Music & Having Fun

Making Music: Exercise for the Spirit by Mark Golin

Playing an instrument stimulates both the creative and logical parts of the brain and requires them to interact. Additionally, it exercises coordination between the eye and hand. The creative satisfaction that playing music provides can be enjoyed throughout life and will help you to retain mental lucidity in later years. It also gives you a reason to stick around and unnerve your grandchildren with all that lucidity.

Once you choose an instrument and begin to practice, clear your mind of the day's problems. Then when you pick up your instrument, concentrate on every note you play. Not only will you learn faster, but your daily workout will become something akin to meditation, providing you with a kind of musical stress control and a peaceful sense of purpose.

A word of warning. You'll occasionally reach points in your advancement where things seem to level off and you're just not progressing as quickly as you'd like. It's all right. Achievement plateaus are to be expected. Keep plugging away . With perserverance you will eventually regain your forward momentum.

Now I can't promise you that Carnegie Hall will be pestering you for a recital, but so what? You'll be having fun, you'll be exercising your mind and spirit and you'll be doing something most folks only dream about.