We all need healthy outlets to ease stress, anxiety, and the blues in our daily lives. While things like exercise, meditation, and talk therapy are well known, lots of other hobbies and activities offer underrated mental health benefits as well. Let’s look at two surprisingly therapeutic pastimes: gardening and music.
The Joy of Gardening
There’s just something about getting your hands dirty, nurturing little sprouts into blooming plants, and spending time outside amid nature that feels profoundly grounding. Gardening provides a rare chance to be fully present and focused on the simple act of tending to living things, with no multi-tasking or digital distractions allowed.
Beyond the mindfulness aspect, caring for plants delivers a series of neurochemical boosts. The rhythmic motions of digging, pruning, and planting trigger the release of serotonin and dopamine, those precious feel-good hormones. Just breathing in the earthy microbes in soil can raise serotonin levels. And successfully coaxing new growth provides a sense of purpose and accomplishment.
For those with anxiety, gardens offer a soothing oasis to rest one’s busy mind. Becoming immersed in the vibrant colors, textures, and details of plant life takes you out of your repeated worried thoughts. At the same time, rhythmic tasks like weeding and watering can serve as a centering meditation.
Gardening Brings People Together
Community gardens have taken root all over as shared spaces for neighbors to gather, socialize, and collaborate on a meaningful group project. This injected dose of community can be hugely impactful for those struggling with loneliness, depression, or isolation. Even tending to plants individually provides that sense of being part of something bigger.
Music’s Magic
Think about the last time you were feeling down, only to flip on the radio to a nostalgic, happy song you love and instantly felt lighter. That is the near-miraculous power of music to shift moods and mental states in the blink of an eye.
There is a reason sound meditation has been an established therapeutic discipline for decades now. The good folk at Maloca Sound tell us that listening to music causes our brains to release dopamine, creating real pleasure and joy. Upbeat tunes with powerful rhythms can give us a surge of motivation and energy. Slower, moodier ballads allow us to process sadness in a beneficial way.
The Impact of Playing Music
While simply listening is beneficial, there are even greater payoffs to actively playing and creating music yourself. Learning and practicing an instrument is an excellent cognitive exercise that can sharpen your focus, memory, and discipline. Hitting those challenging intervals correctly triggers dopamine rewards.
To play music, you need to coordinate your mind and body, helping you escape from your thoughts and enter a state of blissful presence. Group music activities like garage bands, drum circles, or choirs add to that social connection factor too.
Researchers think that many engaging neural firings across different domains, including motor control, auditory processing, emotional flow, and memory, is what gives music its therapeutic potency from reducing depression to slowing cognitive decline. There’s even promising research into how sound frequency vibrations used in music therapy can affect the body’s healing processes on a cellular level.
Of course, music’s mood-boosting effects extend to the realms of dance, songwriting, and other creative outlets. Finding an expressive avenue for pent-up emotions, exploring your identity, and sharing that with others is powerfully therapeutic.
Conclusion
The next time you’re struggling with feeling uninspired, stressed, or down, try nurturing your mental health through simple activities like gardening or jamming out to music. The act of creating something from scratch, pouring your energy into nurturing growth, and accessing the emotional transcendence of song are paths to authentic well-being.
