If the last time you picked up a coloring book was when you were 8, it’s probably time to get one again. Coloring books are great tools for children to develop their hand-eye coordination and imagination. But new studies are beginning to show that their effects on adults are just as important. Adult coloring books have taken the world by storm. Everyone from the Duchess of Cambridge to your next-door neighbor seems to be doing it. If you’re curious about how exactly adult coloring books can give you greater emotional stability and make you more productive, these seven points could help you understand.
1. It’s A Form Of Meditation
Mounting responsibilities, multiple appointments and no time to yourself can create a cluttered mind. When your mind is cluttered, it’s easy to lose sense of what’s important. Meditation helps you declutter your mind by virtually emptying it of all thought. Mindful meditation requires you to sit in silence and not think of anything. Most people find this impossible to do, which is why coloring books give you an easier alternative to meditation. While you color within the lines, your mind is only concentrating on the task at hand. This helps you feel calmer and in better control of your life.
2. It Energizes Both Sides Of Your Brain
Most tasks just require you to use one part of your brain, either your creative side or your analytical side. Over-dependence on just one part of our brain can cause the other to become less efficient. Coloring on the other hand, requires you to use both sides. You use your analytical side to decide which color to choose for a section and your creative side to come up with the best color combinations.
3. It Can Help You Manage Your Anxiety
The rhythmic motions of coloring and the need for you to focus solely on the task, can help you deal with anxiety. It slows down your thoughts and can calm you down. Coloring is an important complement to anxiety therapy as it frees your mind of distracting thoughts and helps therapy penetrate your mind better.
4. It Can Jog Your Creativity
The more caught up we get in dreary day-to-day chores, the more our sense of creativity dies. Coloring can help you jog your latent creativity back to life. It requires you to creatively fill in patterns with different colors to make your picture look beautiful. Adults who spend more time filling in coloring books are able to use this creativity in other areas of their life too. They come up with innovative solutions at work, think of new ways to furnish their house and are drawn to other creative hobbies too.
5. It Invokes A Sense Of Nostalgia
Coloring as an adult transports you back to when you were a kid. Nostalgia can give you a sense of security because it rekindles the time when you were a child, had no responsibilities and were taken care of by someone else. When you’re feeling unhappy, coloring could be just what you need to feel gratified again.
6. It’s Like A Mini-Vacation
If only we could pack our bags and leave every time the stresses of our daily lives got to us. We may not be able to fly to Ibiza whenever we want to, but we can always pick up a coloring book. Coloring books help you de-stress by giving you time to do nothing at all except color. It empties your mind of nagging thoughts and slows time down for a while. Coloring is a great way to just switch-off at the end of the day and recharge your batteries.
7. It Can Help You Discover Your Purpose
We all had big dreams growing up, but somewhere along the way, we became adults trapped in dull jobs. Coloring can help you re-evaluate your life choices and make better ones. By giving you time to yourself, it helps you introspect better. You get a rare chance to explore your inner thoughts and find out what you really need to be happy. This can help you let go of unhealthy habits you’ve been clinging on to. It pulls you out of your rut and pushes you to dream big again.
