The Granny Hobby Protocol - by Anu - Working Theorys

Last week I outed myself as a strong believer in granny hobbies for health. (I like to keep my domain purchases close to the vest, but I’ve quietly held grannyhobby.com for a while too.) A lot of people seemed to resonate with my confession, so Twitter then forcibly showed it to 2 million people.

The same week there were two related New York Times pieces (related because granny hobbies overlap a lot with the world of leisure-crafting): One profiled Happy Medium, a newco opening casual “art cafes” in NYC. The second was all about the brain benefits of handwork.

“We really missed making things with our hands without this pressure to perform or make it perfect or to sell it on Etsy.”

Studies have found that a whole range of hands-on activities — such as knitting, gardening and coloring — are associated with cognitive and emotional benefits, including improvements in memory and attention, as well as reductions in anxiety and depression symptoms ... The researchers who looked at coloring, for example, speculated that it might promote mindfulness, which could be beneficial for mental health. Those who have studied knitting said something similar. “The rhythm and repetition of knitting a familiar or established pattern was calming, like meditation.”

Researchers want to know if its the hand movement that’s beneficial or other attributes of tasks involving your hands — e.g. concentration and mindfulness. I don’t think it matters which exactly, but it’s probably both. (I suspect concentrating hard on a digital knitting game isn’t as good as knitting in real life. And just mindlessly pushing some button in real life without paying any attention or care to it isn’t all that good for well-being either.)

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