Skateboarding, synths, and disc golf: the new self-care
This article is one of a series written for Kooth, an organisation that provides mental health and wellbeing support for young people.
What do you think of when you hear the words ‘self-care’? Do they make you think about bubble baths and scented candles? The reality, though, is that self-care can be anything that helps your wellbeing and makes you feel good – like hobbies.
In this article, we hear from three people who have different hobbies that bring them joy and help them relax. We discover how they got into them, and how these interests help them cope with life’s ups and downs.
Jon’s story: finding friends through skateboarding
Jon started skateboarding as a teenager, when he spotted others trying out the sport in his local neighbourhood.
“I love how skateboarding challenges me and that there are limitless tricks you can do,” he says. “But what I love most about it is the community. I’ve made friends with people from different backgrounds, and have formed tight bonds with some groms (young skaters) and their families. I’ve even had the opportunity to connect with professional skateboarders because everyone is so welcoming and accepting, regardless of your age, skill, race, or background.”
Relieving stress and putting life in perspective
For Jon, skateboarding is an amazing way to help him forget about his everyday troubles.
“Skateboarding is definitely a stress reliever for me,” he says. “When I’m skateboarding, everything else going on in life – good or bad – just disappears.
“It’s also sometimes an amazing wake-up call, especially when I take a slam. Not only does it teach me to get back up when I fall, but it gets the energy flowing, and somehow gets me even more focused.
“I’ve also learned perseverance, as there is so much failure within skateboarding, as you’re trying to learn something new. There’s no better feeling than landing a trick that you’ve been trying for some time. Skateboarding helps with my stress and gives me a sense of accomplishment, but also puts life in perspective through its mental and physical challenges.”
Tristan’s hobby: where golf meets frisbee
Tristan’s into disc golf, a sport that has similar rules to golf, but where you throw a disc into a basket instead of hitting a ball into a hole. People often play in forested areas, which adds an extra element of challenge to the game.
Tristan first discovered disc golf when he was about to start university. Like Jon, Tristan finds that the social side of the sport is an attraction. “It’s always fun to play with a group of people,” he says. “The disc golf community is friendly and the culture around the game is laid back. People want to relax and have fun.”
Playing a sport with others, exercising, focusing and being in nature all come together to support Tristan’s mental wellbeing. “One of the great things about disc golf is you’re playing outside in a variety of landscapes and terrains,” he says. “It provides a good opportunity to commune with nature and helps me practise focusing.”
Zak’s talent: turning electrical signals into sound
While Tristan and Jon find that sport helps support their mental wellbeing, for Zak, it’s making music. He’s into semi-modular synthesis, which involves using a keyboard that turns electrical signals into sound, then allows you to make music from those sounds.
He explains: “The sounds you can make are as varied as you could possibly imagine – from endless drones to drum sounds, freaky sound effects, massive bass tones, and everything in between.”
A therapeutic distraction
Zak finds this hobby both absorbing and relaxing. He says: “I used to be a ‘proper’ music producer and touring DJ, but I found the music industry extremely challenging for my mental health.
“There were a few reasons for this. For a start, I was out late most nights and living a party lifestyle. But it was also difficult to manage the pressure to make a living. It’s similar for many freelancers: you have to be relentless and extremely tough, and there’s a huge compulsion to take every available opportunity. Meanwhile, music is incredibly competitive, subjective and scene-based, which can foster a dog-eat-dog culture.
“That’s why it was a blessing to find something so therapeutic that I could explore as a hobby. Synthesis gave me back my love of music.”
He adds: “I don’t get as much time as I’d like to use my synths these days. However, I still love to lose myself in a session when possible. I find it completely absorbing, which for someone with high energy levels like me is very therapeutic.
“I often struggle to be ‘in the moment’. I’m always thinking about what’s next, or what should happen now. So losing myself in something that requires total focus is extremely rewarding and centres me. I find the same with my other hobbies such as tennis – I like to get lost in things. But because the sound is such a blanket and the processes are so complex, nothing works quite like my synth jams.”
Are you looking for a hobby?
If you’re looking to find a hobby that helps you, here are some suggestions.
Find a sport you love
If you’re interested in taking up a sport, have a look at this list from the BBC ‘Get Inspired’ guide. It covers everything from adventure sports, climbing and disability sport to weightlifting, wrestling and yoga.
This information from Mind, the mental health charity, explains how physical activity can help your mental health. It talks about how physical activity can help us manage our stress, meet new people, and improve our sleep, mood, and confidence.
Explore music as a hobby
Music is known to release dopamine, the feel-good chemical in your brain. It can improve your mood, increase your confidence, and help you focus and relax.
Like Zak, you might want to find a way to make music yourself. Or you can relax and improve your mental wellbeing by making playlists to suit different moods and listening to your favourite tracks.
Have a look at Kooth’s guide on how to make a ‘good mood’ playlist. It may help you create a list of music that lifts your mood which you can listen to any time.
Published on Kooth
This article was originally published by one of my clients, Kooth, who provide mental health and wellbeing support for young people online. See the Kooth site and discover more about my work for Kooth.
See more about my work for charities here.
Photo credit: Miss Baudien, FaceMePLS from The Hague, The Netherlands, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons