View Full Version : unable to enjoy music
Hi there,
I'd like to know what people's experience with music has been during times of anxiety and depression.
Up until the age of about 16, music and in particular guitar was my passion.
But before any real anxiety or depression had surfaced, I found that I had no where near the level of enjoyment or emotion I used to get from listening or playing music. Becuase of this, I lost the motivation to play.
I can appreciate music, but almost automatically now, I find myself criticising it and focusing on the mechanics, instead of just letting it flow. I would liken it to standing too close to a painting. But it's a habbit that I can't seem to break.
Anyway, if anyone has had similar experiences or knows any tips, I would like to know about it.
Thanks
Sheik N Shimmy
05-04-07, 16:12
Hi there,
I'd like to know what people's experience with music has been during times of anxiety and depression.
I'm very much into my music. I've been fanatical about it for the best part of 30 years.
However, during my darkest days of anxiety / depression I wasn't bothered.
It's a sign of depression - losing interest in the things you once loved.
The passion has come back for me anyway since I got over the worst days of anxiety.
Paddington
06-04-07, 13:26
Gosh this rings so true with me too :weep: i used to write ,sing ,play the guitar...i always listened to music as it so moved and inspired me ,then i stopped:ohmy: it is as tho i dont connect with it ..or cant!I have started to see live bands this last year and enjoy it biut not at the same level...having said that my son put acopy of a dvd in my car,no title,nothing ,so i put it on...WOW!!It was by Tom Baxter,a track called Amost there came on and i was lifted truely for the first time in years by the emotion in his voice..maybe this was because i wasnt looking for it??As i did not know who it was??I think depression and axiety cause a deadening of pleasure but maybe the key is to stop trying,who knows.I do recommend the album tho:) Love Paddie.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxps Feather and stone it is called:flowers:
Yes I seem to have lost the ability to listen to music and enjoy it like I used to. I used to find listening to favourite tracks always made me feel better, now I can't even be bothered to listen.
I know the feeling too. I play guitar and used to write music a lot, and get a lot of ejoyment from it. But as I got more depressed I felt less and less like playing and found it harder and harder to concentrate, so now I hardly play at all and am badly out of practise. :lac:
I find with listening, sometimes it's great, cheers me up or brings tears to my eyes, but other times I just feel numb and don't get any enjoyment from it at all.
Jim
My stratocaster gathered dust in the corner for 18 months a while back. Now I am back to annoying the neighbours with punk riffs ;)
It will come back mate, just takes time.
Jaco
hey,
i can agree with everything thats been said. when my anxiety began, i was in a band playing bass. after my panic attacks started happening, i quit the band and couldnt listen to music at all. in fact my mp3 player gathered dust for about 5 months.
some metal music would make me really anxious, mellow music would make me bored...i would never be able to get the volume to my liking, i would lower it too much..then higher it, then lower it..etc..i just didnt care.
this is because your mind is so concentrated on how youre feeling and your thoughts are elsewhere..you dont have any time to pay attention to music, and when you try you feel like youre forcing yourself..
nowadays i have my mp3 player with me all the time, i listen to music on my way to work, at work, and on my way home from work..i still dont listen to as much as i used to, and i still havent picked my guitar back up. but thats because i have gotten unused to it from all those months of not playing..
so, it will come back.
Stan.
LickeyEndBlues
08-04-07, 15:35
Yup can relate to this big time!!
Music has been a consistent pleasure for me once I was able to listen to my choices as a teenager. (I was very much deprived of the 60's scene by my parents who objected to the "rubbish" that was pop!!) When my illness is at it's height then music just doesn't get played. Sometimes I try but can find nothing, sometimes I put a cd in and forget to press play!!
Recently though I have been able to listen and enjoy again, I've also started to go to gigs and enjoy them.
To add to Paddingtons recomendation can I suggest Teddy Thompsons "Separate Ways"
Hello! It's an old thread - but I googled "unable to enjoy music", read this thread, realized it's a forum about some issues I'm dealing with - and registered.
So yeah, what can I say, I'm unable to enjoy music! But it's so wonderful to see that some people have had the same thing and that it has got better! Usually when people have said to me that it just takes time I have had hard time to believe because nobody has been in this position - but you have and if you are nowdays able to enjoy music, I'll be too! :)
So the thing is, that music is the closest thing to me in the world - I am a musician. My father's too so it's in the family, and I started to compose at the age of 10. I've been very much involved with music since that... in my extremely obsessed way, as I have Asperger syndrome :) But well, a bit over a year ago after having spent several months making music and making music only, I faced a some kind of burn-out situation and since that I have not been able to feel the music. It's just gone. I remember how I had my favourite albums or songs playing and the feeling was just so unbelievable... stronger than anything. And then it's gone - it's horrible. The thing that kept me going!
