Welcome to Musical Monday, where I feature an original song just for the heck of it. Want to hear more? Check out my previous musical posts, Time – And Brain Chemistry – Heal All Wounds, Biochemically, All Is Fair, and Taking Einstein’s Advice, and previous Musical Mondays Stay Near Me and As Hard As It Is.
I’ve had a song banging around in my head for awhile, and finally this weekend I took the time to get a very rough draft out. When it comes to love, everything is a gamble. So, enjoy!
Welcome to Musical Monday, where I feature an original song just for the heck of it. Want to hear more? Check out my previous musical posts: Time – and brain chemistry – heal all wounds, Biochemically, All Is Fair, Taking Einstein’s Advice and the first Musical Monday: Stay Near Me.
So, I had a little free time this holiday weekend and re-recorded another old song of mine. This one goes way, way back to when I was in high school—and of course, it’s about a boy, as many of my songs are, and certainly many were at that age. But, it was a particularly insightful one for little 14 year old me, about how sometimes letting go is harder than it should be. Enjoy!
I’ve always loved music. It was my first passion—long before I was traveling the world diving for lionfish or writing up science news for Scientific American, I was writing songs. Notes and chords have always been my closest friends, the ones I turn to when I need to work something out. For some time now, I’ve been blending my original songs with science to produce the most personal posts I’ve ever written, including Time – and brain chemistry – heal all wounds, Biochemically, All Is Fair and Taking Einstein’s Advice.
Well, now I want to be more explicit in my sharing. I don’t have fancy blog posts to go with every song I’ve ever written; I’ve been writing songs since I was a kid. So, I’ve decided to start a new series: Musical Mondays. Surely I won’t manage to post one every Monday, but on some Mondays, I’ll post songs of mine to share with all of you. I’ll try and write a little backstory on the songs, just to give some perspective.
This is a song I wrote over a decade ago (gosh, has it really been that long?!), and have always played for myself when I need comfort. It’s probably the most honest and soul-searching I’ve ever been in a song, which is why I’ve kept it to myself for so many years. But talking to awesome people like David Kroll—hearing, firsthand, how much music can make an impact, even on us science types (neurologically!)—has got me thinking a lot about songwriting and what it means to me, and I think it’s time I shared more, especially the songs I guard most vehemently. So, enjoy.
Einstein once said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results. Yet as scientists, we are taught to fundamentally question this assumption. We replicate and repeat with the express purpose of determining if a result is reproducible or merely the product of random chance. As social and emotional creatures, we do the same thing. We like to believe in second chances. We tell ourselves that stochastic circumstances are to blame when things don’t go the way we imagined, so when presented with the opportunity to try again, we often do. Or, at least, I do. But no matter how logical an argument I can make for do-overs, Einstein was right.
In retrospect, I feel like a fool. As I sit at the edge of my bed fumbling with my guitar, I can’t help but blame myself. Why did I choose time and again to trust a person whose actions have always betrayed it? Blinded by love, I had a slew of reasons, a variety of parameters I could change that I thought might affect the outcome. But now, with 20-20 hindsight, I cannot find any. I should have known better, I chide myself. I failed the scientist in me.
Yet still at the slightest mention of him, I flush with anger, jealousy and regret, and heart pounding, I fantasize about retaliation and justice. Evolutionary psychologists would tell me that the physiological experience of betrayal stems from the fact that humans, at our core, are a social species. Personal bonds were vital to our ancestors, and thus natural selection has reinforced emotional mechanisms that evaluate the connections we form with others. In a dangerous world, our ancestors had to know whom they could trust with their lives. Anyone who threatened the relationships we have with one another didn’t just wound pride or break hearts, they threatened our predacessors very survival. The reaction is strong and visceral: stress hormones spike, leading to twisting pain in our gut and heightened sensitivity. But at the same time, areas of our brain involved in deception detection activate. While we feel the rush of cortisol and adrenaline clouding our thinking, brain regions like the anterior insula process our physical and emotional state to make judgements of trustworthiness to inform future interactions.
My desire for retribution is primal, too. When we feel betrayed, our brains light up in areas associated with agression and testosterone levels rise. Scientists have found that other primates get upset when they feel that have been treated unjustly, and that people, when trust is broken, often will choose to punish the transgressor even if that punishment comes at a high cost to themselves. We want to lash out, to make things equal by returning the wrongs inflicted upon us. But instead of acting on instinct, I start to play. As calming notes pour from my fingertips, I feel the burning pain in my chest subside.
