Kids these days

[Ukecaster]

My daughter's company (big pharma related) is big on employee mental health and wellness. In addition to swag and gift cards always arriving in the mail, they get the day off after each Daylight Savings Time clock change. 1 today, and 1 in the fall! They call them Mental Health Days. Imagine? Wish they had that when I was in the corporate world!

 

[TimWilson]

Mental Health Days. Imagine? Wish they had that when I was in the corporate world!

My experience in the corporate world was that NOTHING was conducive to mental health! 🤣 Good for her and all the other folks who've made things better!

 

[EDW]

If they truly care about their mental health, they should buy everyone a ukulele!

 

[TimWilson]

If they truly care about their mental health, they should buy everyone a ukulele!

🤣 I've said this a few times here before, but I try not to say it too often because it sounds like a joke -- picking up the ukulele in 2020 had as big an effect on me as when my shrink first helped me get my meds adjusted. It's not a joke, though! I'm not kidding even a little.

I don't know that learning ukulele would definitely have the same effect on everyone else that it did on me, in the same way that no one medication works as well for everyone. But I know what it did for me, and it's massive.

Certainly for someone on meds, it's not a straight swap. LOL Doing both is the right idea. But I can easily imagine that a lot of people who might not necessarily benefit from antipsychotics would get a long way toward the balance they're seeking, much more quickly and easily with an ukulele than with counseling alone. 😁

 

[bbkobabe]

Wood-shedding with my uke during the pandemic was key to my mental health during those years...

Nothing like singing every day while playing an instrument to support proper functioning of the human organism. It's a vital for health and balance.

Nothing else can fully replace it.

Dancing while singing along... maybe.

 

[Voran]

I feel this...I have a cold right now and my voice is gone and my mood is in the TOILET. I need to learn some instrumentals.

Wouldn't mind learning some pieces from Riverdance but on a baritone uke.

 

[Wiggy]

My daughter's company (big pharma related) is big on employee mental health and wellness... they get the day off after each Daylight Savings Time clock change. 1 today, and 1 in the fall! They call them Mental Health Days. Imagine? Wish they had that when I was in the corporate world!

If they really cared, they would give 2 floating "mental health days" to be used when you need them most.

Back in the day (70s-80s), I used sick days or vacation time for mental health. In my case, a good walk in the woods (a bonus if it was raining) day seemed to cure what ailed me.

 

[Patty]

🤣 I've said this a few times here before, but I try not to say it too often because it sounds like a joke -- picking up the ukulele in 2020 had as big an effect on me as when my shrink first helped me get my meds adjusted. It's not a joke, though! I'm not kidding even a little.

I don't know that learning ukulele would definitely have the same effect on everyone else that it did on me, in the same way that no one medication works as well for everyone. But I know what it did for me, and it's massive.

Certainly for someone on meds, it's not a straight swap. LOL Doing both is the right idea. But I can easily imagine that a lot of people who might not necessarily benefit from antipsychotics would get a long way toward the balance they're seeking, much more quickly and easily with an ukulele than with counseling alone. 😁

You are so RIGHT, Tim! The uke has helped me enormously in coping with (1) Covid, and (2) living in Florida.

 

[Ukecaster]

More kids these days...my wife is a substitute teacher in our local 4-6 grade elementary school. The other day a fifth grade boy hit another kid at recess, he is taken back to his classroom. The teacher calls the principal, and prepares to bring him there for discipline. 2 minutes after entering the principals office, the kid's mother shows up, and demands that he be dismissed immediately. Apparently, the principal must agree. So, with no discussion at all, the kid gets cut loose. How did Mom know? The kid texted her on his Apple watch! Despite the rules about no phone/device use in the classroom. Imagine, Mommy buys an Apple watch for her fifth grader. WTF? Kids these days.

 

[ploverwing]

More kids these days...my wife is a substitute teacher in our local 4-6 grade elementary school. The other day a fifth grade boy hit another kid at recess, he is taken back to his classroom. The teacher calls the principal, and prepares to bring him there for discipline. 2 minutes after entering the principals office, the kid's mother shows up, and demands that he be dismissed immediately. Apparently, the principal must agree. So, with no discussion at all, the kid gets cut loose. How did Mom know? The kid texted her on his Apple watch! Despite the rules about no phone/device use in the classroom. Imagine, Mommy buys an Apple watch for her fifth grader. WTF? Kids these days.

Really? Wouldn't that be more a parents these days sort of thing? Pftht. What's the poor kid going to learn about this situation? Act out and get rewarded. Great.

 

[Eggs_n_Ham]

My daughter's company (big pharma related) is big on employee mental health and wellness. In addition to swag and gift cards always arriving in the mail, they get the day off after each Daylight Savings Time clock change. 1 today, and 1 in the fall! They call them Mental Health Days. Imagine? Wish they had that when I was in the corporate world!

I'm retired from healthcare 12 hour shifts- we self-scheduled. Always scheduled myself off the day of DST when you "spring forward" an hour!

 

[Eggs_n_Ham]

🤣 I've said this a few times here before, but I try not to say it too often because it sounds like a joke -- picking up the ukulele in 2020 had as big an effect on me as when my shrink first helped me get my meds adjusted. It's not a joke, though! I'm not kidding even a little.

