Art and music therapies

Among the things I’ve discovered that will help me to distract myself when my mind is troubled with thoughts, dancing is one that is entertaining and effective. I just have to put on some music, YouTube is really good, and dance. You don’t have to know how to dance to do this. It’s just moving your body, limbs, according to the beat of the music or simply exercising your body with music, anyway you like, just be creative. While I was in the hospital, 50 days in total, I danced everyday in the courtyard. Doing so keeps me agile and I could go back straight to do table tennis and badminton and not find them difficult. One Indian nurse from Fuji saw me dancing and she told me that a feature of Indian dance is that eyes follow the hand movements which in fact is a kind of mindfulness. It is one of the easiest mindfulness things to do for me, and it works. My mind is off ruminating and I feel my mind relaxing.
Another thing I’ve discovered that helps to distract is playing the piano. I find that when I concentrate on playing, trying to hit the right notes, I totally immerse myself in the act and after half an hour or more my mind is relaxed, and I can sleep without having thoughts bothering me. Recently, I have had a breakthrough in piano practising. I used to be very impatient, when I kept making mistakes on some of the pieces I just quit, but these days, instead of quitting, I play slowly in order to eliminate mistakes and I insist on playing to the end. There was this piece, the Fur Elise, which I dreaded attempting to attempt playing because I find it very difficult but now I have started playing it, this is a big breakthrough.
Art, music are such great therapies, find your own and I’m sure it will help as they have helped me greatly.