The Art of Living

Third, Revisit your childhood hobbies or interests. What if you can’t think of any types of art you want to pursue? Go back to those things that got you excited as a teenager—possibly the same time that part of you got shut down. Did you draw, write, paint, or play an instrument? Even if you don’t go that direction now, it may open up doors for other kinds of art that work for you today. Actually there's so much more than that but those are the example that I recommend to add more art into your life.

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Here are some of the best ways creative expression can benefit your brain and mental health to make you a happier, healthier person.

Creating Art Relieves Stress
Activities like painting, sculpting, drawing, and photography are relaxing and rewarding hobbies that can lower your stress levels and leave you feeling mentally clear and calm. Creating art provides a distraction, giving your brain a break from your usual thoughts. The average person has 60,000 thoughts per day and 95% of them are exactly the same day in, day out! When you get totally immersed in a creative activity, you may find yourself in what’s known as “the zone” or in a state of “flow.” This meditative-like state focuses your mind and temporarily pushes aside all your worries. Creating art trains you to concentrate on details and pay more attention to your environment. In this way, it acts like meditation.

Art Encourages Creative Thinking
Art enhances problem-solving skills. Unlike math, there is no one correct answer in art. Art encourages creative thinking and lets you come up with your own unique solutions. Out-of-the-box thinking also stimulates your brain to grow new neurons. Contrary to popular belief, creative thinking does not mean using the right side of your brain. It involves getting both hemispheres of your brain communicating with each other. The concept of left-brain right-brain dominance never had a strong foundation in science in the first place, and now this theory has been totally debunked. The most complicated activities humans do, such as learning a language or playing or listening to music, require whole brain thinking.

Art Boosts Self-Esteem and Provides a Sense of Accomplishment
You may stick your kids’ artwork on the refrigerator door to boost their self-esteem. Hanging your latest work of art on the wall can instill in you the same feeling. Creating art increases the “feel good” neurotransmitter dopamine. Dopamine has been called the “motivation molecule.” It boosts drive, focus, and concentration. It enables you to plan ahead and resist impulses so you can achieve your goals.It gives you that “I did it!” lift when you accomplish what you set out to do. Dopamine stimulates the creation of new neurons and prepares your brain for learning.  You don’t have to produce fine art. Crafting hobbies of all kinds — knitting, quilting, sewing, drawing, photography, woodworking, gardening, and do-it-yourself home repair — increase dopamine, ward off depression, and protect the brain from aging.

Art Increases Brain Connectivity 
Every time you engage in a new or complex activity, your brain creates new connections between brain cells. Your brain’s ability to grow connections and change throughout your lifetime is called brain plasticity or neuroplasticity. Creating art stimulates communication between various parts of the brain. In this way, creating art has been proven to increase psychological resilience and resistance to stress. It’s thought that intelligence depends more on the number of brain connections than the size of your brain.

Art Increases Empathy, Tolerance, and Feelings of Love
A study of over 10,000 students found that a one-hour trip to an art museum changed the way they thought and felt. Students who visited a museum not only showed increased critical thinking skills, they also exhibited greater empathy towards how people lived in the past and expressed greater tolerance towards people different than themselves. Professor Semir Zeki, a neurobiologist at the University College London, discovered that simply the act of viewing art gives pleasure, much like falling in love. Brain scans revealed that looking at works of art trigger a surge of dopamine into the same area of the brain that registers romantic love.

And that's all I see and know about the art in living our basis lives, hope this article will help you to grow yourself into a much better person through art that "we" put into our lives. because art still have so many benefits and advantages that we still can get from it. 

( Dhelia Maharani Oetomo 2016-012-238)