I wish we could do the opposite because every time I listen to the cool music I discovered in high school I'm unfortunately teleported back to all the emotional distraught of those years.
I've found that the associations I have with a song do get weaker the more I listen to it in another context, so it may be possible to disassociate those memories by forcing yourself to listen to those songs enough times.
But I've only noticed this with songs that conjure relatively benign associations. Stuff from times and places I really don't want to evoke I also avoid.
> Stuff from times and places I really don't want to evoke I also avoid.
There are songs I can't listen to like before anymore after some conversations (eg lightning crashes by live) or some time (Champagne supernova by oasis).
But likewise, there are places I don't have the energy to hang around anymore.
This sucks. I live with music but when I feel really bad, I no longer listen to music, to avoid tainting it. Now, days when I feel bad are quiet.
Though I mostly enjoy travelling back in time through music, including to high school. Fortunately these years were not traumatising for me. Specific songs are particularly strong for that.
Some songs are strongly associated with specific emotions that were not very enjoyable at the time, but are strangely comforting...ish today. I hope someone gets this and formulates it better / differently. This is probably a kind of nostalgia, but not really in the sense that it was better back in the day.
The first time I ever heard the Numa Numa song was when I was 10 and had the flu. I was puking in the hallway and had intense nausea for hours. My classmates kept playing the song because it was the new viral thing.
It took me over 10 years before I could listen to the song without feeling sick. It's fine now though.
Maybe there are ways to build up tolerance to the music by combining it with activities that do not allow the mood to catch on because they are too incompatible? Like running or working out vigorously while listening to this music? Maybe the link between the music and the memories would wear of with time?
I'm not a therapist but this sounds like something I would try on myself if I were in this situation.
