Karen Agro

Transcript

I can't move I'm lying on a cold floor the sun shining on my face looking up at the ceiling in a rock climbing gym in San Francisco I've just free Fallen 15 ft Landing with a thud my arm angled unnaturally behind me my mind muddled from the impact I can feel the warmth of the morphine injection radiating up my neck and I can hear the paramedics calling in a suspected spinal fracture I'm terrified as the team moved me on to the stretcher they asked me what do you do for a living and I said I'm a musician the reality I wasn't a musician I was

a pharmacist and a consultant my dreams of being a musician had died in in my teens but in the pain and fear of that moment I intuitively knew music was going to save me and so I embraced my inner musician music is a reliable Pathway to Joy it brings us to those moments that make us feel most alive it brings us to Joy even when our situation is something else music can situate Us in the present while triggering memories that soothe us so that we can find the resilience to keep going Joy comes to us in moments like the moment my kids were born I

was so overwhelmed with love that it almost hurt and so I triy to recreate that feeling with them to connect in bond like scaling a climbing wall but of course that always has its consequences but life is finite and we want to create those memories brne Brown tells us that Joy comes to us in ordinary moments but we get too busy chasing down the extraordinary and music music connects us to those times in our life we are emotionally bonded like the birth of a child kiss Joy lingers in the same places that music touches our heart and the years in between seem to fall away

like personalized Sonic medicine music can give us what we need in the moment like our coffee to wake us up in the morning or a glass of wine to relax Us in the evening it reaches us Beyond conscious thought lighting up the same parts of our brain as cocaine chocolate and sex no wonder it brings us joy have you ever been driving in the car and a song you love comes on the radio and in an instant you're rolling down the window singing in full voice feeling joyful and free no pill works that quickly okay what about that Breakup Song you know the one you

listened on repeat to heal interestingly it only takes 13 minutes for music to release feelings of sadness and less than 10 minutes for music to bring on feelings of Happiness no wonder we listen on repeat music allows us to savor our emotions triggering cathartic releases this is where we find joy on that cold floor in that Climbing gym I intuitively Knew music was my connection to Joy I just didn't know why or how with elbow reconstructive surgery behind me and a and my spinal fracture ruled out my arm was encased in a borg like exoskeleton for six long months and I had to relearn how

to use my body so what did I do I tried to play the guitar because it brought me joy and I healed my connection with music experts tell us that Joy collected over time fuels resilience giving us reservoirs of emotional strength to draw on when hard things do happen my own experience proved this I was lying on that cold floor but remembering the love of music that soothed me giving me the resilience to keep going music is Sonic medicine so choose a song and let it take you to Joy

Transcript generated from the recording and lightly cleaned. Some names and wording may differ from the spoken speech.

Transcript

I'm sitting in a cold cheap Hospital chair where I slept last night all crumpled and folded up like a pretzel beside my comatose father I use foam swabs to moisten his very dry mouth and I can hear the patient behind the curtain next to us the smell of antiseptic permeating the room but none of this matters these are his last moments of life and there is nothing more I can do so I play my classical guitar at his bedside wanting to create a connection with him that we may not have had in life and I'm playing this piece that he loved and my father came

back for just a moment and said the name of the piece sounds of bells I was dumbfounded life is a series of moments like a rope built strand by strand we tie knots to Mark those memories that we want or need to revisit one day like a bookmark so we can find them in that moment music was a not for both of us it bridged Two Worlds between life and death and father and daughter music brought him back to me because that's what music does music is an emotional language that transports us to those moments of meaning those knots to uncover the emotional and physical

experiences of the past so we can take the learning and bring it into our present day and even into our future now music can also bring us to moments we didn't know we needed to remember my parents wanted me to love classical music so as any good teenager does I made sure they knew I hated it long before the internet and Spotify a 45 vinyl little disc with a big hole in the center arrived from my uncle in England I was intrigued but by this point I was done playing music I would never learn to like but there I was secretly in my room listening

to those opening notes of cavatina I discovered I could love classical music it was this piece that helped me see myself differently that I could be both a musician and a scientist I didn't have to choose this was another knot in my rope and music can shortcut us to spots in our life that we didn't even know we needed to remember fast forward 20 years and I'm standing in my empty family home realizing that my 18 Summers were done my kids were off to live their lives and I didn't realize that my role in their lives had a 18-year shelf life and there comes a

point when it all stops and there I was in my empty home listening to this song Joni Mitchell's both sides now reminded me that I had less time ahead of me than behind me that the finiteness of Life meant that I had to be in the present moment choose who I was and live life intentionally music brings with it a set of visceral emotions that reveals truths about ourselves that we sometimes only see in hindsight and music can shortcut us to the past so we can take away new learnings for our life now it's a few years later and I'm standing in my empty childhood

home of 55 years we packed up only What mattered the rest we let go of in a recycling truck that was pulling away and it was this piece color sepia that was running through my mind I'm reminded of the child who rebelled against music yeah they also see the adult who's considering becoming a performer this is my Crossroads do I choose to put myself out there or do I let it all go and tell regretful stories of what could have been this piece shortcuted me to the past and propelled me to the Future and in a split second I saw who I could be in

either scenario music was my guide and so I chose performer that day in hospital music anchored us to a knot in my father's rope we lived a lifetime in that moment re-experiencing our bond as father and daughter music right now is marking this time in all of our Lives anchoring us to the emotions we're currently experiencing because that's what music does it transports us to those moments of meaning so that we can take the learning from the past into our present and even into the future and in those moments music is helping us learn something something our future self will thank us for

Transcript generated from the recording and lightly cleaned. Some names and wording may differ from the spoken speech.