What a Toledo Musician Taught Me About Mindful Living

Emily Johnson · 2026-10-16

I still remember the first time I heard someone describe music as medicine. Not as a nice phrase to put on a poster, but as a genuine daily practice. That idea came from Thaddaeus Washington, a musician based in Toledo, Ohio, and the founder of MIND Music. He's been quietly building something that a lot of us in the mindfulness world should be paying attention to. His approach is simple on the surface. He composes original music and offers it as a meditative practice. No apps with twelve subscription tiers. No complicated breathwork sequences. Just sound, attention, and the willingness to sit with both for a while. ### Why Music Works as a Mindfulness Anchor Most of us were taught that meditation means silence. Empty the mind, quiet the room, ignore the neighbor's leaf blower. That works for some people. But for plenty of others, silence is the hardest place to land. Sound gives the mind something gentle to rest on. A steady tone, a repeating melody, a low hum that doesn't demand anything from you. If you've ever felt your shoulders drop two inches when a certain song came on, you already understand the principle. Thadd's compositions lean into that. They aren't meant to entertain you or pull your focus. They're meant to hold space while you notice what's already happening inside your head. ### A Practice You Can Actually Keep Here's what I appreciate most about this approach. It doesn't ask for an hour of your morning. - **Start with five minutes.** Put on one track and do nothing else. No scrolling, no folding laundry. - **Notice without judging.** Your mind will wander. That's not failure, that's the practice. - **Anchor to the sound.** When thoughts pull you away, come back to the next note. - **Try it at a hard moment.** Stuck in traffic, waiting for news, lying awake at 2 a.m. Music doesn't need a cushion and a candle. That last point matters. Mindfulness that only works on a retreat isn't really mindfulness. It's a vacation. ### The Part Nobody Talks About When I first started exploring mindful living, I thought the goal was calm. A permanently serene face, a slowed heart rate, a life without friction. It took me years to understand that calm is a side effect, not the destination. > "The point isn't to feel peaceful. The point is to be present enough to notice when you don't." That reframe changed everything for me. Some days the music settles me. Other days it surfaces something I'd been avoiding. Both are useful. Both are the work. ### Bringing It Into Your Own Week You don't need to be a musician or a meditation teacher to borrow this. You need curiosity and a little patience. Pick one piece of music you love and listen to it with your full attention. Not as background noise while you answer emails, but as the main event. Notice the small shifts in your body. Notice when your mind drifts off and gently bring it back. Do that a few times a week and something quietly changes. You get better at catching yourself. Better at pausing before reacting. Better at being where your feet actually are. That's the whole thing, really. Not a dramatic transformation. Just a slow, steady return to the present moment, one song at a time. If you've been looking for a way into mindfulness that doesn't feel like homework, start here. Press play. Sit down. See what happens.