Well, after the burn-out I have done other things and it's been greatly useful - I have learnt so much about myself and life. But I still need my ability to enjoy music, firstly because that would make me more happy and secondly because that's my strength and I want to make a career of it.
About half a year ago a psychologist suggested to me to start working on the music, making it, even if I wouldn't feel inspired - even if I wouldn't "feel" it. She said that I can't just be waiting forever, I gotta do something about it. It was a bit hard to understand, but I have finally found ways to kind of work on music without feeling so inspired. To make a career out of something you gotta work no matter what, so that's what I'm doing and I think it's great - I'm learning, proceeding and so on. HOWEVER I can not compose or do much creative things. I believe that the fact I'm not letting "lack of inspiration" prevent me from making music is healthy for the inspiration and ability to feel, but it seems to not totally take me back to my old mood.
Another thing to note is that I can very much identify with what these guys on this thread have said - about how we're so focused on the feeling, wanting it to be something special. Not just relaxin'. As my ears have became very accurate and I have became able to hear small details in music, I can't stand lower quality music no more. Which is insane, because as young adolescent I was in heaven when listening to low-quality mp3-files from a crappy mp3-player through two-dollar earphones. Well, of course as we mature we start to notice details more and we want better things, but perhaps I've taken this too far. I can not enjoy music no more unless I use my best equipment - my expensive headphones and audio interface. And I still don't enjoy it! Just... I feel that lower quality is not tolerable. And for me the listening experience has became something frighting. I can see how I'm afraid of music and how I'm looking for the perfect moment to enjoy some certain piece of music to make sure that it wouldn't feel nothing. And it always ends up feeling like nothing.
During the past year I have perhaps twice felt music. First time was when I just ran into this new song and it's video and it was just something new for me but still contained the elements that I love the most, and it was just brilliant. I was in heaven and well, guess what, I composed and produced a great song right after that. I felt inspired, but well, it was all soon gone. Then, another time was recently when I understood lyrical content for the first time in my life. Before lyrics had meant nothing to me, but this time I just realized how a certain song's lyrics were about my situation, and it was unbelievable. I believe this is a sign of good direction: I'm experiencing music in a different way, and it was nothing forced or nothing too quality-focused or anything; a good sign.
I will continue "working on" music making, I will continue trying to be less quality and detail focused, I will continue self-analysis - just wanted to share my feelings with you. I feel that this is the biggest thing in my life as music truly is what keeps (kept) me going and the only thing I really want to make the core of my career.
:)
I wold like to apologize firstly that my U key doesn't work. I had to copy that one.
~~
Interesting! My problem is I feel it too mch! Any level of emotion in moosic or film makes me panic, rather than engage with the emotion intended. ESPECIALLY moosic I yoosed to listen to dooring bad times, like a track I heard the other day that took me straight back to last winter dooring a time of terrible anxiety.
I have also fond my playing is rather bad when I'm anxios - I play 12 string gitar and it seems to be extra frnstrating now, trying to think of where each finger goes.
Moosic shold be an expression for emotion, bnt anxiety masks all emotions in one big panicky face that blocks out and traps all good things :(
The spelling tortoored me too, I assiore yoo.
Lol.....luv the spelling...:D
Petra x
Ooh I know at least what I have done for the mean time is assigned U to my hash key as I never use hashes. At least it wasn't E! :wacko:
I wold like to apologize firstly that my U key doesn't work. I had to copy that one.
~~
Interesting! My problem is I feel it too mch! Any level of emotion in moosic or film makes me panic, rather than engage with the emotion intended. ESPECIALLY moosic I yoosed to listen to dooring bad times, like a track I heard the other day that took me straight back to last winter dooring a time of terrible anxiety.
I have also fond my playing is rather bad when I'm anxios - I play 12 string gitar and it seems to be extra frnstrating now, trying to think of where each finger goes.
Moosic shold be an expression for emotion, bnt anxiety masks all emotions in one big panicky face that blocks out and traps all good things :(
The spelling tortoored me too, I assiore yoo.