If only my previous judgements had been more permanent. A friend of mine likes to say “monkeys learn,” but clearly, I didn’t the first time. Though the rest of our evolutionary lineage seems to be quick to categorize friends from foes, I could not.
What’s done is done, though, and I am left to collect the pieces of my heart that they shattered so effortlessly. While I might not have learned my lesson as quickly as I should have, I have learned it now. I know that this time is different. There will be no more replicates, no more re-runs with the hope of a different result. There are no variables I can change to get what I want. The data are clear, and it’s time to stop trying to bias them toward the end I prefer. All that is left is to document what happened, so like a good scientist, I write and record my final results.
Like this post? Check out Time—And Brain Chemistry—Heal All Wounds and Biochemically, All Is Fair
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
I stare hard into his hazel eyes. Those damned eyes. I blink, and I’m bombarded with flashes of those eyes through lenses of love, trust, fear and anger. My blood is pumping with passion, sped on by norepinephrine and vasopressin. The neurons in a round structure at the base of my forebrain are firing like crazy, a cacophony of neural activity. I glance down at his lips. Half of me wants to kiss him – half of me wants to break his jaw.
Part of the problem is that for intense emotions, my body reacts in a similar way. Heart rate and blood pressure skyrocket, driven by stress hormones. My muscles tense. My palms sweat. My cheeks flush. Objectively, it might be hard to tell what I am feeling. Subjectively, it’s hard, too.
Love him or hate him, two regions of my brain – the putamen and the medial insula – activate when I look at his face. Some have suggested that since the putamen regulates motor functions and contains neurons that activate when we plan actions, perhaps it is helping me decide between that punch and that kiss, but there seems to be more going on. The putamen is highly regulated by dopamine, one of the neurotransmitters linked to intense romantic feelings and the messenger of our neurological reward system. I smirk at the idea that, perhaps, I just find the thought of cold-cocking him deeply rewarding.
It is the activation of the insula, though, that is most intriguing. The insula is a bit of a neurological slut, and is intimately involved in our experience of number of basic emotions, including anger, fear, disgust, happiness and sadness. Scientists believe the insula acts as a translater, connecting sensations in our bodies to emotions in our brains. The insula turns a bad taste into disgust, or a gentle touch into arousal. But what makes the insula so interesting is that many believe these connections go both ways. Not only are my feelings affecting my body, the very act of processing my body’s reaction to the situation – my fast pulse, shallow breaths, sweaty palms – is changing how I feel.
As my sensations surge, parts of my cortex responsible for judgement and reason shut down – love and hate really are blind in that way. Studies have suggested love is more blind, though, as larger areas of the cerebral cortex deactivate. I know my thoughts aren’t logical anymore. They’re at the mercy of neurotransmitter tides, waxing and waning. Confusion is an understatement.
I blink hard and try to focus.
Even my hormones are flirting with both sides of the emotional spectrum. The flushed skin, pounding heart and rapid breathing are the fault of norepinephrine and adrenaline kicking on my fight or flight instinct. Passion is passion, and the same hormonal system is triggered by fear, anger, lust and desire. Whatever the fueling emotion, my body is primed, ready to spring into action.
My other hormones are no help, either. Oxytocin, the ‘love hormone’, long touted as the chemical responsible for affection, also has a dark side. While it strengthens feelings of love and trust, it also intensifies envy and suspicion, and may even lead to strong feelings of hatred like racism and xenophobia.
Similarly, the anger-pumping hormone testosterone has a romantic side. Testosterone levels strongly control feelings of lust and desire, but more importantly, women falling in love have higher circulating testosterone. Thus even a hormone so intertwined with agression and hate is instrumental in my experience of romance and pleasure. I briefly wonder if the increased testosterone level in my body is having side effects as I clench my fist.
Sure, love and hate have their differences, too. The giddy, happy romantic feelings come from different parts of the brain than deep passion. But as the intensity of the emotion rises, the fine line between love and hate blurs. It’s no wonder philosophers have been lumping them together for centuries, two sides of the same coin. As glorified as our idea of love might be, passionate love has the same biomarkers as addiction and obsessive compulsive disorder – and like with addiction and obsession, when the stakes are high, the smallest thing can push a person over the edge.
