I listen to a lot of music across many different genres. I listen to it while I work, while I relax, in the car, out with friends, or on game nights with the family. Music is everywhere and permeates life. It also occurred to me that music has a “magical power.” It has the ability to cut across time and connect the past to the future.

I stumbled upon this power while thinking about the music I had been listening to lately. The stations and playlists I was choosing from Google Play Music were mostly pop and rock hits from the seventies and eighties. I started wondering why. I arrived at the conclusion that I was connecting these songs to positive experiences from my youth. In other words, my selection of music wasn’t random chance. My music selection was unconsciously bolstering my spirits and altering my mood through connections to positive moments and events from the past.

Once I made this discovery, I realized that there was an inherent power in music, and that it wasn’t limited to those classic tracks I was listening to. Songs from the nineties, 2000’s, and today that had a similar power and ability to alter my energy and my mood.

Why the fascination? Well, by understanding the power of music, I can use and harness it as a means to affect my mood, my focus, and my productivity. The end result? I should be more deliberate about my musical choices to get even more out of the day.