Some of my favorites by Enya.

In my last post I mentioned about new age music which is using for mind relaxing and I gave some of the examples  from Enya’s albums.

Enya is one of my favorite music artists. I think her songs can calm down my mind. As a music lover I like various types of music.Eastern classical, western classical, hip hop, Reggae, jazz and Baroque are some of them. (Baroque is a music type that can be directly used for the mind relaxing purposes. During my research I compelled to find more facts about baroque music and  hope to talk on  them in my future posts.).

I think the type of music that can entertain us is differ according to our mood. For example if I’m in a cool and happy mood I may feel to listen some hip hop or rock music. If I’m feeling sorrow, I prefer to listen slow classical  music. If i feel tired or bored I like to listen Enya’s music. It can refresh and relax my mind. I believe that taste of the music differ to person to person. So it is up to you to find what are the most suitable music for you for a  particular moment. Listening  high quality music with a high quality player, speakers or  head phones will provide you the maximum benefits of listening. 

Given below are several songs of Enya which I prefer very much. please check whether you too like them.:)

 

 

 

Enya’s music

During my last posts i talked a lot about the music therapy. my last post explained the music types that can be used for mind healing. today I’m going to give some of the examples . In my last post i mentioned about new age music. Enya is a musician who uses new age music for her creations.  Enya first became widely known when her 1988 album Watermark was released. Her follow-up, Shepherd Moons, was even more successful, selling over 10 million copies despite its slightly lower grade of ethereal enchantment. In 1997 she released Paint the Sky with Stars, an assortment of her best work from these two early albums plus gems from 1995's The Memory of Trees and the soundtrack to the BBC series The Celts. The most melodic and atmospheric examples of Enya's lovely Celtic-flavored songwriting shine on this disc. Overall, an outstanding collection from an artist who gives New Age a good name.

Personally I prefer her music . Also I think they will really help to calm down your mind. So you can try on these sample music and  see whether you like them.

 

‘Watermark’ by Enya

‘Shepherd moons’ by Enya

Stress relief music

 

Music is extremely a vast area that is  full with lots of variations. It depends on various countries, cultures, religions etc. But the most interesting thing is music is universal thing . That’s why we can feel and taste any kind of music which belong to different country or a culture. For example, sometimes we may not understand even a word of our favorite song. But we can feel the overall idea or the theme of that song. That’s why we can say that music is an universal language.

There are various various music types which are coming from various regions of the world. when considering about the music types that can be used for stress controlling, actually there are are many of them. Mainly three kinds of music types are used for stress releasing.

New Age music

'New Age music is music of various styles, which is intended to create inspiration, relaxation, and positive feelings, often used by listeners for yoga, massage, inspiration, relaxation, meditation, and reading as a method of stress management'

The melodies are often repetitive, to create a hypnotic feeling, and sometimes recordings of nature sounds are used as an introduction to a track or throughout the piece. Songs of up to 30 minutes duration are common.

New Age music is defined more by the feeling it produces rather than the devices used in its creation; it may be electronic or acoustic, or a mixture of both. New Age artists range from solo or ensemble performances using Western instruments such as piano, acoustic guitar, flutes, harps and many others, to electronic musical instruments, and Eastern instruments such as sitar, tamboura, tabla; and instruments from all other parts of the world.

Classical music

In here it is considered about the western classical music. It is given the extremely broad variety of forms, styles, genres, and historical periods generally perceived as being described by the term "classical music," it is difficult to list characteristics that can be attributed to all works of that type.

It is described that classical music as anything that "lasts a long time,"  however, there are characteristics that classical music contains that generally few or no other genres of music contain.

Classical and popular music are often distinguished by their choice of instruments. the string instruments including violins, violas, cellos, double basses and harp; woodwind instruments; brass instrument; and many diverse percussion instruments are used in classical music.

Especially in opera, the human voice is highly used.

Psychedelic music

Psychedelic music is a term that refers to a broad set of popular music styles, genres and scenes, that may include psychedelic rock, psychedelic folk, psychedelic pop, psychedelic soul, psychedelic ambient, psychedelic trance, and others. Psychedelic music can occur in almost every genre of music, including classical Western art music

Psychedelic rock evolved in the 60s as an offshoot of the rock and roll movement combining elements of rock, electronic music, eastern influences, and other diverse elements, inspired by the use of mind altering drugs like cannabis, mescaline, psilocybin.(Reference-  www.wikipidea.com)

Other stress controlling methods

There are many methods which can be used for controlling the stress level of human brain. Let’s simply have a look on those methods.

Meditation

Many religions contains meditation in the purpose of healing minds of the people. Also it can be practice out side of religious concepts.

Meditation helps you to achieve you a higher state of consciousness, to greater focus, creativity or self-awareness, or simply a more relaxed and peaceful frame of mind.

Deep breathing

deep breathing is a easy method of getting relaxation.

