Staying healthy is often referred to physical health in common sense but mental health is also as important and is necessary to take care for, and should never be neglected. But the concept of mental health seems to be quite abstract in comparison to physical health.

There sure is a lot of research has been done on the topic but everyone seems to pay more attention to and discuss more on physical health like how to keep form, how to have nice body, ways to cut fat, etc. not to mention acknowledge mental health’s importance enough to take action to keep one’s mind healthy.

To keep our mind healthy, we can’t just tell it to stay positive as we cannot simply avoid running into problems, staying away from frustrated situations, we cannot make our mind work the way we want just by saying “Hey buddy, let’s have a good mood and be nice.” And to me, the solution is taking action in advance, “work out” with my mind to get it ready for everything, not just wait to react when things happen.

And in order to do that, I take up new hobbies to keep my mind busy outside working hours. Some choose reading books, some favor playing board games, solving puzzles etc. and I choose Photography. As a form of visual art, it can as well amuse me and help me develop new skills I can put into use. After spending hours writing, crafting words and sentences, please my mind with something visual is a good thing to do. To take photos, I have to walk around, to take a look at everything around and many writing prompts can suddenly come up which is good for work. And walking is also a sports activity which is good for my physical health.

To me, hobbies do not simply keep our mind from being idle, keep us staying positive, hobbies can help us sharpen our mind and in many other good aspects. Overall, it’s good for our mental health.

I want to hear about your hobbies!