Gratitude for the power of music
Where do you find your memories? Music is one of the most evocative ways, at least for me. I can often find myself in floods of tears or up dancing as soon as I hear something that pulls me back through time.
Recently I started to listen to music before I work again. This is something I haven’t done in a long time because I like to write to silence, a clean desk and some nice smells. But right now it is energising me. I also put music on before a Zoom call to give me energy and put me in a great place.
Music touches us emotionally, where words alone can’t – Johnney Depp
Music has the power to take you on amazing trips, along lanes, roads, highways and byways to destinations once lived and now forgotten.
I remember sitting in class many aeons ago, and the teacher played music from the Grand Canyon Suite. In the far right corner of the room were pictures of the Grand Canyon and we were invited to write stories about what we saw, felt and heard. I don’t know what I wrote, but in that moment I was lost, and it became a dream to visit this wondrous place.
One Christmas my then partner and I went to Las Vegas for a relatives 60th birthday, and on Christmas Day I flew over the Grand Canyon in an epic and exhilarating helicopter flight with music blaring. The music this time was more rock than classic all designed to fire up your emotions and connect you to the movement of the helicopter, the vast ocean of red rock, floors of bobbly green brush and striated skies of turquoise and pale blue. A veritable feast of pleasure.
By contrast in my party days, my most gorgeous friend and DJ Leroy would play my favourite songs – he would know, it was always Wonderland first, then during the night Whole Lotta Rosie, Come Up and See Me and Carwash. Sadly, he committed suicide and they played Imagine at his grave. In my memory, he is forever in Wonderland. Both Wonderland and Imagine and make me cry. I am sad that he took his life, but also they are tears of gratitude to have known him.
Silly songs like Haircut One Hundred – Fantastic day remind me of my first husband. He thought it was hilarious to come back into the bedroom to find me lying in bed somehow dancing to this, under the sheets.
What about throwing the curtains wide to Elbow – One day like this, whilst singing
“So throw those curtains wide
One day like this a year would see me right
Throw those curtains wide
One day like this a year would see me right”
And anyone who knows me knows that Nirvana and licking Kurt Cobain all over while he strums The Man Who Sold The World gets me every time.
How I wish I could sing and be on stage rocking my stuff out. Words and music really do have the power to move us.
If you are looking for inspiration for your writing and journaling and want to be taken back to another time period, compile a playlist, get up and dance, scribble down whatever words come into your head, have fun, laugh, cry, scream, but most of all capture what it was like to be you then. Please do share your golden musical memories with us.
Be inspired and have a beautiful day.
Journal Gratitude and Music Prompts
Listen to one of your favourite songs before you start to write. One of mine is Nirvana and the David Bowie classic – The man who sold the world. When you get your journal write 3 things that you feel gratitude for which are inspired by the song. Ask the following questions and finally, say thank you for what you have…
- Where does this song take you?
- What feelings does it evoke?
- Who does it remind you of?
I hope this brings some joy to your say. Music takes me to some incredible places.
If you love writing and journaling come and join me in Writing To Heal pathway.