For the longest time, music has been one thing I’ve felt like I’ve actually understood. Life is crazy and ever-changing, but once a song or an album is published, it’s consistent. You can listen to the same song a million times and it will always be the same. Some people will claim that’s why they don’t like music, but to me, it gives me the same sense of familiarity and comfort that sleeping in your bed after a period of being away does. Whether you’ve slept at someone’s house or spent a summer away from home, sleeping in your bed for that first night brings you back to what you’ve always known and how you’ve felt in the past--music does the same thing for me.

Recently, I saw the band I was obsessed with in middle school/early high school for the first time in a couple years. I didn’t buy tickets because they were playing, but because my current favorite band was playing with them. I really had no idea what to expect in seeing them again because they were something I associated with an old version of myself. Who I am now, weeks from graduating high school, is very different than who I was my freshman year. I’m proud of who I have become and at that moment, I felt a little weird about seeing people so prominent to my old self’s life. As soon as they came on stage, though, it felt so familiar. The songs I spent many nights listening to while I fought with a friend or couldn’t sleep were still the exact same and I still remembered them all. I found myself singing along just as I would have a couple years ago. I don’t know why I expected anything to be different, but I guess because I am different, it would make sense for it to be different--but it wasn’t.

That’s the amazing thing about music in my opinion. It doesn’t change even as everything around it, including the people who made it, does. Next time you’re upset or just feeling a little stuck, I challenge you to find that old album or even just one song you used to be obsessed with and listen to it straight through. Sing your heart out to it, dance around the house or just curl up in bed and stare at the ceiling while you listen. However you want to go about it, just do it. Allow it to take you back to a time when things in life were different, even if that’s not a time you really like to remember. You may not always realize it, but music serves a purpose. Take some time to yourself and figure out what purpose that album played in your life. Maybe you love that it doesn’t change or maybe you just love the way the drums make your heart pound and the lyrics make you smile. Music is a personal thing and you should find why you love it. Everyone can connect to music in some way or another so find the music that makes sense to you. It may not be the same music as me, or the people you spend your time with and that’s okay.