Hobbies for Mental Health Self Care Challenge 2

Welcome everyone to my second Health Storylines Challenge! If you missed the first post of this series, then click on over here. In this series I’ll be motivating you to take part in challenges that promote self-care because it’s often a neglected aspect of life with a chronic illness.

So self care isn’t just for the body it’s also for the mind, we can’t just do everything we can to treat a physical illness if we don’t also take care of the mind. Life with a chronic illness is hard and we’re often consumed by it. We need distractions to help us just step back and be in this moment.

My favorite way to distract myself is one of my myriad of hobbies. I have a variety of them, such as; reading, writing, painting and learning something new are a couple of things I like to do. If I haven’t done one of my hobbies in awhile, it feels kind of strange to pick it up again but at the same time it makes me really happy. And it helps the time pass more quickly when you do something that you like to do. So this month, I challenge you to either pick up a hobby that you haven’t done in awhile or find a new hobby that you want to try out. Use the Journal Tool in the Health Storylines app to keep track of any ideas and supply lists that you may have so you have everything in one place.

I decided to pick up painting again, it’s something that holds my attention and doesn’t bother my pain too much. My mom actually got me a ceramic unicorn to paint for fun, but I thought it would be a good example for this post. Later this week I also plan on trying some different origami. 

So for the next week I challenge you to pick up an old hobby that you love. Or you could step outside your comfort zone and try a new hobby or learn about something new. Don’t forget when you share your progress on Social Media to use the hashtags #SSHealthChallenge and #selfcareMVMT. Don’t forget to download and register the app here.