Music has been a huge part of my life for as long as I can remember. Some of my earliest memories were of laying beside my father’s piano or listening to a box of old 45’s my mom gave me.
As a Highly Sensitive Person (HSP), I experience music intensely and deeply. For the past 12 years in particular, I have been using music to explore and understand emotions and mood.
Music is a significant resource for psychological and emotional well-being (Moore, 2013). Music influences emotional and neurochemical processes that include changes in dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, cortisol, corticotrophin-releasing hormones, and adrenocorticotropic hormones (Chanda and Levitin [2013], Ferreri et al. [2019], and Speranza et al. [2022]). These biochemical responses to music play a crucial role in mental health and wellness strategies using music to manage, regulate, and evoke emotional states.
I use many music-based techniques and practices within Radical Balance coaching. Explore the following with curiosity and see what benefits you find!
Music-based practices
Sources
Moore, Kimberly Sena (2013) A Systematic Review on the Neural Effects of Music on Emotion Regulation: Implications for Music Therapy Practice, Journal of Music Therapy, Volume 50, Issue 3, Fall 2013, Pages 198–242, https://doi.org/10.1093/jmt/50.3.198
Chanda, M. L., & Levitin, D. J. (2013). The neurochemistry of music. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 17(4), 179–193. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2013.02.007
Ferreri, L., Mas-Herrero, E., Zatorre, R. J., Ripollés, P., Gomez-Andres, A., Alicart, H., Olivé, G., Marco-Pallarés, J., Antonijoan, R. M., Valle, M., Riba, J., & Rodriguez-Fornells, A. (2019). Dopamine modulates the reward experiences elicited by music. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(9), 3793–3798. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1811878116
Speranza, L., Pulcrano, S., Perrone-Capano, C., di Porzio, U., & Volpicelli, F. (2022). Music affects functional brain connectivity and is effective in the treatment of neurological disorders. Reviews in the Neurosciences, 33(7), 789–801. https://doi.org/10.1515/revneuro-2021-0135