If you’re reading this blog at work, there’s a good chance you’ve got your buds in and you’re listening to music right now. Even if you aren’t, chances are you’re going to be listening to your favorite tunes on the drive home.

With access to music easier than ever before thanks to the internet and satellite radio, music is becoming a bigger and bigger part of our lives.

Perhaps more than any other form of entertainment, music has a way of inspiring us and motivating us as we strive to make the most out of our lives. It’s highly portable, it doesn’t take a long time to listen to (unlike watching an inspiring movie), and it has a strong emotional resonance.

There are many ways that music can motivate us in our daily lives. Understanding the reasons why music can influence us so strongly and how to use it as an inspirational tool can help pull you out of a rut or push you to greater heights than you thought possible. Read on to learn more about the impact music can have on your inspiration and motivation:

Emotional Resonance

When you hear your favorite piece of music, it is likely to evoke strong emotions from you, whether it be admiration of beauty, raw excitement, or a deep melancholy. While there are songs that are meant to be thought provoking and technically impressive, they still use the same emotional resonance to explore a variety of thoughts and display their complexity. Even when used in other mediums (e.g. film, television or sports), music sets the baseline for the mood they’re trying to evoke.

The reason music is so emotionally resonant is because of the systems in your brain. Listening to music activates your reward center; this can boost your mood and help you feel more motivated. It can also be a great stress reliever and can help you feel more relaxed. There are even some cases of it being physically and mentally healing, due to your reward center releasing pain reducing and stress relieving hormones.

One important factor is the mood of the music you’re listening to as it can help reproduce that mood in your psyche. Something upbeat or fast and intense can make you feel excited and put you in an energetic mood. Slower or somber music can allow you to temporarily indulge in feelings like sadness which can be emotionally cathartic. Mellow music can be soothing, reduce anxiety and help you get to sleep.

As the Piano Man himself Billy Joel once said: “I think music in itself is healing. It’s an explosive expression of humanity. It’s something we are all touched by. No matter what culture we’re from, everyone loves music.”

Human Expression

It is a common adage that lyrical songs are poems set to music. Music is similar to storytelling in its ability to help express one’s self. Musicians use music to express both how they are feeling and what they are thinking. It can be used as a tool to explore intense emotions, along with deeper philosophical topics and themes, all from an individual human perspective.

Listening to music also gives you a peak at the soul of the performer and what they were going through at the time they wrote or performed it. This ability to express their feeling can be a huge inspiration to many people, whether they want to be musicians themselves or want to express themselves in other ways.

How It Can Inspire You

While there are many obvious ways music can inspire and motivate you, there are also many subtler, more personal ways that it can have the same effect. The emotional connection that a piece of music can create makes it important to find the right music to accompany the activity you want to pursue.

Alternatively, the lyrics within a song can also move you. If it’s a subject you already had strong feelings about, music has the power to intensify those feelings. It could be about the problems going on in the world, social issues that go unrecognized, or even personal issues that some people choose to keep hidden. Music has the power to push you in a direction you hadn’t considered before.

Finally, anything that has the ability to trigger a strong emotional response is also something that can help take you back to a time and place. The sense of smell is well known for doing this, but music is just as powerful.

Whether that be thinking of an old love interest every time you hear a particular song on the radio or tearing up every time you hear a song that was played at a loved one’s funeral, music can help transport you through time and space.

It can also trigger memories of times when you were at your best which can fire you up to go out and recapture that success. Music has the power to inspire us to do incredible things in our day-to-day lives so why not use it to your advantage instead of waiting for inspiration to come randomly from a radio station’s playlist.