Thanks for the reply :) Yeah you probably don't have the same thing as I but that doesn't sound simply like "feeling it too much" either. You just feel it wrongly don't you? Too much is never enough with feelings, right :D But panic, anxiety and frustration... those are not the same things as "amplified" feelings. Or would you say that the feeling that your favourite music created used to be mild panic, anxiety and frustration? Unless you like death metal or something like that, I doubt! :D
Anyway, where are all the people who identify with me???? At the beginning of the thread so many people were like me... come at me xD
Btw, here's an addition to what I wrote - a third time of feeling the music again during this long dark period. This took place maybe three months ago.
A certain live performance that I had seen from youtube couple of years ago came to my mind, I and I checked it out again - just because it came to my mind. It was one of my favourite performers and one of my favourite songs. This song used to make me feel sooooo incredibly strong, typically just by listening to it from CD. But I hadn't felt this song in so long time. But well, now I watched this live performance. It was somehow a new situation. I hadn't watched similar stuff for a long time - and most importantly, not out of curiosity, childlike curiosity. I was like a child. And when the audience started to scream, I was so high! And when the music started, I FELT IT again!!! It was incredible, after a minute I realized that WOW I'm feeling again! I watched some other videos and it lasted, it was great, but well, the next day it was gone. But anyway, once again, it was all about "reinventing" the whole thing, finding the childlike ardor again. I'm on the right track.
But yeah, I want to meet others who have experienced this shit! PLZ!
This thread is very old and these members may not be active anymore, that's why there aren't replies from them :)
I wonder if it might be depression that makes you feel nothing towards msic because depression is supposed to make you feel emotionally dead or numb. It would be interesting to see if new music you find creates emotions in you again and if it's just the old music you feel nothing towards. Have you found any new music that you love and feel deeply about for example, or does nothig at all make you feel good.
I know it's an old topic but I figured there are people in similar situation now too since so many were then - but actually, there were not so many people and it took days for them to reply so I'm just being impatient xP
Like I explained, there have been moments of feeling music strongly, and it has always been about something new in the music. Some new element. I believe that in order to retain the ability to feel the music (including the old, familiar music) I need to reinvent my approach to music. Isn't that what the guys at the beginning of this thread wrote? So to your question, yes new music has made me feel, but it's just so random that by no means new things generally create feelings. I think I need to explore this, try to find what things make me feel and what not.
Richard1960
22-06-12, 11:58
Hi
When i first got my illness about 10 years ago i used to love music concerts ect ect and went off my music until my dperession was well under control and all of a sudden my feelings for my music collection came back,and now music is one thing i focus on almost everyday so it could just be where your mind is at the moment i know that was the case with me.
Thank goodness though it passed as i love music take care Richard.:)
Music is my passion, my haven, it is everything to me. I can't imagine how dreadful it would be to lose the emotional connection i have with it. Thankfully, through all my problems, my ability to respond to and appreciate music hasn't changed. The comfort and reassurance i get from just picking up the guitar!! Just like an old friend! I wonder if the loss of pleasure from music could be due to medication? Some meds have emotional flatness as a side effect, this would hopefully pass as the brain adapts to the meds. Just a thought.
I know it sounds awful. I cannot listen to any sort of music. if it sentimental it makes me cry if it is noisy music I could scream.
I have a rack full of CDs, and have given my player away.
Years ago I bought a organ and was learning to play with instructions from a book.
Never got into playing was a waste of money and now the organ has gone.
I do listen to Radio 4 and talk sport mainly because there's no music.
Radio 4 has desert island discs on Sundays, have given up on that as well.
You make think that i am a miserable person, but I am not that at all.
It's just the music thing.:lac:
Richard1960
Thanks, very encouraging. I'm sure I'll find my feelings again :)
MazF
Yeah - what I think is that I would take my feelings of music and other things over anything else. I wish I could feel the music - no matter how bad things would be I would always be able to sit down and listen to that wonderful song, and be sure that everything's gonna be alright. When people around me complain about their problems and at the same time tell how encouraging a film they saw was, I just want to say "cool story bro, try my situation".
Magic
I have no personal experience of that, but I have read about that. Some people seem to be in that position. I'm sure you can find more about that by googlin' a bit :) Ha, sure you ain't miserable. But I recommend you to do your research because for sure your life would be greater if you'd be able to enjoy music! That's what I want for me, because it's such a great power. Let's search for it :)
VCrane,
Yes I proberbly am a miserable person---- must try to do some work on that:shrug:xx
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