MINDY PETERSON, NCTM

 

September 17, 2019

We Americans love productivity: We love feeling productive, we’re proud of increasing our productivity, and we’re fond of anything that will get us into a flow state, also known as being “in the zone” – that mental state of being fully immersed in an activity with energized focus. Studies and brainscans have shown that certain music can bring us to a focused flow state and then keep us there, increasing concentration up to 400%.

Guest

Our guest today is cognitive neuroscientist Julia Mossbridge, who joins us from northern California. In addition to being the founder and research director of Mossbridge Institute, LLC, Dr. Mossbridge is a Visiting Scholar in the Psychology Department at Northwestern University in Evanston IL, a Fellow at the Institute of Noetic Sciences, the Science Director at Focus@Will Labs, and an Associated Professor in Integral and Transpersonal Psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies.  Dr. Mossbridge’s work has been covered in ABC News 20/20, Wall Street Journal Ideas Market, Fox News and other mainstream media outlets.  She has authored several books and is a peer reviewer for publications including Brain Research, Psychological Bulletin, and Journal of the Acoustical Society of America.  She received funding from the National Institutes of Health in her role as post-doctoral member of the Psychology Department at Northwestern University. Julia has a Ph.D. in Communication Sciences and Disorders from Northwestern University, a Masters in Neuroscience from the University of California at San Francisco, and a Bachelors in neuroscience from Oberlin College.

Notes

• Science based focus music is used by employees at Google, Apple, Tesla, and Microsoft.
• Focus@Will produces music scientifically designed to keep your mind from avoiding two undesirable states: distraction and habituation. Habituation is the opposite of distraction – your mind gets bored with your surroundings (environmental habituation) as well as whatever you’re working on (goal habituation). Because your mind seeks novelty, habituation leads to checking your social media, opening your email, or calling a friend rather than making continuous progress. Keeping your mind from being distracted away from your work while simultaneously keeping you from habituating to your work is the key to Focus@Will’s audio technology.
• It’s well known that Albert Einstein used music and violin playing to focus and get into a flow state.

 Improv

Go to Focus@Will’s website and click on the quadrant that best describes you (Creative Thinker, Logical Thinker, Student, or Entrepeneur).  Listen to the different options of scientifically optimized focus music that can help increase your accuracy and efficiency up to 4x. (My favorite is Alpha Chill, although my quiz results recommend Electro Bach.  I’ll have to try them both!)

Connect

• LinkedIn
• Mossbridge Institute website and newsletter
• Focus@Will website

Coda

Focus@Will shares a 30-second clip of two of their most popular focus music channels: Einstein’s Genius, and (fading into) Alpha Chill.

Focus@Will is offering a special discount to Enhance Life with Music listeners: Use Code “Enhance15” for 15% off the current price (on release date: $69.95 less 15% = $59.46 for 1-week free trial + 1-year subcription). In order to use the code, signup must be done from desktop/laptop, and not mobile. After signing up with the discount, the app may be downloaded and used via mobile.

Additional Resources

• Focus@Will 15% discount for podcast listeners! See Coda, above, for details.
• Articles:
  • The music you should listen to during revision to improve concentration levels by as much as 400 per cent
  • The Benefits of Streaming Music through Your Office
  • The Science That Powers Focus The Mind
  • Einstein vs. The Clash: How I used music to hack my brain; I get my brainwaves scanned to see whether a concentration app that uses music can help achieve that all-important flow. By Richard Trenholm

 Listener Improv

Russ in Maple Grove, MN, left a comment on our website: “A way that we use music in our everyday life as a family is to sing a “brush your teeth” song while brushing our son’s teeth. He never fights us during it, and he knows just how long to brush his teeth.” OK, I’m wishing I thought of this when MY kids were young, because I have vivid memories of my son clamping his teeth down on his toothbrush every time we tried brushing his teeth! Make up a song (or find one on YouTube), and you’re set — the kid finds it entertaining and fun, and knows exactly how long to expect the process to last. 

Let me know how YOU enhance life with music by leaving a comment below; by commenting on social media (I’m on Instragram, FB, and LinkedIn); or by email (mindy@mpetersonmusic.com). I look forward to hearing your ideas and including one in next week’s episode.