---
title: Does Music Help You Focus?
description: We know that multitasking isn't real. Our brains only work on one thing at a time. When we switch activities we lose focus. But what about listening to music?
image: https://blog.awesomeinstitute.com/hubfs/Does_Music_Help_You_Focus.jpeg
---

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# Blog

# Does Music Help You Focus?

Posted by [Scott Offerdahl](https://blog.awesomeinstitute.com/author/scott-offerdahl) on June 5, 2015

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![Does_Music_Help_You_Focus](https://blog.awesomeinstitute.com/hs-fs/hubfs/Does_Music_Help_You_Focus.jpeg?width=300&name=Does_Music_Help_You_Focus.jpeg)One morning, I had to walk my dogs alone, since my wonderful wife was out of town.  At first, I popped my headphones in and started listening to Comedy Central.  But for some reason after I walked out of my home's Wi-Fi range, the signal crapped out, and so I was met with silence.  Rather than drag my phone out of my pocket, I just walked with the silence, and after a couple of minutes of consciously enjoying the sun and view of the lakes and my cute dogs, my brain popped out the answer to a complicated problem I'd been thinking about for a couple of days. Eureka!

This reminded me of what we've been talking about in our [Getting Focused for Entrepreneurs class](https://awesome-institute.squarespace.com/getting-focused). Multitasking is not real, our brains only work on one thing at a time, and when we switch activities we lose time and focus. One of the points we discussed was that even listening to music with words (much less a comedy routine) causes part of your brain to focus on the words rather than whatever else is at hand.

However, I often prefer to do focus work while listening to music. I am reminded that I should put Beethoven instead of Def Leppard on my focus-work playlists, or just use one of the many [focus playlists on Spotify](https://play.spotify.com/genre/focus).

-Scott

P.S. We are running the Getting Focused for Entrepreneurs class again starting July 9.  [Click here for more info about the class or to sign up.](https://awesome-institute.squarespace.com/getting-focused)

 Topics: [Focus](https://blog.awesomeinstitute.com/topic/focus)

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