Indulging Your Creative Impulses

Did you know that time spent indulging your creative impulses can bring you the same benefits of healthy lifestyle as meditating? It’s true! When you spend time focusing on creating or enjoying art, music, fictional writing, or poetry you enter a state that mimics the same state you enter when meditating. The result is that your breathing regulates, your muscles relax, and even your digestion is positively impacted.

Anybody can benefit from creative expression. However, people who are feeling sad, depressed, anxious, or overly-stressed should especially consider adding or increasing the creative activity in their lives. How do you nurture your creative side? What if you’ve never been particularly creative? Don’t worry. Everybody has the ability to enhance and increase the time they spend creating and appreciating music, art, and writing. If you need a few suggestions, keep reading. The tips below can help anybody get started.

Find Easy Arts and Crafts Projects

As a child, did you have an arts and crafts box? If you did, you probably remember that it contained glue, colored pencils, crayons, felt, construction paper, glitter, googly eyes, and all sorts of other nifty items that were perfect for rainy day creativity. Well, you should seriously consider putting together an arts and crafts box for yourself. Then, use it! The idea is to pursue the creation of art in a way that is fun, and in a way that you can be successful. If the idea of an arts and crafts box doesn’t seem fun, take some time to explore a nearby arts and crafts store and grab whatever seems interesting. Here are a few creative projects that are suited to nearly everybody:

• Using graph paper to design your dream bedroom
• Making collages
• Painting by Number
• Making Latch hook rugs
• Making window hangings with “Perler” beads
• Making beaded necklaces and bracelets
• Origami
• Making Sand Art
• Creating Dioramas

The possibilities are endless. Remember, your goal isn’t perfection. It is to enjoy the process. While you are working on your project, your brain will release a lot of dopamine. This is a brain chemical that acts as a natural anti-depressant.

Get Creative in the Kitchen

We all have to eat. For most of us, this means that we also have to cook. One excellent way to enhance your creative side is to add creative element to something you already do. Cooking is a great place to start! You don’t need to be a gourmet to get started. Just get creative with flavors, colors, and textures. Even something as simple as baking a cake from a mix can become a creative activity if you use the frosted cake as a canvas for some decorator’s icing and sprinkles. When you make a salad, add different fruits and vegetables for more visual appeal, and to add new flavors and textures. Try adding different fruits and berries to make a smoothie. Don’t be afraid to experiment! Every attempt may not work perfectly, but you’ll benefit from the boost in creativity and the addition of new foods to your diet.

Try Knitting or Crocheting

This is no longer a creative outlet reserved for grandmothers. Men, women, children, and teenagers are all discovering the pleasures of creating via knitting and crocheting. One of the benefits of knitting and crocheting is that it is a hobby that is relatively easy to learn, yet, as a person progresses, they can challenge themselves with more complex projects. Knitting and crocheting involves a lot of repetitive motion which has been proven to increase relaxation and your ability to focus. And as a bonus you will get new hand-made clothes which you can also use as a gift. And we all know how joyful it is to give presents!

Get out of the House and Experience Art in Person

If you are fortunate enough to live in an area where you have access to art museums, art fairs, sculpture parks, or urban art installations, please make the time to go and look at these exhibits. When you look at art, you engage the parts of your brain that process feelings of pleasure and success. This is even more so when you look at pieces of art that you are not able to immediately understand.  Of course, getting out of the house and looking at art has a few additional benefits. You will be out among other people benefiting from socialization, and you’ll be getting in a lot of walking, which will help you to stay healthy and happier, as sports evoke the release of dopamine. You can ask your friends go out with you and thus you will have a better mood.

No matter how exactly you decide to increase the presence of creativity in your life, you are going to reap both physical and mental benefits. Of course, this only works if you do it. So, don’t wait! Before the day is over, do something creative. Your body and brain will thank you. And all the academic assignments and term papers writing will become much easier for you once you develop your creativity.