YOUR 2024 BRAIN BRAWN MINI RESOLUTION A MONTH OF MICRO RESOLUTIONS • WEEK 1

This Week's Micro Resolution: Music & Art Therapy

Good morning and welcome to August!
 
We are taking a slightly different approach to our mini resolutions this month with four different brain brawn micro resolutions for the month—a new one in each week—instead of one overarching resolution!

(Do you recall April's Nature micro resolution?) 

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​Our mini resolutions for the month of August will be:

Week 1: Music and Art Therapy (this week!)

Week 2: Social Engagement (week of 8/12)

Week 3: Brain Games (week of 8/19)

Week 4: Hearing Loss (week of 8/26)

A Music and Art Therapy Brain Brawn

 Music and art therapy are two non-pharmaceutical interventions with a long track record of positively influencing certain symptoms in neurodegenerative conditions.
 
Music and art therapy have been shown to improve behavioral symptoms, like agitation, and psychological symptoms, depression and anxiety, in addition to enhancing memory and encouraging socialization. These beneficial findings occur whether the patient is simply an observer OR holding a paint brush or musical instrument.
 
Music and art have been described as a scaffolding between the deteriorating areas of the brain and the preserved areas, which is quite remarkable and fascinating. Interestingly, a 2023 meta-analysis of studies involving music and neurodegeneration found that 93% of the 107 studies analyzed demonstrated at least one benefit of music on neurodegenerative conditions. While the exact molecular mechanism isn’t completely understood, a few things are established:
 
Music Therapy Mechanism of Action:

• Musical training can induce brain plasticity. In other words, in response to stimuli, adaptive structural and functional changes can be made to the brain. This can be as extensive as recovering from a stroke or simply learning something new. This connection between music and learning was tapped into by the Saturday Morning cartoon, Schoolhouse Rock.
• Listening to or playing music can stimulate the release of the neurotransmitter, dopamine, which helps regulate learning, memory processing and cognitive function.
• Music can stimulate autobiographical memory. Indeed, this connection is often resistant to decline.
• Music can even epigenetically influence genes! This is known as “sensogenomics,” meaning music can turn on certain genes. In this context, these genes may protect memory and cognition.

 
Art Therapy Brain Benefits:

• Enhanced memory recall (particularly through collage making)
• Reinforced sustained attention and intellectual engagement
• Encouraged bottom-up and top-down cognitive processing. These are two different theories about how the brain processes information delivered via the senses. Top-down processing is when the brain takes in the information as a whole and breaks it down to the smallest, minor aspects. Bottom-up processing refers to the idea that individual elements are taken in, one by one, and pieced together to create the entire structure as it is seen.

 
What does this mean for those of us wishing to ward off neurodegenerative conditions?
 
It means that enjoying the arts, either as a participant or an observer, may be beneficial for the structure and processing of the cognitive function of the brain. It also means we can potentially create a reservoir of memories accessible to us via the arts.
 
Let’s look at a few options and resolve to tap into just one of these ideas this month.

​ART THERAPY

Dip a toe:
Think you might like to make something for future use? Check out this long list of interesting ideas.

Feel like a kid again with an adult coloring book.

Learn something new while coloring with one of these anatomy coloring books.

Take the plunge:
Attend an adult education class in art history. Free options are available online, via local junior colleges and even some local libraries. Then, take what you learn to explore a museum.

Attend an art class—drawing, painting or crafting.

Contact a certified art therapist for more ideas.

MUSIC THERAPY

Dip a toe:
Musical games such as music trivia and bingo challenge our memories of lyrics.

Attend a sound bath session.

Explore the scales—xylophone not required.
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​Take the plunge:
If you always wanted to learn to play a musical instrument, what’s stopping you now? Years ago, this may have necessitated expensive private lessons but, today, with video and online courses, this becomes available to pretty much anyone!

Find a certified music therapist for more ideas.

​But how do we connect music and art to our memories?
 
Make a collage. It has likely been a few decades since you used old magazines to create a vision board or a story about your life. But pull out the glue and glitter, old magazines and photos. Theme each collage about either a particular person or persons, or a memorable time in your life. Alternatively, you can make a memory jar with the collage on the exterior, with trinkets and tokens inside that remind you of the person or time in your life. Better yet? Make these in conjunction with the relevant individuals and share the stories, laugh and cry together enjoying the time and, all the while, deepening your memory reservoir.
 
Create playlists about a particular person/s or a time in your life. Journal your relevant thoughts to the selected music or use this playlist while making your collage.
 
On a side note, if you are a caregiver to someone with a neurodegenerative condition, you may wish to explore Meet me at MOMA. Note this is a program local to NY, but MOMA has a written program so that other museums may follow suit. 

TRACK YOUR PROGRESS

THIS WEEK'S MICRO RESOLUTION: MUSIC & ART THERAPY!

Enjoy the arts by dipping a toe or taking the plunge into music and/or art therapy. Use the log below to track your weekly micro resolution as well as to continue to log your exercise, sleep, sugar, water and fruit and veggie goals!

Click to view and download the log.