Mindfulness and meditation are buzz words in today’s society. We know that there are immense benefits to taking time every day, for as little as 3 minutes but for as long as we can to focus inwards, to be more aware of our surroundings and to improve our health.
Meditation is often recommended to those looking to reduce stress levels. There have been multiple studies that prove meditation reduces the effects of stress and anxiety. Physiological disorders such as heart disease and high blood pressure can also be attributed to a high stress lifestyle, so when we choose to meditate, we not only benefit from it mentally, but physically as well.
I believe all of us would love to be able to rise to the challenge and set aside an hour, or even half an hour a day in order to gain the benefits from all that meditation can provide us with. However, life gets in the way, doesn’t it? In order to make a practice a habit, we need to keep at it without fail for at least a month. In order to keep at something, we need to see progress that keeps us inspired to continue.
Unfortunately, through my experience at least, however hard I try I cannot seem to garner enough immediate satisfaction from my meditation sessions to justify not doing something else on other days. Although I feel on cloud nine after a yoga class and can’t wait to go back, I often procrastinate and bake cakes, spend time with my family and talk to my friends. I also diamond paint.
But hold on.
As we discovered the research into the effects of diamond painting on mental clarity and as you all began to share your own diamond painting experiences, the similarities between the benefits of diamond painting and the benefits of meditation became surprisingly common. Look here:
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The Effect of Meditation |
The Effect of Diamond Painting |
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Reduce Stress: One of the main reasons a modern day person chooses to meditate, giving you that time to let thoughts go which is a great stress reliever.
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Reduce Stress: One of the most effective, non-medicinal treatments doctors prescribe is “natural stress reduction.” That means changing your lifestyle and finding activities or hobbies to help reduce the tension and stress in your life. |
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Lower Blood Pressure: This is a physiological side effect of reducing stress. The relationship between deep breathing and blood pressure in a large Japanese group were studied here, concluding that deep breathing reduced blood pressure.
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Lower Blood Pressure: The enjoyment of a hobby or craft such as diamond painting is proven to provide feelings of wellbeing well into the next day. Alongside reducing stress, these positive feelings lower blood pressure. |
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Ignites Creative Spark: As we become more open to our surroundings and we free up our thoughts from negativity and fear, we are able to pursue our creative side.
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Ignites Creative Spark: By doing an art or a craft, you, the colors, patterns and the act of creating something increases creativity. Creativity helps us to problem solve |
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Sharpens Mental Focus: A study suggested that even 4 days of meditation can increase attention span. Not to mention benefits found for age related memory loss.
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Sharpens Mental Focus: Dementia is lowered in those who participate in an activity or a hobby for at least 30 minutes a day. |
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Helps Eliminate Depression and Sadness: Loving kindness meditation can produce positive feelings towards yourself and others.
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Helps Eliminate Depression and Sadness: A treatment for mild depression is to pursue a hobby for an hour a day. |
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Improve Patience, Discipline and Endurance (boosting dopamine levels): The mental discipline that you develop from practicing meditation can be so strong it can help break addictions by increasing self-control and broadening awareness of potential triggers. |
Improve Patience, Discipline and Endurance (boosting dopamine levels): Dopamine is connected to feelings of pleasure, learning and motivation and is our ‘feel-good hormone’.
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Increases Social Circles: Strong communities are available. A group of breast cancer sufferers who joined a Tai-Chi program and claimed they had more self-esteem than simply joining support circles. |
Increases Social Circles: A hobby brings you in contact with people who have similar interests.
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*Check out https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/12-benefits-of-meditation#section1 for more links to scientific articles on the benefits of meditation.
I love to use diamond painting as a form of meditation, focusing simply on what I am doing and letting the thoughts come and go. Combining this with low-fi hip-hop tunes, meditation music or nature sounds (or even out in nature if you can!) can further enhance this experience.
Some other tools that can help you make diamond painting a more meditative experience include listening to guided meditations through YouTube or meditation Apps on your smartphone or computer whilst accomplishing your favorite diamond painting. When providing a gentle, calming and safe environment in which you can let your thoughts free to wander whilst doing something constructive as you diamond paint, you can easily spend the time on yourself that is so essential these days for good mental and physical health and wellbeing.
Without changing the way you breathe and by just breathing naturally, simply focus on how your breath flows in and out of your body. Notice how you rib cage, shoulders, lungs and anywhere else reacts to your breath. This simple discipline is one of the foundations of meditation.
Meditation is all about letting go. Although there are elements of concentration to attain this and visualization techniques are creative stress-reducing and mind opening experiences, the foundation of meditation comes from surrendering to the silence.
Diamond painting provides us the opportunity to gain the health benefits from what we can experience through regular meditation, plus other benefits such as finger and hand dexterity. Meditation certainly has innumerable benefits and we should all seek to improve our lives by practicing. Can diamond painting be the new meditation? Share your thoughts!
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