For most of us, music plays a pivotal role in our lives. It adorns the media we consume, it fills our ears through headphones, car radios, and even sometimes from the boombox of an eccentric passerby in the park. We all have songs we reach for in times of emotional need, as well as playlists for those days when everything feels in alignment and you want a joyous soundtrack to celebrate. What many may not know, however, is that the study of music as it relates to neuroscience and human emotion is not a new phenomenon.
Something that has long set our practice and clinicians apart in the field of mental health is our integrative and team based approach. Consistently, research and our experiences show that mental healthcare works best when it is individualized and patient-centric and borrows from a wide range of modalities and practices that allow practitioners to meet patients where they are. Whether looking at mental health through an unapologetically sex-positive lens, working with historically underserved perinatal populations, or exploring the relationship of psychedelics and mental health, taking an integrative approach to treatment yields promising results. And promising results mean happier days ahead. Where might music fit into this?
Science Based Music Therapy
Spiritune is an app that is seeking to answer that question. The music-based app is founded in the principles of music therapy and neuroscience to use music to promote wellbeing and released earlier this year. As Jamie Pabst, Spiritune founder, spoke to in a piece for online publication Well + Good, the proof is in the concept. “We as humans associate music emotionally,” says Pabst. “We should be using it more and more as a tool for emotional regulation.”
What she was speaking to in this piece was a study conducted at the University of California, Berkeley in which researchers mapped how music can impact and cause a range of emotions. Alan Cowen, PhD and lead researcher on the study elaborates further stating that “we arrived at the findings that at least 13 different emotions were reliably conveyed by the music—more than people have thought.” Those emotions range from anxious and tense, to calm and serene as well as erotic, scary and heroic! And while the exploration of music as it relates to therapy on its own is promising, there is even more potential when exploring fusing therapeutic applications of music with other therapies, such as psychedelic backed mental health treatment.
Music and Psychedelic Healing
The history of music as a tool in psychedelic healing is long and vast. Despite a white-washed medical framework that routinely misses these perspectives, music and psychedelics have long gone hand in hand, especially in Indigenous healing practice. In South America, auyahuasca shamans sing sacred songs known as icaros and many indigenous medicine practitioners and shamans were and are renowned for their poetry and chants. Music has long been thought of by many indigenous peoples as a conduit to the spiritual.
A Guardian piece published last month explored the relation between music therapy and psychedelic healing further. Michelle Lhooq writes: “When scientists began studying psychedelics in the 1950s and 60s, music was quickly identified as having a profound impact on a trip, and recent research has found that it might even play a greater role in facilitating positive outcomes than the dosage of the drug itself.”
Clearly, there are broad based applications for music for emotional regulation, both in and outside of therapeutic settings. With apps like Spiritune, these tools are becoming more individualized and accessible than ever. As we grow as a practice and continue to explore new ways to innovate in the field of mental health, we’re thrilled to be partnering with Spiritune to make music therapy more available to our community. Whether you’re receiving Spravato treatment, group therapy, or weekly one on one sessions, it might be worth checking if Spiritune’s research based approach can enhance your outcomes. If you’re interested in giving it a try you can get your first month free using code BROOKLYNMINDS and signing up via this link.
