How music can help us

Music is something we tend to enjoy very much. Because of its’ nature, all kinds of people can make music to appeal to anyone at all. We use music for all kinds of things: Exercise, changing our moods, setting moods and a lot of other uses. You may think that music is just nice to listen to while doing things, though it may be deeper than just nice to listen to. Studies have shown that depending on what you listen to and what you’re doing and what you’re playing, music can have some very interesting benefits.

Exercising

Many of us like to listen to some music when we’re out on our morning jog, or just generally when we’re getting our exercise in. What some of us don’t know is just how much that music is helping us. There are many studies that have gone towards proving that music actually boosts our bodies’ performance. That's outside of the placebo effect too. Music can: Help up exercise harder, increase our body’s efficiency using oxygen and even distract us enough to be able to work longer.

Relaxation

Music has proven to help us greatly when it comes to stress levels and achieving a calmer state of mind. This can be helpful in situation where maybe a student has upcoming exams, pre or post-surgery, and other stressful events. Music can also help when you meditate too, just make sure it’s the right music for doing so.

It feels good

This has a large range of meanings. Firstly at the shallow end, when we listen to our favorite songs it feels good. This is good in itself for obvious reasons, but it can also help with many other things. Dopamine is a hormone our brain releases to make us feel pleasure. Listening to music makes our brain produce dopamine which is why music makes us feel good. The important part of this is that because dopamine makes us feel good, we tend to repeat things that makes us produce it. (We eat ice cream because it feels good, we don’t put our hands into bonfires because it feels bad.) So dopamine, and the other chemicals that make us feel god encourage learning. This is why we are given treats when we do something good, it’s called reinforcement. Because of this, music can actually help us learn. Students who listen to music while studying may actually remember more, and that doesn’t just go for students. Anyone who is learning may be able to remember more when they listen to music. Music can also help people suffering from depression and other similar afflictions. Even just bouts of sadness can be lessened by simply listening to music. Of course it’s not the only fix, many things require effort and multiple sources to help properly but music is a good and easy start.