Deep breathing is the act of breathing deep into your body. It is a healthier and good habit of absorbing more Oxygen to your body.

Some of Yoga and other meditation methods use deep breathing techniques in mind relaxing

 Exercises

Physical exercise is any bodily activity that enhances or maintains physical fitness  and overall health. It is performed for many different reasons. It helps prevent the heart diseases, diabetes and many other diseases. It also improves mental health and helps prevent depression

Spas

The term spa is associated with water treatment .It helps for maintaining healthy body and mind. The spa towns or spa resorts offering such treatment, or the medication or equipment for such treatment.

when we compare the music therapy with above methods, there are many advantages of it. Main advantage is we can listen to music while we are working. It is not necessary  to allocate separate time for this. You can listen to music while you are working or studying. so it is time saving and effective stress relief method which we can use in our day today life.Also it is free from bad after effects.

Changing the states of the human brain by using Audio tones

There are scientific methods that can be used to change the sates of the human brain. Binaural beats are one of famous method of doing it. The basic thing that is doing in here is proving an audio tone that has a particular frequency which is in brain wave frequency range of a particular brain state. For example lets think your brain is in Beta state. You need to go to Alpha state to get relaxed your self. What you can do is provide your brain an audio tone which is in the range of 8Hz-14Hz. But It will not be work. Because human ears will not here the audio tones that are below 20Hz. The sensitivity range of the human ears is between 20Hz and 20000Hz. So how you can provide a tone below 14Hz frequency to your brain? Then you have to use binaural beats. Following picture provides you a clear idea on that.

Figure 2- How Binaural Beats work

According to the example which is describing in this picture, the left head phone will play an audio tone of 500Hz. The right head phone will play a tone of 510Hz. Then the brain will mix the two tones and it will take the difference of 10Hz. Now the brain has a tone that has an Alpha frequency. So the state of the brain will be easily convert in to Alpha. That means you are relaxed.

This is one way of relaxing your mind by using audio tones. This is a basic concept behind the music therapy.

What is stress?

Before look at  how music therapy can be used to control the stress level of the human brain, lets see  have an idea about what is stress.

Stress is a condition which has the ability to suffer the human brain.

There are six separate forms of stress that can be experienced. These are symptomatic in physical, behavioral, emotional, cognitive, spiritual, and relational aspects. Physical symptoms can be concerned as: headaches (specifically tension headaches), nausea, dizziness, sleep difficulties, tight neck and shoulders, racing heart, trembling hands, and restlessness.

Behavioral symptoms can be named as: a definite excess in smoking, bossiness towards others, becoming critical of others, grinding of teeth. Some of the emotional symptoms included such as: crying, anxiety, nervousness, boredom, overwhelming sense of pressure, overwhelming anger, being unhappy for no reason, and very testy.

Cognitive symptoms can be recognized as: forgetfulness, long-term memory loss, inability to make decisions, and constant excessive worry. Spiritual aspects of stress are: doubt, unforgiving,
apathy. Examples of relational symptoms included: isolation, intolerance, resentment, clamming up, nagging/whining, distrust, and less contact with friends.

Actually stress is a specific state of the human brain. There are four main states human brain. The are called Beta, Alpha, Theta and Delta. Those brain states are occurred due to different frequencies of the brain waves. The brain wave frequencies relevant for each brain states are given below.

• Beta - 4Hz-30Hz
• Alpha - 8Hz-14Hz
• Theta - 4Hz-8Hz
• Delta - 0Hz-4Hz

Figure1- Brain waves in each brain state

In each of these states the brain responds differently. The activities that you can do are different when your brain is in those states. When your brain is in Beta state you are fully awake. Your mind is sharp and focused. You can pay attention on your works very easily when your brain is in this state. When your brain is in Alpha state you are relaxed. Your awareness will be expanding. Your creativity will be enhanced. When your brain is in theta state you will feel deep relaxation. Also it is a meditative state. Your brain is in delta state means you are in a deep sleep. This brain state will help both your body and mind for recovery processes.

Music therapy

In today’s world using music for healing purposes is called as music therapy. For this we can use classical music or self selected relaxing music.

Music can do wonder and alleviate bodily pains as well as mental stress. We can feel the comfort while listening to the beautiful and soothing music. Music has a great power to heal and the charm of music itself is so soothing that people who are stressed out can get rid of all their pains by listening to some light music

Play the music and sing along with it. It works like magic in the worst of time. Even if you can’t play any instrument, you can listen to music and sing softly with it. It also works while you are stressed out.

Biological response: Whenever the proper sounds were experienced by the listener, amazing right/left brain hemisphere synchronization occurred. It has been observed that the entire human energetic system is extremely influenced by sounds, the physical body and energy stores react specifically to some specific tones and frequencies

Psychological response: According to popular researches, music produces in the physiological response system and many psychological patients revived their senses after listening to the music. Music pertaining to loud drum beats was extremely soothing.

