On a warm and cozy day, isn’t it nice to feel the breeze in your skin while basking under the sunshine? In the midst of pandemic where we are all stuck inside our homes, going out is one way to boost our mood and refresh our senses. Different outdoor activities can be done now that there are lesser restrictions and one of them is gardening. Gardening is a mentally and physically healthy activity that can be enjoyed by people of all ages. You also get to eat the tasty fruits, vegetables, and herbs that you grow. The trend in gardening shoots up in the middle of us being stuck at home with little to no chance of enjoying ourselves outside due to the COVID-19 scare. The term “plantito” “plantita” originated from this trend. Millennials and Gen- Zs were so immersed in gardening as a hobby that they started collecting different plants from across the country and would even barter their collection with one another. Gardening became a good hobby and a business as well even in the middle of the pandemic. It helped people unwind and de-stress just by tending to the plants they have at home. Many were enchanted to embark into gardening which is not a surprise because there are many reasons as to why gardening as a hobby makes you productive and healthy at the same time. Do you want to be convinced to immerse yourself into gardening? Or you just want to find a new hobby make yourself feel productive? Then let me share with you 8 reasons why gardening is a good hobby.
8 Reasons Why Gardening is a Good Hobby
1. MOOD BOOSTER
If you have a lot on your mind, gardening can help you focus on something that will make you happy. Also, gardening has been shown to aid in the prevention of depression. Spending time in a garden reduces anxiety and makes people feel less depressed. For 12 weeks, people suffering from depression took part in a gardening intervention. Following that, researchers assessed several aspects of their mental health, including depression symptoms, and discovered that they had all significantly improved. This is why gardening is a good hobby because the benefits lasted for months after the intervention was completed.
2. MEMORY ENHANCER
Recent research suggests that engaging in gardening activities may encourage the growth of nerve cells related to memory. Researchers in Korea gave 20-minute gardening activities to dementia patients in an inpatient facility. Researchers found that both males and females had higher levels of certain brain nerve growth factors linked to memory after the residents had raked and planted vegetable gardens. Analysts discovered that horticultural therapy, or gardening to improve mental health, may be an effective treatment for people with dementia in a 2014 research review. In fact, people with dementia frequently participate in ground-breaking Greencare programs in the Netherlands and Norway, where they spend a large portion of the day working on farms and in gardens.
3. HEALTY HABBIT
Gardening is exercise, and activities such as raking and cutting grass may be classified as light to moderate exercise, whereas shoveling, digging, and chopping wood may be classified as vigorous exercise. Working in the garden, in any case, engages every major muscle group in the body. Anyone who has woken up sore after a day of yardwork will recognize this fact. Working in a garden has been shown in studies to help offset both age-related weight gain and childhood obesity. Additionally, University of Pennsylvania researchers found that gardeners are more likely to get a full 7 hours of sleep each night.
4. FOSTERING CONNECTIONS
Gardening as a hobby is not limited in our homes and personal lawns because there are school gardens, family gardens, and community gardens sprouting up all over. The fact that these small local gardens are flourishing may be due to human interaction as much as it is to the produce. Students who participated in school gardens in one study took photos of their work and shared their experiences. Students reported a sense of personal well-being as a result of the skills they learned and the relationships they formed. Working in a garden with people of various ages, abilities, and backgrounds is a great way to broaden your knowledge and meet new people.
5. MANAGE ECOANXIETY
Watching the gradual, unchecked effects of climate change increases daily stress and creates a burdensome sense of guilt for many people. One of the most challenging aspects of this eco-anxiety? According to researchers, it's the sense that you have no control over the situation. To combat the negative health effects of ecoanxiety, you can garden with the aim of mitigating climate change. If you want to cut carbon on your own — and thus reduce your own environmental anxiety — the National Wildlife Foundation recommends the following actions:
· Use hand tools rather than gas-powered ones.
· Reduce your water consumption by using drip lines, rain barrels, and mulch.
· Composting helps to reduce waste and methane production.
· Plant trees to help absorb CO2.
6. CALMS YOUR SENSES
Gardening as a hobby can help you recover after a stressful experience. Researchers exposed study participants to a stressful activity in a 2011 study. Then they asked half of the group to read quietly while the other half went gardening. Researchers discovered that the gardening group recovered from stress better than the reading group when they tested the levels of the stress hormone cortisol in their bodies. The gardening group also reported that their moods had improved, whereas fewer of the readers had.
7. HELPS FIGHT DISEASE
You're more similar to a plant than you realize. Your body is capable of photosynthesis, which is the process by which plants produce their own food by using sunlight. That is why gardening is a good hobby as it helps the sunlight be used by your skin to produce one of the nutrients you require: vitamin D. Depending on how much your clothes cover and the color of your skin, a half-hour in the sun can produce between 8,000 and 50,000 international units (IU) of vitamin D in your body. Vitamin D is required for hundreds of bodily functions, including bone strengthening and immune system function. Studies have also shown that spending time in the sun can help reduce your risk of:
· Breast Cancer
· Colorectal Cancer
· Bladder Cancer
· Prostate Cancer
· Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma
· Multiple Sclerosis
8. GROWING YOUR OWN FOOD
Ripe produce has the highest nutritional value. Fruits and vegetables are harvested before they reach maturity. Then they have to travel a long distance to get to the supermarkets. By the time you eat it, it may have ripened. The nutrition in the fruit comes from the stem of the living plant. After harvest, the value actually decreases with each passing day. When you grow your own vegetables, you get the most nutritious vegetables possible, with the majority of the nutrients intact.
So, what do you think? Gardening is a fun and relaxing way to connect with nature, and it also has numerous health benefits. Gardening is a mentally and physically healthy activity that can be enjoyed by people of all ages. In the Philippines, gardening is a hobby for many Filipinos. It is one of the most common outdoor activities for Filipinos since most of them have spare garden lawns in their housing lots. One of the best-selling types of real estate are house and lots that have enough space for gardening and driveway. If you are looking to have your own dream house and planning to build your personal garden the you should check out Bria Homes’ offer of affordable house and lot. Check out their page for more information.
By Noelyn Kate O. Cabrera
Comments