The Other Wes Moore: Assignment #3

 The Impact of Music:

By: Destiny Portillo

When it comes to music, plenty of individuals can tie it to the sense of comfort. Music has been known to be a therapeutic form for individuals to increase relaxation and the processing of one’s emotions and thoughts.  In the novel “The Other Wes Moore”, the genre of hip hop music played an important role in giving Wes an identity.  It seemed to give him a form of clear mindedness from the chaos around him from selling drugs, to being told not being in class results in better outcomes for his teacher and fellow peers.  As well as allowing him to avoid facing the inevitable for a split second when it comes to his mother’s anger.  Although Wes has so much going on around him, he still finds a sense of relief from listening or rapping to hip hop.

Wes allows individuals to view the idea in which the sound of any music may perform a meaningful impact on one’s life.  A prime example would be myself since I’ve noticed first hand the positive transition in my life since I have taken a portion of my day to tune into my music.  I tend to hold a lot of my emotions in since I have a hard time expressing myself to friends and family.  Which allows the stress I experience from handling both school and work to pile on top of the weight already placed on my shoulders.  Feeling like I had the weight of the world on my shoulders, I searched for several outlets.  I first began by journaling, but found it very hard to maintain this cycle and simply kept forgetting to write down my thoughts and emotions.  

Having failed in the attempt of journaling, I dove right into meditating next and for a while it worked.  I found it lovely to be able to sit and think in silence and feel some peace at last, but once again as I began to work more oftenly since receiving a new promotion I felt I lost the time.  That’s when I began to feel like what was supposed to be a wonderful thing, getting a promotion I felt my world crashing down when I began to just juggle school and work non-stop.  There was no space left for me to feel, think, and or process . I simply felt as if I was a robot.  As hard as it seemed for me to gain a reduction of stress I began to play music at every chance I got.  A playlist of all my favorite genres, pop, hip hop, classical, techno were in constant rotation while I was at the gym, in my car as I drove to school / work, or just playing in the background as I cleaned or did any homework!  I can happily say I have found an outlet that has worked for me to release tension, stress, pain, and elevate my happiness.  Music has and will always play a major role in the way I tackle my day from morning to night without feeling as if my world is crumbling or too overwhelmed!