Creativity in 30 Days (Day 24) — Make a Mixtape
“One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain.”
- Bob Marley
Remember mixtapes? Specifically, a mixtape was a term that used to be applied to a homemade compilation of music. Before online downloading and streaming was available, these were often songs recorded from the radio. These days, the modern equivalent of mixtape is a digital playlist, although the term mixtape is still loosely used.
One of the greatest benefits of listening to music is that it has the power to influence your mood as well as help you to be more creative.
Music can be relaxing, thus clearing the way for creative thought. It alters the state of our brainwaves as well a producing neurotransmitters such as dopamine that alter our mood.
Music can help us to create images in our mind and open us up to new ideas.
Studies have shown that listening to the music we love and the music we are familiar with helps us to become more creative. This is because it can increase focus and lift your mood. Music has been scientifically proven to increase the beta waves in your brain (these are at an increased level when you are creative).
Your Task:
Revisit the songs you love and make a compilation of them, whether it be a YouTube, Spotify or iTunes playlist, on your computer, phone, tablet, or on CD. Maybe you still use cassette tapes?
The music that you are most familiar with is the best to use (studies have shown that unfamiliar music is better for downtime than it is to inspire creativity).
Listen to your mixtape often.
Extract from the forthcoming book Think It! Make It! by Richard P John of The Creativity Toolbox
