As life gets busier, it is quite easy to get wrapped up in your daily routines and completely forget about your own well-being. We get it! We, also, have been there! Most of us have been going through life as if we are on a treadmill – working so hard to support our families, especially during the pandemic – that we’ve forgotten our own mental health. The needs of our families come before our own, and that’s totally fine, but do you know the kind of pressure and the impacts it has on our mental state? It leads to us having extreme stress and even depression, with the constant worrying and anxiety of not knowing what is going to happen the next day.
But do you know what you can do to help reduce stress and anxiety? Art! See, not only can we use art to express our innermost thoughts and feelings, but also as a medium for therapy and stress relief. According to Paint by numbers Australia, through the paintbrush, one can channel all the emotions and feeling you might otherwise not have been able to express in other ways, therefore, lifting your mood and reducing your stress level. Painting is super effective, so much so that even therapists recommend it to patients struggling with stress and depression. To understand this much better, let’s take a look at ways in which painting helps reduce stress.
Painting helps take your mind off things – As adults, our day-to-day activities can be exhausting. It is not uncommon that one gets burned out easily. But after all this, painting tends to be one of the best ways one can relieve stress and anxiety. When you are engaged in an activity such as drawing or painting, you engage a different part of the brain, and you can get caught up in what you are creating thus temporarily forgetting what’s worrying you. Eventually, you will find yourself having stopped occupying your mind with unnecessary things, and that it’s become clearer as days go by.
Painting calms you down the way meditation does – You probably can attest to this, but creating art equals or is equivalent to meditation. When you concentrate on what you are drawing, you usually shut yourself from any unwanted thoughts as you are completely immersed in the activity. You are in the zone, a state of flow. So, essentially, you will be driven in a near state of meditation, which eliminates your negative thoughts and lessens your stress. As your mind calms down, so does your anxiety level.
Playing with colours boosts your mood – Did you know that when you are sad, depressed, or upset, colours can uplift your mood instantly? Colours such as yellow, blue, green, purple, and orange can brighten up your mood, and so using such colours to create art gets your mind relaxed and slowly starts relieving you from the daily stress. As a matter of fact, recent studies have proven that colouring geometric shapes do induce meditative benefits that are quite crucial and helpful to people struggling with stress and anxiety.
Getting creative – For you to create art, one has to get creative – that’s a fact. In this instance you will start to think outside the box, unconsciously or subconsciously trying to come up with ways to express yourself or even create something new. Frankly, just immersing yourself in creating something for a person you love is extremely heart-warming, and engaging in such a process makes you feel good, happy, in control, boosting your mental health in the process.
Through self-expression – As we mentioned earlier, painting is a great way of expressing our innermost feelings. Some of us find it really difficult to explain what we go through each and every day, especially with the pandemic at its peak. Probably because some people are unable to articulate what they are actually feeling or just don’t want to talk about their problems altogether. If you are one of these people, did you know that you can express everything you are feeling through art? When you are unable to express yourself, but wish to, painting helps you release all those emotions, as you are actually able to tell your story.
As a wrap-up, modern life, as of today, is very active as we are under constant pressure to do more, to achieve more. Between taking care of our kids and working hard to advance our career, there is almost no time to take care of our own well-being. But here is the thing, adding a little art each day would go a long way in minimising your stress and anxiety levels. Painting will help you relax your mind and, therefore, focus on your creative powers on something. What’s more, you will be able to clear your mind, which enables you to deal with life challenges with better decision-making power.