Self-Care Tip: Swimming

Another self-care idea that's on the more physical side is swimming. Some benefits to swimming, not focusing on the pillars of wellness, is that it can be fairly affordable depending on where you go swimming. I used to live 10 minutes from this small beach and that's free. There's also a variety of activities that you are able to do, such as water volleyball or Marco Polo. You can also decide to spend time with friends or swim alone if wanted. This is also a great activity for kids as it is usually seen as a fun activity and is not as formal as other exercise options may be.

Now, going through the health benefits, swimming works your whole body and builds your strength and endurance while toning muscles. Swimming also strengthens your heart and lungs and is a low-impact exercise that makes it safer injuries or other conditions that make high-impact exercises difficult or dangerous. This is because the water is only a gentle resistance when swimming and other exercises, such as water aerobics, the water can lend a feeling of weightlessness that helps in recovery and flexibility.

More health benefits is that swimming can boost moods and lower stress using natural endorphins released through exercise. This also improves your sleep quality as exercise can tire you out, and again is safe for those who can't usually do other exercises. Swimming has also been proven to make people smarter as kids who swim had better fine motor skills, confidence, and were further along in their physical development. 

The pillars of wellness that this addresses is physical, emotional, social, and intellectual. The physical pillar is addressed as this is classified as an exercise and swimming does have many physical health benefits as previously talked about. The emotional pillar is addressed as this exercise releases natural endorphins and that helped boost moods, lower stress, and swimming improves sleep quality which can also help. Next, the social pillar is addressed as people generally swim with others or do activities with others. This can be further addressed if you are in a class and meeting new people through swimming. The intellectual pillar is addressed regarding kids having better fine motor skills sooner than kids who did not swim. 

To get started, I will be using my personal experience as that is how I learnt to swim. First, the best thing to do is to enroll kids within swimming lessons and classes to build those muscles and learn to swim safely. Kids younger than one year can start even by just learning to float and lay on their back with their head up, which helps negate the risk of a baby falling in a pool and drowning. As an adult, for more professional swimming, finding a new pool, you would need to learn the pool etiquette such as pool lanes, entering and exiting correctly, and diving. If there's ever questions though, lifeguards are there to help.

So, this is an activity I take part in and I tend to find it very relaxing. I don't mind going swimming by myself, I more like the feeling of the water and I like that sweat isn't a big deal as the reason I hate exercise is mainly due to the feeling of sweat. I love being able to have fun doing exercise and that swimming is more loose so if I leave early, I don't feel like I failed in my workout in any way. I do realize that this relaxes me so much as my brain has made the connection that swimming equals no worrying, so even nowadays, I can't seem to worry much.

My resources used were: 

Hansen, S. (2022, October 27). What are the benefits of swimming for your mind and body? Lifehack. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.lifehack.org/articles/lifestyle/ten-benefits-swimming-you-may-not-know-about.html

Marcin, A. (2017, September 9). 12 benefits of swimming: Weight loss, health, and more. Healthline. Retrieved November 13, 2022, from https://www.healthline.com/health/benefits-of-swimming#get-started