The Music Doesn't Have to be Music

August 13, 2020

My friend Tony has been a DJ for 40 years, so he knows a lot about the art of filling one's head with sound. But during COVID-19, Tony decided to program his own mental soundtrack with a different kind of music: He taught himself to paint. A brain that is wondering how to make leaves look like they're fluttering in the breeze has less space for dark thoughts. These days, Tony steps into the nature scene in his backyard and feels at peace...and then he paints a world he can control, at least a little.

What music plays inside your head when you're not paying attention? If you think about it, you'll know what I mean: It's the soundtrack that plays in the just-barely-conscious part of your brain. Sometimes it's literally the music you've been listening to recently, sometimes it's flashes from a movie you've recently watched, sometimes it's a scene of a place you've been, or today's news report, or your to-do list, or a litany of complaints from someone in your past. Tony's pandemic experience has taught me how important it is to program that soundtrack on purpose rather than just let the world fill it in.

It sounds simplistic to say it, I know, but the good things in life are just as real as the bad things. Addressing the problems we need to solve is important, but when focusing on negative stuff brings no value, we need to fill our heads with the good stuff. And the best way to do that is with art, because we're human, and art sticks to human souls.

I personally find music to be particularly soul-sticky, but the art most meaningful to you might not be music: It can be YouTube videos, or a TV series, or a podcast, or an online class on the art of negotiation, or a watercolor on the wall, or needlework, or your kids' latest creation, or even the replay of a memory. You can fill your head with someone else's art, or with something you create yourself.

The first step is to learn to pay attention to what's playing in your head; that way, if you notice it's the wrong music, you know to change the channel. I'm guessing that Tony might suggest that at such times you turn the dial to WARM 101.3. But you do you.