calm, at peace. It can make you want to dance, or want to sleep.
Music can help you relax. Music can help you calm down.
Music can also get your adrenaline pumping. It can boost your enthusiasm and help you get things done.
Here are 8 ways that music can help you to Calm Down and Fire Up.
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1. Go to Sleep. Go Directly to Sleep. Do not pass GO, do not collect $200.
Sometimes out minds and bodies are over tired: so tired, in fact, that we can have difficulty getting to sleep.
Not sleeping properly or enough will cause you to be sluggish and physically slow and lethargic.
It will make your mind not as sharp or quick or as accurate as it normally can be.
Listening to some calming music just before we go to bed – or even in bed – can have a wonderfully relaxing effect. Some soft classical or jazz, or perhaps some relaxation music can slow the body, calm the mind and help you to wind down.
Getting a good night’s sleep can have such a rejuvenating effect that you can feel like a million dollars the next day.
Bouncing out of bed in the morning really feels fantastic. It can make a big difference in your life, your attitude, your output, your expectations, your enthusiasm and your outlook.
Sleep is important.
Music can help you to make sure you get enough of it to function as the most effective human that you can be.
2. Wake Up, Jeff ! The Wiggles knew it. Now you know it.
In case you have never had anything to do with children, The Wiggles are a band whose primary market and audience are 2 to 7 year olds.
Their tunes are fun, exciting, and excellent for little kids dancing. (Secretly, I’ve always fancied myself as the secret and unknown 5th Wiggle…. We can but dream….). They have sold approximately 27 gazillion CDs and DVDs all over the world.
One of their most famous songs is called, “Wake Up Jeff” and is based around one of their band members, Jeff, who keeps falling asleep, but the rest of the band need him to sing and dance and play music with them.
The message sent to millions of children all over the planet in multiple languages through this song is to rest when you are tired so that you can wake up refreshed, full of energy and ready to embrace life to the fullest.
Interestingly, The Wiggles put out a CD / DVD several years ago called “Go To Sleep, Jeff”, which was a lullaby and beautifully relaxing and calming music take on some of their more well-known songs.
3. Want to experience some joy and be uplifted ? Visit your happy place via the soundtrack of your life.
Everyone has a “special song”, or a playlist of music that evokes special memories.
Your first kiss, that wonderful holiday, school friends, THE party of the decade, songs that remind you about your long gone parents, locations, personal or world events, milestones – all can come flooding back at the sound of the first note of a particular song.
These special memory songs can be fast, slow, loud, soft, instrumental or lyrical, or from any musical genre.
Just as the sense of smell can revive long lost memories, so too can music. In fact, music can actually help to hold on to memories. Chances are high that you know the name, the melody, the artist or the composer of many of your special songs.
The joy associated with this song, the sadness associated with that song, the love relived through another song, the feeling of calm that come with yet another piece of music can have a very pleasant effect on an individual.
Feeling down ? Put on your “happy” song.
Missing someone ? Listen to your “remembering” song.
Feeling happy ? Crank up the volume on your “party til you drop” song and dance as if no one is watching.
And even if they are watching, just keep dancing anyway.
4. Relax. Sit Still. Clear your mind.
Moving on from deliberately filling your mind with recollections of times gone by with specific songs, music has long been used to clear the mind as well.
Several Asian or Eastern religions, such as Buddhism, use music in their prayers – chanting is a form of musical conversation and meditation. Middle Eastern religions, such as Muslim, have musical influences in their call to daily prayers for their faithful.
The traditional “Om” used with various forms of meditation is a regular specific note that can help empty your mind.
Calming music, relaxation music, new age music, and meditation music – whilst being very similar in style and sound but with various and different names – can all be used to help block out the excessive noise(s) and thoughts in your head.
Classical music and calming music of multiple varieties can help slow the heart rate, relax the breathing and form an imaginary wall of protection around the listener.
It can allow the listener to turn off and tune out from the hectic and busy world that surrounds them.
Deliberately sitting still while listening to some music can arguably be as good as a power nap – refreshing, relaxing, rejuvenating.
Giving your brain and body a rest with the help of some suitably relaxing music can work wonders when it comes time to return to the reality of life again.
Refuelling your mind by clearing some space can re-energise your day.
Flickr creative commons image thanks to Steven Shorrock and Ed Yourdon and Neal Fowler and Kate Lewis
