Our meaning of music

Have you ever thought about what your life would be like without music? Sure, boring, dull, quiet and somehow different. But what really makes music so important to us?

Every girl (but maybe you guys too) is guaranteed to have had one heartbreak story or another. You cry and cry and think that your life is just falling apart. What do you do in such moments? Many listen to music. Sad, rousing love-sick crooners. This music gives you the feeling that you are not alone with a certain feeling. Everyone will experience a song differently and interpret it for themselves. Each song tells thousands of stories, even though everyone seems to be listening to the same song. This one significant thing about music is that we start to engage with ourselves. Where some people find it difficult to admit and express feelings, in music everyone finds them.

For some years now, I have not been able to listen to sad songs with suitable lyrics in such phases, because I get too stuck on the problem, but I have now found alternatives. On the one hand, simple piano music without any lyrics. On the other hand, I discovered rock music for myself some time ago. With it, I got to know a completely different side of myself. Through music I have learned to deal with the anger that often builds up inside me.

Here on the plane, where I'm sitting right now while writing this article, I'm listening to music, of course. But also in the train, bus and car. Now, for example, during take-off, it distracted me from the queasy feeling one gets when "going up in the air". I always think of music as a constant companion and friend who is always there for you when you need it. Be it that you feel pain or that you simply long for calm before the storm. No matter when, where, how or what, my motto is always "music on, world off".

It's the same with singing. When I need a distraction, there's nothing better than a karaoke evening with friends. Just sing everything off your chest and laugh for all it's worth. It doesn't matter if you can sing well or if you mess up a few notes. The fun is in the foreground here.

But concerts and festivals also play a very important role here. You are at a music event with like-minded people. Everyone here shares the same taste in music and it doesn't matter what the story or background of each individual is. It's all about the feeling of being free and forgetting everything around and inside you. Dancing, singing, dancing. The loud music and the exuberant party atmosphere make it possible to leave everything behind and be fixated only on the here and now.

A similar feeling builds up when you move to the music in the disco. Everyone comes together to experience that one indescribable feeling of weightlessness. Simply not having to think about anything and literally "letting it all hang out".

Even though many people think that it's only about the alcohol associated with it, there's actually much more to it than that. I myself struggle with panic attacks and fear. Confined spaces usually don't make it any easier for me. However, when I am in the disco or at another dance or music event, I forget this feeling of fear. Because the music makes it possible for me to feel absolutely free, despite the confinement in the room.

I've only been to a disco once before Corona, when I was 16. Now I'm 18 and I'm even allowed to go to any disco in Germany. Despite this unique event, I can immediately put myself back into the indescribable feeling I had back then. The same with a party I went to last year. For others it might have been a date, an outing or something like that, but for me that one party was the best day of my life. I danced like never before. Moved like never before. Felt a sensation in my body that I had never felt before. Suddenly all my self-doubt was blown away. For one evening I had no more worries and suddenly dared to approach people on my own. I was me again and exactly the person I had lost throughout puberty. And all because music freed me and made me brave.

That was my story about the connection with music. What are your experiences that you have had? What does music mean to you in your life and from what difficult situation has it perhaps also given you a sense of freedom and weightlessness?

July, 2021