Music isn’t Just a Pleasure-Daily Meditaton-5.4.23

Today’s quotation:

Music isn’t just a pleasure, a transient satisfaction.  It’s a need, a deep hunger, and when the music is right, it’s joy.  Love.  A foretaste of heaven.  A comfort in grief.  Is it too much to think that perhaps God speaks to us sometimes through music?  How could I be so ungrateful as to refuse the message?-
Orson Scott Card

Today’s Meditation:

I love music, but my relationship with music goes much deeper than that.  I’ve written several novels; when I write, I need to have music playing, preferably rather loudly.  There’s something about the rhythm of the music that allows my thoughts to flow more strongly and more efficiently, and even though when I’m deep in concentration, I don’t consciously hear the music anymore, I know from experience that it still needs to be playing.  I’ve tried writing without music, and it’s always challenging and frustrating.

Music is a special gift to human beings, but most of us take it for granted.  It can raise us up to heights that we can’t even imagine without music, making us feel as if we were floating in space or looking down at the world from a mountaintop.  It can add to fear or alleviate fear; it can make us feel good or make us feel sad, depending on keys and chords and the notes that are used and the order they’re used in.  Over the years, I’ve grown careful to listen to music that cheers me makes me feel positive and, energetic, and happy.  If I have that resource available to me, after all, shouldn’t I make use of it?

Music is a beautiful gift and one that we’re fortunate enough to be able to access anywhere, at any time.  I can’t imagine what life was like when music could be heard only at concerts or recitals and only when someone was playing and singing it live.  It would have been difficult for me, I think, to wait for the next song.  These days, I’m fortunate enough not to have to wait.

Questions to consider:

In what ways do you take advantage of the gift of music?

Why do so many of us take music for granted?

What kinds of music make you feel better?  Which kinds make you feel worse?

For further thought:

Music… will help dissolve your perplexities and purify your character and sensibilities, and in times of care and sorrow, will keep a fountain of joy alive in you.-
Dietrich Bonhoeffer

If you missed our last Daily Meditation, it is right here.