Using Music With Tinnitus

10:36

Using Music With Tinnitus

by Peter Vernezze

Type

talks

Activity

Meditation

Suitable for

Everyone

In this talk I look at how music might fit into living with tinnitus. I explain why sound can feel unwelcome at first, and why I would not suggest starting with music straight away. I then share a way of thinking about the nervous system in three states, and how different music can suit each: music that settles you, music with energy that helps you get moving, music that keeps you company in a low mood, and music that is simply joyful. I suggest building your own playlist and refreshing it often, since music you choose yourself tends to work best. This content is educational and is not a substitute for one to one professional care.

Ambient Sound Meditation Deep Listening Music Tinnitus Nervous System Polyvagal Theory Stress Emotional Resilience Nervous System Regulation Dopamine Release Stress Hormone Reduction

Meet your Teacher

Tucson, AZ, USA

Meet your Teacher

Tucson, AZ, USA

Transcript

So I want to talk about this book I started reading and am pretty fascinated by. It's called, I heard there was a secret chord, Music as medicine. By Daniel Levitin who is a neuropsychiatrist or neurologist of some sort. And it's a fascinating account of first how music, What music does to the brain and how all the neuroimaging, What it tells us about music in the brain. Which by itself is an interesting thing. Saga. But the reason I'm talking about it in this podcast is really what the subtitle lets on to, And that is all the ways that music is used as therapy, Which I didn't know about this amazing literature of the way music is used for physical and emotional situations, Trauma, Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's, Dementia. Depression, Pain. Stroke, Neurodevelopmental disorders, Just a ton of ways that music is used in a therapeutic way. And that got me to thinking about, Well, If it's used in therapy in all of these other areas, Would it be useful for tinnitus? Now, There's an obvious problem here, And that one of the things that tinnitus does is it can make us very reticent, Resistant to sound, And so the last thing you want to do usually is to put on some music, And it's not something I would recommend when you're first starting out. But I did talk to, Worked with, Especially my meditation group, Which has been a more advanced group, And many of them echoed the usefulness that music has had for them in their journey. Well, Pleased and surprised. So, Dive in this a little bit. If you think about one of the things we know about those of us with tinnitus is our sympathetic nervous system is overly activated as a rule, As a group, Compared to a baseline population and that's not a surprise. The sound of tinnitus. Puts us on hyper alert. And the body gets dysregulated. And one of the things, I wrote this quote down that, The author talks about. What music does to the brain, As an individual listens to enjoyable music, The brain's reward pathways are activated and neurotransmitters like dopamine are released. This may enhance mood and alleviate symptoms. Another factor lies in music's stress-reducing effects. Engaging in music activates the parasympathetic nervous system, Promoting relaxation and lowering heart rate, Blood pressure, And cortisol levels, Hormones all related to stress. I thought, Bingo, This is what tinnitus is all about. I've always said the whole game with tinnitus is the dysregulation of the body. So can you use the music to calm the body. I mean, We all, You know, When we think of calming music, We think of classical music, And that's not the only music that calms. I never found it particularly calming. I think we all have music we can relate to where, Let's say before Tinnitus hit, That it was something that would just really change the chemistry of the body. You'd sit and it would just relax you. I think of some pieces like a poof, A ripple by the grateful dad, A peace peace. Another piece, Just. . . Pieces that you hear them and your body just goes, Ah. So the thing is, If you had those sort of experiences, And it could be classical, It could be other jazz or anything, Produces that relaxing effect in you. In that work before. I would suggest as soon as you're able to start listen to that again as a device for calming the nervous system. As I said, Calming the nervous system is the key to working with your tinnitus. So anything that can facilitate that process is something I would recommend. So I would see how that works with respect to relaxing music. It's actually a little more complicated. Complicated and interesting in that Here I'm going to refer to polyvagal theory, Which I've talked about elsewhere, But the basic idea in polyvagal theory is that our nervous system is in one of three states. We're either in a ventral state of relaxation and calm. We're in a sympathetic state of activation or fight and flight, One of those sympathetic activations which we all know and don't really love. And then there's also what it calls a dorsal vagal state, Related to the vagus nerve as well as the thyroid. Ventral vagal state at the top of the list is, And the dorsal vagal state is kind of a shutdown state. The parallel that's often used in polyvagal theory is an animal is running away and gets caught. It's in fight or flight, Gets caught, And very often it'll play dead. That's dorsal vagal. That's shutdown mode. We can go into that mode when we get depressed and pull the covers over our head. And it is a progression. You can get so, Let's say, Go into tinnitus, You get activated, And then at some point you give up. And that's the dorsal vagal. So those three levels, I was thinking how there's really different music for different purposes. One of the things of the rules or the guidelines in polyvagal theory is if you're going to get out of a state, It's like a ladder, So you go from dorsal to sympathetic to ventral. So say you've fallen down to the low level of dorsal. You need energy. You need sympathetic activation to get you out of that state. So think about songs that energize you. I think I hear of workout music that can get you really hyped and that will be useful in getting yourself out of trouble. This shutdown state, For me. . . The first song that comes to mind is. . . A theme from the Sopranos, Like that always gets me going when I'm running. But anything will work that has that workout music quality to move the energy. From dorsal to sympathetic. Another interesting sort of role that music can play that I've as I've been thinking about this is sometimes when you're in this shutdown state, In dorsal vagal, You just want to kind of be there for a while. This is the whole foundation of the blue. There is something about hitting that bottom and staying there. But not by yourself, But with music, And it's very empowering. How it works, But it does. And I've had times where I'm listening to, Again, Just to talk of my own. Music I kind of listen to in this state is Cat Stevens' Trouble. That will really just kind of fall into a state of, Yeah, Here I am, And it's not a good place to be, But we need to be there. And sometimes we need to be in these dark places. Sometimes we need to turn to the shadow, And when we can be accompanied by music, I think we feel less alone. And it's comforting. So music, I think, Can play that role. I've also noticed one more type I'll throw in here, And that is music that just is not relaxing. It's just joyful. You know, Music that just makes us feel good about ourselves, About life, And again, It's going to vary so much from person to person. I mean, One thing they find out in these studies that was interesting, And not surprising, Is that although music can be useful therapy and multiple arenas, It's always better if the individual picks out the music. Again, No surprise. So when I think of this sort of music, Bruce Colburn's Thinking About Eternity. I just love that song. It's just joyful. I can hear it and it immediately picks me up and that's a great state to be in. So. The message to take away is if you can, If you're in a space where you can begin to listen to music, And we want to get back into that space with tinnitus because music was useful before the tinnitus and we want to integrated back after the tinnitus and music can have all these wonderful constructive uses to work with the nervousness and help us Both can get out of a relaxed body. Get out of dark places, Get into bright places. And just as an all-around tool for well-being, It's something, As we talk about the tinnitus toolkit, I like to think of a polyvagal playlist. What's my ventral vagal songs, My sympathetic songs, My dorsal songs? And work with them, Use them, Listen to them. They will affect your nervous system. And always find new ones. One of the things, Again, Another piece of the research is we tend to, Can get kind of tired of songs after a while, So you always need to be refreshing that list. Hopefully you find that useful. If you want to let me know how it goes, I'd love to hear. In any case, Take care.