College can be a stressful experience, even for the most dedicated and enthusiastic students. Between classes, extracurricular activities, and concerns for the future job market, mental and physical health often gets shoved onto the back-burner. Stress weighs down onto the shoulders of students, crippling their ability to complete their tasks in a timely manner. Luckily, there are ways to turn your crippling academic anxiety into positive, compartmentalized stress eliminating hobbies.

Hobbies, whether they are activities done alone or with friends, help reduce negative stress in busy lives. Weekly times of gathering with friends for casual games or chatting through a shared activity can help some folks put their lives back into perspective as they recharge. Building relationships with people that share interests provide a structure of support that can keep an individual grounded in their stress. Taking an hour from homework or studies to do something for one’s own mental health allows an individual to refocus their priorities and causes the time spent working to be more productive after a period of rest. For example, if a student just cannot seem to get those last two essay paragraphs up to snuff, they can take a break for half an hour or so and play a video game. When that timer goes off, they get back in front of the computer, have a fresh look at the assignment, and can return to finish it with renewed energy.

Allotting time for hobbies routinely can also help with productivity in every part of life. With “good stress,” such as devoting time to completing something that bears no weight aside from personal accomplishment (knitting a blanket, defeating a difficult video game boss, etc.), one can adapt to view other kinds of stress in life to be other challenges to overcome, rather than overwhelming weights bruising backs.

So, write a story. Start to crochet. Invite your neighbor over to teach them your favorite video game. Peek in on a club you would not have thought to be interesting. Ask some acquaintance that you have only spoken to twice how they de-stress. Write a letter to your grandparent about how your classes are going. Walk around campus and take pictures of everything you never noticed before, or just take a walk while playing some unfamiliar music on shuffle. Try to do something specifically for your personal health every day, even if it just involves putting your feet up for twenty minutes. Healthy hobbies make for happy people with schedules that suddenly do not seem so grueling.

If you want to read more about different healthy hobbies and why they are good for you, you can visit: http://bestmedicinenews.org/7-reasons-why-hobbies-are-good-for-your-health/