"The most robust finding, the one finding that has been the most widely and rigorously replicated, is that self-selected music is far more effective than music selected by someone else for nearly every application of music as medicine."
- Levitin
When I started comparing the public playlists on Apple Music and Spotify to playlists made by actual individuals for running, the difference felt immediate. Apple’s running playlists—like Pure Running or Runner’s High—all blur together into the same kind of techno-driven sound. It feels engineered for consistency, like the goal is to lock you into one steady rhythm. Spotify goes in almost the opposite direction, but ends up with a similar problem. Playlists like Hype Running Mix or Weightlifting Mix sound more like an iHeartRadio rotation—just cycling through the most popular, high-energy songs. In both cases, the intention is clear: optimize for energy and momentum. But what’s missing is any sense of actual personalization. It doesn’t feel like these playlists are made for someone—they feel like they’re made for everyone, which ends up meaning no one.
That contrast becomes really clear when you look at personal playlists. The biggest difference is that they don’t follow a strict BPM or genre formula. There’s way more variation—songs that speed up, slow down, shift emotionally. But that variation isn’t a flaw; it actually points to a different priority. The focus isn’t on maintaining a perfectly engineered pace—it’s on maintaining engagement. When I run with music that I’ve chosen myself, the experience changes completely. If I have an emotional connection to a song, I get pulled into it. My attention shifts away from the physical strain and toward the music itself. Instead of thinking about how tired I am or how much longer I have, I’m locked into the sound, the lyrics, the feeling behind it. In that sense, the most effective running playlist isn’t the one that controls your pace—it’s the one that captures your attention so fully that you stop noticing the effort altogether.
I believe this data segways naturally into a conversation of identity and music which could be a project of its own. But clearly, we can see how a personalized playlist, with songs selected in harmony with your identity will more impactfully trigger the neurochemical reactions discussed in the empirical analysis and further supported philosophically by Nanay in a sense of attention. This process comes together so that you can be the best version of yourself as you perform the bodily ritual of movement that then releases the reward mechanics of our brain—which points to the evolutionary and innate truth that we are designed to practice this aesthetic engagement.