He shouldn’t have pushed me.
My amygdala turns on. Today, the dark side wins. I close my eyes as aggression ripples through my body. I didn’t want a fight, but my body disagreed. Rage fueled by love overwhelms me. It takes everything in my power not to fly at him. Feeling my self-control waning, I clench my teeth. Then, slowly, I open my eyes to see his have hardened, too. Alright, then. Here we go.
Like this post? Check out Time – And Brain Chemistry – Heal All Wounds
I know I’m not physically hurt. Though it feels like I’ve been kicked in the stomach with steel-toed boots, my abdomen isn’t bruised. Spiking cortisol levels are causing my muscles to tense and diverting blood away from my gut, leading to this twisting, gnawing agony that I cannot stop thinking about. I can’t stop crying. I can’t move. I just stare at the ceiling, wondering when, if ever, this pain is going to go away.
It doesn’t matter that my injuries are emotional. The term heartache isn’t a metaphor: emotional wounds literally hurt. The exact same parts of the brain that light up when we’re in physical pain go haywire when we experience rejection. As far as our neurons are concerned, emotional distress is physical trauma.
Evolutionary biologists would say that it’s not surprising that our emotions have hijacked the pain system. As social creatures, mammals are dependent from birth upon others. We must forge and maintain relationships to survive and pass on our genes. Pain is a strong motivator; it is the primary way for our bodies tell us that something is wrong and needs to be fixed. Our intense aversion to pain causes us to instantly change behavior to ensure we don’t hurt anymore. Since the need to maintain social bonds is crucial to mammalian survival, experiencing pain when they are threatened is an adaptive way to prevent the potential danger of being alone.
Of course, being able to evolutionarily rationalize this feeling doesn’t make it go away.
I lie flattened, like the weight of his words has literally crushed me. I need to do something, anything to lessen this ache. The thought crosses my mind to self medicate, but I quickly decide against that. Mild analgesics like ibuprofen would be useless, as they act peripherally, targeting the pain nerves which send signals to the brain. In this case, it is my brain that is causing the pain. I would have to take something different, like an opioid, which depresses the central nervous system and thus inhibits the brain’s ability to feel. Tempting as that might be, painkillers are an easy – and dangerous – way out. No, I need to deal with this some other way.
Slowly, I sit up and grab the guitar at the foot of my bed.
Where music comes from, or even why we like and create music, is still a mystery. What we do know is that it has a powerful effect on our brains. Music evokes strong emotions and changes how we perceive the world around us. Simply listening to music causes the release of dopamine, a neurotransmitter linked to the brain’s reward system and feelings of happiness. But even more impressive is its effect on pain. Multiple studies have shown that listening to music alters our perception of painful stimuli and strengthens feelings of control. People are able to tolerate pain for longer periods of time when listening to music, and will even rate the severity of the sensation as lower, suggesting that something so simple as a melody has a direct effect on our neural pathways.
So, too, does self expression. Expressive writing about traumatic, stressful or emotional events is more than just a way to let out emotion – college students told to write about their most upsetting moments, for example, were found to be in remarkably better health four months later than their counterparts who wrote on frivolous topics. These positive results of self-expression are amplified when the product is shared with others. While negative emotions may have commandeered our pain response, art has tapped into the neurochemical pathways of happiness and healing.
So, I begin to write. At first, it is just a jumble of chords and words, haphazardly strung together. But, slowly, I edit and rewrite, weaving my emotions into lyrics. I play it over and over, honing the phrasing, perfecting the sound. Eventually, it begins to resemble a song:
The rush of dopamine loosens the knot in my stomach ever so slightly. For now, the agony is dulled. Still, I can’t help but think that I’m never going to really feel better – that the memory of this moment will be seared into my brain, and a mental scar will always be there, torturing me with this intense feeling of loss.
Scientifically, I know I’m wrong. As I close my eyes, I am comforted by the thought that the human brain, though capable of processing and storing ridiculous amounts of information, is flawed. The permanence of memory is an illusion. My memory of this moment will weaken over time. It will be altered by future experiences, until what I envision when I try to recall it will be only a faint reflection of what I actually feel. Eventually, this pain won’t overwhelm me, and I will finally be able to let go.
