How My Hobbies Improve My Mental Health and Confidence

To make a long story short, I’m having some problems with my pink and green quilt. I originally thought I knew what was wrong with it, but I was wrong. Due to this, I decided to postpone any blog updates about the quilt. Instead, I’m going to try to fill in my weekly post schedule by writing posts about things I’ve been thinking about lately.

After working on my quilt, I realized that it made me very stressed out. I was stressed out when I began to make it. I was stressed out as I made it. And now that I ran into some problems with the quilt, I’m also even more stressed out about it. The thing is, I loved making my quilt. The stress I had was what I like to think of as a “good” kind of stress. This “good” stress is the kind of stress I don’t mind having in my life. It also forces me to think about something else besides my normal, everyday life problems. I also enjoy the problem solving end of these kinds of stresses.

When it comes to sewing, as well as knitting, sketching, and photography, I like to take them on as fun projects. Even though I also use them as ways of earning some extra income, they are enjoyable parts of my life. They also keep me motivated to continue to work on things that I don’t normally do for my day job. More times than not, being able to have these hobbies makes me more confident in my work and contributes to better adaptability and healthy multitasking.

In addition to these things, I also enjoy looking forward to doing something that I’m not being judged on. I don’t need to worry about work performance, how long I am taking to make something, and dealing with coworker I don’t get along with. I really enjoy that. Also, creating things gives me a fulfillment that not only want but need.

To be honest, I started to focus on my hobbies (And started this blog because of them) due to my health problems. At the time, my doctors told me that I would suffer from my health issues for a long time. This made me very depressed. I had plans to move out of the area where I lived at the time (And still currently do), get a job, get the chance to hang out with my long lost childhood friends and new friends I made over the years, and get to travel more frequently. At that time, I already had a plant to go to Disneyland and San Diego! Yet, I couldn’t go anywhere or do anything. And all my money to move and and travel was used to pay out of pocket expenses. Hobbies was the affordable option to keep myself optimistic.

Years later, I’m happy I did what I did. I’m happy I spent my money on getting quality sewing machines, buying bolts of fabric to sew with, better pencils and pens to draw and sketch with, better cameras to use, and yarn to learn how to knit better than I ever had before. I wish I could’ve worked on and finished many of the projects I worked on back then as the skill level I knew I could have, but I was sick. And having an illness takes away your ability to work on things the way you would’ve otherwise have.

None the less, I am a better person for it. Whenever I feel sad about something someone said to me at work, I tell myself about how I can do things. I did it in my hobbies, so why not apply it to my everyday work? Once I do, and I try to drown out the people that get on my nerves, I feel more comfortable and confident in my work. I enjoy it more to. (Well, sometimes I enjoy it more. Other times I wonder if I really should be working for the company at all. Still, I know I wouldn’t be able to see the reality of the situation until after I talk myself into not giving up. It’s amazing how people don’t like a person more since they decided to embrace unfairness and try to thrive despite it!)

Well, that’s all for now! Thank you for reading!