Music is an excellent therapy because is meets with little or no intellectual resistance and does not need to appeal to logic."

According to this statement it is clear that, for any group of people who are in any educational level or any age limit can use this music therapy to get relief from stress.

History and the religious' view of music therapy.

There is a saying that music is the language of Gods. Actually music is an universal language. That’s why we can entertain any kind of music which belongs to different culture or a country.

Almost all the religions focused on the spiritual development of the humans. Different religions use different concepts and methodologies to make the mind conditions of humans into a good state. For example in Buddhism, there are lots of methods that can be used to heal the human mind. Among those methods ‘Pirith Chanting’ plays a big role regarding healing the mind. Actually ‘Pirith Chanting’ is music related thing which can effect strongly on human mind. In pirith chanting just few musical notes are used. All the stanzas are chanting with in the few range of musical notes. Some times the frequency of the stanzas is changed and it can make the pirith chanting more powerful and attractive.

The Catholics and Christians use music a lot in their religious activities. They usually sing hymns and do their prayers in rhythmic manner. Those things help to relax the mind condition very easily. In the holy Bible, it is described that how music was used to alleviate the pains of human mind. For example holy Bible says, David played his harp in order to alleviate the pains of King Saul.

In Sri Lanka various kinds of ‘Shanthikarma’ and ‘Thowil ’ events were used to heal the people in past. In rural areas those things are still used. In those events various kinds of drums specially ‘the Yak Beraya’ is used. The rhythm of a drum can effect on the mental state of a human. If you have watched a ‘shanthikarma’ event you may have seen that the rhythm of the drum starts in a low tempo and increases in to very high tempo. According to the changes of that rhythm the mental and physical condition of the patient is also get changed. The patient also stats to move(in Sinhala it is called as ‘aawesha wenawa’) according to the rhythm of the drum. When the rhythm becomes slow the patient also gets calm down. So it shows that how music or rhythm can make effects of human mind.

You may have noticed that various tribes use various kinds of drums for their traditional music.(Eg:-African and Australian tribes). In Sri Lanka even there are many kinds of drums. It is found that the rhythm of a drum can make effects on both human mind and body . If the rhythm is similar to the rate of the hart beat of a person, that person will be relaxed easily. If the heart beat rate of that person is high(that means he is in a stressful condition), the external rhythm can be started similarly at the beginning. Then little by little the external rhythm can be reduced. Then according to the external rhythm the stress level and the heart beat of the person will get reduced.

I hope to describe the scientific views for these things in my coming posts..

Brain, Stress and Music

The power of a human brain is unlimited. The capability of a human brain is immeasurable. That’s why we can call it as the most powerful organ in the body. It is so important to pay attention in maintaining it in an effective and healthy manner.

Stress is a very common word that we here in our day today life. Lots of people are suffering from stress in their day to day activities. Heavy work loads, unbearable competitiveness and bad mental conditions are some of the main reasons which lead humans to increase the stress of the brain.

Actually the stress of the human brain is always not a bad thing. Sometimes it is a very essential factor that helps us to make our works successful. But the most important thing is, the stress should be in us up to some limited extend. For an example, stress helps us to get ready and pass an exam well. If we have a normal stress about an exam, then we will compel to study hard and get ready for it early. But if we have a big stress regarding the exam, then we will not be able to perform in the exam as usual. So in such situations keeping the stress up to a limited extend is very important.

High stress effects on us badly, both physically and mentally. Various diseases can be appeared due to the stress. So it is very essential thing to control the stress in our day to day life.

How we can control the stress? There are various techniques and methods have been introduced to do this. Various kinds of meditations, exercises and healing methods are using on this purpose. Having a good sleep is a very simple method of reducing the stress of the human brain. Also another easiest and simplest way to do this is ‘using MUSIC’ in our day to day life.

Let’ Start..

Hi friends,

During our last semester we had to do an independent study on any area that we are interested in. As I’m a music lover I thought to select a music related topic.Finally I decided to do a research on “HOW MUSIC CAN BE USED TO CONTROLL THE STRESS OF THE HUMAN BRAIN.” The facts I have collected by doing that research are really interesting. So i thought to publish them in my blog.

Actually music is a very familiar thing for all of us in our day to day life.  So if we can use it for very important and useful thing such as stress controlling, it will be a very effective and efficient way. Because it is free from cost and after effects. Music effects on everyone in different ways. Some people use music for the entertainment. Some people use it to express emotions. Some are using it as a source of inspiration of the mind. According to these things we can see that music can make a big effect on us .So it is nice to get to know about these things and apply those things for our lives in a correct manner.

So I hope to talk more on this topic by my coming posts and you'll be able to use music not only for the entertainment, but also for the stress controlling process of your brain... So... Have a nice reading and LET THE MUSIC HEAL YOUR SOUL...............

Hello friends,

Welcome you to my blog!!!