Gardening can make you feel calmer and happier. Focusing your attention on the immediate tasks and details of gardening can reduce negative thoughts and feelings and can make you feel better in the moment. Spending time around plants relieves stress for many people. Pushing the lawn mower into those stubborn corners and changing wheelbarrows full of dirt and manure can be great for upper body and thigh strength.
Regularly putting your hands and knees to dig in the dirt will keep your joints flexible and lubricated (as well as strengthen your back) and keep your fingers agile to prevent the risk of arthritis and associated conditions later in life. Regular bursts of any type of exercise in the garden will also be good for your heart as you climb and you will increase your cardio rate without the need to jog around the streets and pump the pedals of an exercise bike. Seniors will also benefit greatly from a regular potter around the garden with their wellies, as this will increase their internal balance and sense of balance, drastically reducing the risk of falling anywhere in the house or in public. Certainly, we're not touching reading as a stress reliever.
However, gardening clearly has a positive impact on both stress and mood and is not always considered the stress-relieving activity that is reading, and perhaps deserves a little more attention as a stress-relieving option. Gardening has several benefits that can minimize stress. Here are a few reasons why gardening is a fantastic stress reliever. According to the Mayo Clinic, chronic stress is hard on the body and contributes to anxiety, depression and illnesses, such as heart disease and diabetes.
That's why it's so important to find healthy ways to cope with and care for your mind and body. Sow some seeds, water a little, cut a bouquet or weed and you'll soon discover that time has flown by and the care that was previously pressing on you has receded into the distance. Working in the garden reduces levels of cortisol (a chemical that the body produces in response to stress) even more than reading a book. Sitting in a garden also helps.
More and more hospitals are adding vegetable gardens to their facilities to help patients heal faster and prevent staff members from burning. New study shows that people who work in the garden every day have 6.6 percent higher wellness scores and 4.2 percent lower stress levels than people who don't grow any type of garden. A report published in the Mental Health Journal* cited that gardening was able to reduce stress and improve mood, with a reduction in symptoms of depression and anxiety. Gardening relieves stress and anxiety, and planting and caring for a garden is a great way to reduce anxiety.
And staying active in the garden has never been easier with plenty of tools that make gardening easier on the body and more accessible. Once you have started, you should discover that the act of creating a garden can bring you peace and that the garden itself can bring you joy. Those with health problems reported that gardening relieved episodes of depression (13 percent), increased energy levels (12 percent), and reduced stress (16 percent). Gardening has a lot of potential for people with defined mental health needs, offering a huge variety of activities and options, more than any other type of therapeutic activity.
One of the most important things to remember is to keep gardening as a hobby and not turning it into a chore. As the weather starts to warm up, the need to spend more time outside gardening is steadily increasing. Whether it's a small area next to your yard or a large plot in your yard, you think your garden is what you can handle. Gardening and caring for plants provide physical activities for people to do, distracting the mind from things that induce stress.
According to the study published in the journal Cities, gardening frequently, at least two or three times a week, corresponded to the greatest perceived health benefits. Gardening More Often May Be Linked to Improvements in Wellness, Perceived Stress, and Physical Activity, New Research Suggests. While both groups experienced a decrease in stress, gardeners experienced a significantly greater decrease in stress (as measured by salivary cortisol, a stress hormone), as well as a complete restoration of positive mood; readers actually experienced a further decrease in the state of mind. Research shows that gardening combines physical activity with social interaction and exposure to nature and.
. .