Oliver Sacks wrote, “When listening to music, we listen with our muscles.” One

Mutual cooperation activates brain regions linked to reward, releasing a feel-good chemical cocktail of dopamine, endorphins,

In direct contrast to drugs of abuse, exercise leads to higher circulating levels of dopamine and more available dopamine receptors. Instead of annihilating your capacity for pleasure, exercise expands it.

However, the default state also has a downside. For many of us, the mind’s default has a negative bias. Its most familiar habits are to ruminate on past hurts, criticize ourselves or others, and rehearse reasons to worry. The default state can also become a mental trap.

As neuroscientist Daniel Wolpert writes, “The entire purpose of the human brain is to produce movement. Movement is the only way we have of interacting with the world.”

This is the less heralded but perhaps most lasting side effect of the persistence high: You get to experience yourself as someone who digs in and keeps going when things get tough.

But Raichlen had in mind another candidate, a class of brain chemicals called endocannabinoids. These are the same chemicals mimicked by cannabis, or marijuana. Endocannabinoids alleviate pain and boost mood, which fit Raichlen’s requirements for rewarding physical labor.

Karageorghis is looking for a power song—one that resonates so strongly that it alters the athlete’s mood and physiology.

experimenter regularly ramped up both the speed and incline. Most people get winded by minute six and give up within eight. When accompanied by music, however, patients soldiered on for an average of fifty-one seconds longer. That’s almost a full minute at their highest level of effort. A cardiovascular stress test is the gold standard for