Tips from a music therapist on matching your mood to find true calm
When we feel anxious, the instinct may be to reach for something cheerful. Put on an upbeat song, turn up the volume, and dance it off. It is well-intentioned advice, and most of us have tried it. But when exploring how we use music therapy for anxiety, we find that this advice rests on a hidden assumption: that anxiety is a problem to be eliminated, fixed, or reduced as quickly as possible.
In reality, that is not usually how anxiety works. More often, what we need are ways to cope with it. Sometimes that means sitting with it. Sometimes it means accepting that it is here for now. However, forcing cheerfulness onto genuine distress can backfire. That leaves us feeling more alone in the very emotion we were trying to escape.
How music therapy for anxiety meets us where we are
Here is the reframe. We do not always want music to override what we are feeling. Often we want it to do something closer to giving us a hug. In fact, we want it to validate our experience and resonate with where we actually are.
I can think of times when I felt lonely or sad, and sitting with a Billie Holiday recording was deeply comforting. Not because it chased the sadness away, but because it felt like it was on the same wavelength. The music met me where I was instead of arguing with me.
It is worth saying that the music which meets us where we are is deeply personal. Your own history shapes the songs that resonate with you. Specifically, the people you grew up around, your community, and the soundtracks of important life moments define this choice. Therefore, there is no universal “music for anxiety” or universal “comfort music.” What feels like a warm hug to one person can feel cold or unfamiliar to another. This is part of why pre-made playlists labelled “calm” or “feel better” often miss the mark. Ultimately, the music that will actually meet you where you are tends to come from your own musical world.
In music therapy, the idea of starting where the person is has a name. It is often called the iso principle, a concept introduced by psychiatrist Ira Altshuler in the mid-twentieth century. The principle is simple: you match music to a person’s current emotional state first, and only then begin to guide it somewhere new. You start where the person is, not where you wish they were.
All emotions are valid, and all of them have something to teach us
It is worth saying clearly: every emotion is valid, and every emotion carries information. Anxiety, sadness, anger, all of them are telling us something. Validation comes first.
And yet there are times when an emotion stops serving us or our goals. We can feel flooded by overwhelm, gripped by rage, or stuck in a discomfort that is running the show rather than informing it. In those moments, it helps to have concrete tools. Instead of suppressing what we feel, we can use these tools to move with the emotion toward a steadier place.
A practical tool: Emotional Regulation Playlists
One of my favourite tools to build with clients is what I call an emotional regulation playlist. It works in three moves:
- Start at A: Pick a song that resonates with the uncomfortable emotion you are feeling. You do not need to name the feeling. In fact, finding a piece of music that matches it can be more useful than putting a label on it.
- End at B: Pick a song that matches the more comfortable state you would like to move toward.
- Fill in the middle: Add as many songs as you like that gradually carry you from A to B, one small step at a time.
The gradual part matters. Jumping straight from overwhelm to a calm relaxation track rarely lands. But a sequence that honours where you are and then gently shifts can help your nervous system come along for the ride. And because these songs come from your own musical world, the playlist meets you in a way no off-the-shelf one really can.
Example: Inside an Emotional Regulation Playlist
Here’s an emotional regulation playlist I use often:
#1. The Bach piece at the beginning is frenetic and fast—it fits with my experience of anxiety.
#2. Let It Be has a slower tempo but there is still movement and energy to it. The lyrics “Let it be” remind me to just let my feelings be and say hello to them.
#3. Little Blue is one of my favourite Jacob Collier pieces, and I associate it with feelings of calm.
Coming back to music therapy
This is a small, do-it-yourself example of something clinical music therapy for anxiety does at a deeper level: working with emotion rather than against it, and doing so with careful attention to the musical world each person brings into the room.
A quick definition helps, since people often misunderstand this field. In essence, music therapy is a discipline in which Certified Music Therapists (MTAs) use music purposefully within therapeutic relationships to support development, health, and well-being. Music therapists use music safely and ethically to address human needs within cognitive, communicative, emotional, musical, physical, social, and spiritual domains (Canadian Association of Music Therapists, September 2020).
In practice, that can look like many things beyond curated listening: songwriting, clinical improvisation, lyric exploration, re-creating songs that hold personal meaning, and music-assisted relaxation, all within a supportive therapeutic relationship. A meaningful part of the work, on the therapist’s side, is staying curious about our own musical assumptions. As such, we can really listen for and meet the music our clients carry with them, rather than nudging them toward our own preferences.
If any of this resonates, I would warmly invite you to explore further, whether that means building your own regulation playlist this week or reaching out to learn what professional music therapy for anxiety might offer you.
Certified Counsellor (CCC) & Certified Music Therapist (MTA)
Based in Montreal, Andy offers bilingual counselling and music therapy in English and French. A working jazz musician as well as a clinician, he draws on music’s capacity to validate, connect, and gently guide emotion in his therapeutic work.