Having interests and hobbies is what brings color and vibrancy to life. When people are young, they often enjoy exploring new things and finding out what they’re good at. But as people get older, they often find that they get stuck in the hobbies or pastimes that they’ve always had.
Unfortunately, this isn’t always good for people’s mental or cognitive health. Learning something new is great for the cognitive health of elderly people, especially those in senior living communities. So if you have an elderly loved one that you think could benefit from this, here are three ways to encourage your elderly loved one to develop new interests or hobbies.
Try Their New Hobby With Them
Sometimes, trying something new can be scary and intimidating. Especially if it requires new equipment that they don’t have or haven’t used before, knowing what to do to be successful can be a challenge.
To help your elderly loved one meet this challenge, you could try out their new hobby with them. Particularly if you have already done this thing before or have some knowledge of it, you can make this transition easier and much more enjoyable for your elderly loved one. And, by spending time with one another as you try this new hobby, you can increasingly develop your own relationship with one another.
Help Them Modify When Needed
Not all interests or hobbies are going to be suited for elderly people. But in most cases, adjustments and modifications can be made to help them still find ways to enjoy this hobby.
To do this, you might need to do some of the research and modification yourself so that your elderly loved one can try their hand at their new hobby or interest in a safe and easy way. This might include raising things up higher so they don’t have to bend over as much, adding grips to tools that might require more strength or grip than they presently have, and more.
Encourage Them To Explore
In some cases, a hobby that your elderly loved one thinks that they might like could prove to be not what they had thought it would be. In cases like these, something you can do to help soften the blow is to encourage them to keep exploring.
Hobbies and interests don’t all have to be done in the same way. If your loved one wants to do things a bit differently, encourage them in this. Or, if they want to just try something completely new, this is perfectly fine too.
If you have an elderly loved one that you’d like to see trying out some new hobbies or interests, consider using the tips mentioned above to learn how you can help to facilitate this.
