It has been several months since the first cities began shutting down in response to the novel COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak. COVID-19 shutdowns have included an official stay at home orders, requiring all unessential business to halt, and all individuals to stay indoors until absolutely necessary. Though staying home and practicing good social distancing is absolutely necessary for the good of everyone, lots of people are starting to feel the cabin fever set in.
If you are feeling at a loss for what to do during your time in isolation, don’t worry, you are most certainly not alone. People around the world are doing their best to get creative to entertain themselves, their children, their roommates, and we are doing the same! Of course, it wouldn’t be self-quarantine Wowe Lifestyle style if we weren’t putting an eco-friendly spin on keeping ourselves entertained. Here are 6 low waste activities to try out while you practice self-isolation:
1. Digital Art
Drawing, painting, calligraphy, and other forms of visual art are an excellent way to express your feelings, to wind down, or to simply enjoy the process of creating something. While drawing and creating visual artwork can be a super fun hobby, it can also be pretty wasteful, especially during the learning phases.
When you are first starting out, you are going to create a lot of doodles, scribbles, and mistakes, and while some of them might be fun to create, you are definitely going to throw most of them away. If the idea of creating lots of paper waste makes you uncomfortable (believe us, we get it!), but you are still interested in dipping your toes in the visual art waters, digital art may well be your next hobby!
Getting started creating digital art is shockingly affordable, and will ultimately cost you less than the hundreds of dollars worth of art supplies you might end up buying if you stick to traditional physical mediums. Digital art has been growing in popularity over the past decade, helping to expand the market to make the medium more accessible to people at every skill level.
High-quality graphic tablets, drawing programs, design software, and tons of other tools are available for incredibly affordable prices, so even artists on a super-tight budget can get started. Check out this beginner’s guide to digital art from Paintable to learn more about what you need to get started.
2. Upcycling
Upcycling is simply the process of repurposing old materials in order to create something new. Upcycling can be as simple as using an old pasta sauce jar to hold your favorite pencils, or as complicated as sewing a quilt from old pieces of fabric. Fans of the upcycling hobby often scour the shelves and racks of thrift stores and second-hand shops in search of precious items that might make good additions to their latest projects. Upcycling helps to reduce the amount of clothing and waste that is eventually sent to landfills and can help individuals to save money by creating their own custom solutions.
If upcycling sounds like an activity you would enjoy, start by going through your own home to find items you no longer want or need, but could supply good materials for future projects. Old clothes, containers, broken jewelry, magazines, old books, and tons of regular household items can supply incredible artistic opportunities.
3. Cooking
Self-isolation is testing everyone’s ability to take care of themselves, and for many, this is the first time they have had to cook entirely for themselves. While you can certainly still order food for delivery, ordering in can be super expensive, and honestly gets pretty boring and unhealthy when you do it too often. Since everyone is forced to stay in, now is the perfect time to really hone your skills in the kitchen and become a better cook.
If you have always dreamt of whipping up delicious meals for friends and family, wish you could create your own cheese sauce when you are out of boxed mac and cheese, wish you had mastered your grandma’s cookie recipe or anything in between, you now have plenty of time to get acquainted with your stove. Everyone needs to eat, and if there is any skill that everyone really should have, it’s cooking.
If throwing yourself into cooking by making yourself breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day of the week feels overwhelming, commit yourself to cook your own meals 3-4 days a week. Easing into the habit of making your own food can help you feel more in control, and will help you experience more successes than failures. Remember, cooking for yourself doesn’t have to mean eating boring food - choose a few dishes you love to order in, then work to find recipes that work for you.
When you head to the grocery store to do your bi-weekly shop, be sure to bring your reusable cotton produce bags along to avoid collecting single-use plastic bags and reduce your impact on the environment.
4. Yoga & Meditation
The present state of the world is undeniably stressful, and people around the globe are feeling the tension. As we shelter in place, finding ways to reduce stress and practice mindfulness can help improve overall mental wellbeing and keep us feeling sane during this strange and difficult time. Yoga and meditation are both excellent activities that can help reduce stress, center the body, and can even provide a good workout on days when a run, bike ride, or weight lifting doesn’t sound appealing.
Yoga and meditation can be practiced virtually anywhere, and with no need for special equipment. Yoga and meditation can be a solo practice or can include your friends, family, or roommates, so whether you are isolating alone or with others, you can make yoga and meditation part of your daily routine.
5. Creative Writing
In a time when many of us are consuming tons of media, taking a little time to step away from the video content and use your imagination can be extremely valuable. Writing gives you the opportunity to enjoy a little silence while creating something purely with your own mind and can help you center yourself, almost like meditation.
Lots of people think that writing takes a lot of education, but even the world’s most famous writers began as complete amateurs at one point. Writing is one of those things that anyone can do, and while you might not be the next Shakespeare right off the bat, you may discover a passion for storytelling you never knew you had. Now, with a little extra time on your hands, try sitting down for a half an hour a day to jot down some thoughts and ideas; you may discover you have more to say than you initially thought.
6. Foreign Language Learning
Have you always wanted to speak Spanish? Order off your favorite sushi menu in Japanese? Visit your grandparents in Turkey and speak to them in their native language? Have you ever simply wished that you could tell someone you know a second language? Now is a perfect time! There are virtually endless language learning programs available, many that are completely free. Shockingly, a few minutes a day can make a world of difference for your vocabulary and comprehension, and once you finally commit, you will be shocked to see how quickly your language skills grow.
Visit Wowe Lifestyle today to learn more about living an eco-friendly life, and to discover tons of products to help you be green.
