Listen to the Music of Your Heart
Music makes us feel emotional. A sad song can put us in a somber mood. A happy song can lift our spirits. A bittersweet song can make us happy and sad at the same time.
It also works the other way around. We seek out songs about loss when we’re experiencing loss. We seek out love songs when we’re in love. We seek out songs that reflect our current mood and feel in sync with our current emotion.
I suspect that most of us are aware of music’s power to move us or to help us through a rough time, but that’s not the end of the story. When we begin to realize just how deep the connection is between music and our emotions, we can consciously use tools to help us on our happiness and well-being journey.1
Recently I realized (quite by accident) that I could explore my subconscious emotional landscape by paying attention to what music is calling to me right now. Sometimes it’s a single song, sometimes it’s a particular artist, and sometimes it’s an entire genre of music that calls to me.
I noticed this, in particular, when I was reintroduced to a song which had once held much joy for me. The Round Rock Community Choir in which I currently sing is preparing the song “Seasons of Love” from the show Rent for our upcoming spring show. I’ve sung this song with two other choirs in the past2 and really enjoyed it. But this time, it was different.
Our first run-through brought feelings of nostalgia and memories of the people I’d sung this song with. After I’d exhausted my nostalgic feelings, however, I felt quite “meh” about the song. Quite coincidentally, I realized that it wasn’t just this song. I noticed that I had been avoiding all musical theater tunes recently — even ones that were once part of my solo (singing) repertoire.
In contrast, I was obsessed by a new song we were singing in choir: “Give Peace in Our Time” by Ethan McGrath. It was an earworm, to be sure, but it was so much more than that for me. This song was digging deeply into my heart and soul, expressing a longing that has been welling up for the past couple of years. I have been searching for peace. Peace for myself, for my loved ones, and for my community.
In fact, my entire focus at the current time, I realized is about finding and bringing peace to myself and others. My obsession with Native American flutes, my volunteer work at hospice, and my rekindled love for old Christian hymns are each a part of my current peace-seeking journey.
When I realized this, it wasn’t surprising that I’d put my once-beloved musical theater repertoire on the shelf in favor of Christian hymns, Native American songs about peaceful transitions to the Other Side, and harmonically compelling choral pieces. Rather than feeling sad that I’d “lost” my love of musical theater, I rejoiced that I’d found something else — some new, some old — to serve my soul.
Have you ever explored your current musical loves to discover what your heart and soul were feeling?
Perhaps the choices you are making aren’t as starkly different as the ones I have been making. You may not have put an entire genre of music on the shelf and picked up another one instead. But even within the confines of the music you know and love consistently, what song(s) are sticking out as being more relevant than others right now?
What song is your current earworm? What musical artist are you gravitating toward? What genre do you have an interest in exploring more fully?
The answers to these questions might lead you to have a better understanding of your emotions that lie beneath the surface. You might realize, as I did, what lies deep inside your subconscious awareness. Perhaps there is an emotion that needs attention, that wants to be felt, or that wants to help you heal from past wounds.
Music has a tremendous ability to heal us and sometimes the music we need finds us before we find it. Listen to your heart, even when the music you’re currently drawn to seems surprising.
There is no more beautiful music than that which heals the soul.
I highlighted one of these tools when I suggested making a happiness playlist.
As background for my fellow choir geeks, I sang “Seasons of Love” as an alto with The Alexandria Singers. By the time I joined The Reston Chorale almost a decade later, I had found my true voice as a soprano and joyfully revisited the piece in that capacity.