Image credit: Screenshot from Olivia Dean's official Instagram (@oliviadeano)
Music is such a key part of life. It affects mood, emotional balance and gives our inner world somewhere to settle. Soul music, in particular, has a way of slowing the body and grounding the mind, offering comfort and reflection when life feels demanding or when you just want to feel something.
Fresh off her Grammy win for Best New Artist, Olivia Dean is the moment. Her second album, The Art of Loving, brings soul into the wellness space through honesty, restraint, and emotional intelligence. Her writing focuses on how we experience love in real life, from relationships and endings to independence and self trust.
Below are five songs from ‘The Art of Loving’ album that support wellness in different ways. Each song offers calm, comfort, and emotional reset. Whether you are navigating change, rebuilding after heartbreak, or looking for a mental boost, these songs create space to slow down and reconnect with yourself.
Let Alone the One You Love
This song captures the moment you finally acknowledge that love should not make you feel smaller. It reflects the experience of being in a relationship where you are constantly adjusting, overextending, and carrying more emotional weight than you receive. Where your care becomes expected rather than valued.
It’s a reminder that wanting presence, care, and appreciation is not asking for too much. It’s actually the bare minimum. The song encourages self permission to step away from anything that dims your light and trust that the right kind of love will never require you to shrink.
Baby Steps
Baby Steps sits in the aftermath of choosing yourself. The period where everything is unfamiliar again and independence feels both freeing and uncomfortable. The song reflects the reality of rebuilding your life slowly, without needing to prove strength or rush healing.
There is comfort in its honesty. It validates progress that looks small but feels meaningful. One decision at a time. One boundary held. One moment where you choose not to go backwards. Baby Steps reminds you that learning how to be okay on your own is not a failure of love, but a return to self trust.
The Man I Need
The Man I Need brings lightness without losing intention. It is playful, melodic, and confident. Rather than longing from a place of lack, this song reflects discernment. It is about recognising the kind of partnership that supports your growth rather than competes with it.
Listening to this feels like romanticising your life while staying grounded. It encourages you to imagine love as something that adds ease, not pressure.
Lady Lady
Lady Lady is a celebration of womanhood in motion. It speaks to growth, change, and the decision to step into a new chapter with confidence. The song carries strength and softness at the same time, honouring the complexity of becoming without needing to simplify it.
There is empowerment here that feels lived-in, not performative. Olivia Dean embraces womanhood as something expansive, layered, and worthy of joy. It makes you want to take up space in your own life.
I’ve Seen It
I’ve Seen It widens the emotional lens of the album. After moving through romantic disappointment, independence, and empowerment, this song turns its attention outward. It reflects on love in its many forms, friendship, family, shared moments, and everyday connection. It offers perspective. It shifts your focus from what is missing to what already exists. Love that shows up in familiar places.
Anu Aborisade
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