I don't know that learning ukulele would definitely have the same effect on everyone else that it did on me, in the same way that no one medication works as well for everyone. But I know what it did for me, and it's massive.

Certainly for someone on meds, it's not a straight swap. LOL Doing both is the right idea. But I can easily imagine that a lot of people who might not necessarily benefit from antipsychotics would get a long way toward the balance they're seeking, much more quickly and easily with an ukulele than with counseling alone. 😁

So glad you're here! you're a right ol' champ running this board I must say! I agree with you, learning to play ukulele is such a good thing- maybe learning any instrument is a good thing I don't know but, I have come to really love the uke and the community that embraces it.

 

[TimWilson]

So glad you're here! you're a right ol' champ running this board I must say! I agree with you, learning to play ukulele is such a good thing- maybe learning any instrument is a good thing I don't know

That's very kind of you, thanks! Some personal setbacks have slowed my work on further developing the site, but thank goodness it's only a broken bone! 🤣 The healing path for that is a little more, shall we say, linear than my mental health journey.

Ukulele isn't the first instrument I've tried to learn. It's just the one that stuck. I enjoyed trying to learn piano, even though I didn't get very far with it. (I think I might have with a different teacher, although I'm grateful to the one I had for as far as I got.) Guitar wasn't an especially good fit. I tried multiple times, both folky (metal strings) and classical (I think nylon? but might have been gut for all I know - it was a looong time ago LOL), but I couldn't get it to stick. There were a few other instruments I tried, with the same result.

For ukulele, I think it was a combination of being easier to start with, and being smaller. There was something so sweet and cuddly about the mahogany soprano I started with that just made all the inner knots start unwinding. It helped a LOT that I was making something resembling music from the start.

I'm still exploring other sizes and woods, and suspect I may land on a 5 or 8 stringer as my daily driver some day, but it really does feel different than the other things I tried. Instead of a chore to learn, it feels like a balm. I'd like to get a lot better, and I'm happy enough with my progress...but I don't actually need to get a lot better to get what I need from the ukulele. That's pretty amazing to me!

It was also never the case for me with either piano or guitar. For whatever reasons, I just couldn't climb up to a skill level where I enjoyed hearing myself play. Starting ukulele forty whatever years later, less physically and mentally nimble than when I tried to learn before, I still was having real live fun almost immediately, and achieving genuine relief that I wasn't expecting. Kinda hoping for, mind you, but still. That seemed like an awful lot to ask from such a little instrument, but here we are.

 

[ploverwing]

It helped a LOT that I was making something resembling music from the start.

I'm still exploring other sizes and woods, and suspect I may land on a 5 or 8 stringer as my daily driver some day, but it really does feel different than the other things I tried. Instead of a chore to learn, it feels like a balm. I'd like to get a lot better, and I'm happy enough with my progress...but I don't actually need to get a lot better to get what I need from the ukulele. That's pretty amazing to me!

It was also never the case for me with either piano or guitar. For whatever reasons, I just couldn't climb up to a skill level where I enjoyed hearing myself play. Starting ukulele forty whatever years later, less physically and mentally nimble than when I tried to learn before, I still was having real live fun almost immediately, and achieving genuine relief that I wasn't expecting. Kinda hoping for, mind you, but still. That seemed like an awful lot to ask from such a little instrument, but here we are.

All of this. It's so satisfying to relatively quickly be able to make some pretty musical sounds out of this glorious little instrument! I mean, it's also extremely frustrating to slam up against a developmental wall, but it's still a fun instrument to play, so I can tolerate those plateaus a bit better than on other instruments. I'm so glad you're here, and that the ukulele is helping to keep your mental health just that little bit healthier.

 

[TimWilson]

I'm so glad you're here, and that the ukulele is helping to keep your mental health just that little bit healthier.

Thanks so much! I'm glad to be "here" in general too, and here specifically in the UU forums too! It wouldn't be nearly as much fun without your generous support and your kindness towards me, and your creative diligence as a fellow mod.

Good stuff ahead! ☺️

 

[ailevin]

I spent 29 years working for a large corporation, and there were many aspects of the job and the environment that worked out well for me. However, somehow having corporate and mental health in the same phrase just seems wrong. Early on in my career, someone explained that employees often fall into the delusion that they have a relationship with an organization or some bureaucractic structure because they identify with that organization and/or feel loyal to that organization. You really only have relationships and reciprocity of things like trust with people in the workplace. In the often heard refrain, "How could they does this to me?" the they is usually an abstraction that is being treated as if it were a person. Oh and then there is the Human Relations department. I worked with some good and caring people in HR, but HR is short for The Minimize Legal Exposure After Bad Behavior Particularly by Managers and Executives Department.

This set of forums seems much better suited my own mental health, and I appreciate degree of realtionship that is possible here enabled by the folks running the place and fueled by the passion for ukuleles.

 

[Eggs_n_Ham]

I feel this...I have a cold right now and my voice is gone and my mood is in the TOILET. I need to learn some instrumentals.

Wouldn't mind learning some pieces from Riverdance but on a baritone

That's very kind of you, thanks! Some personal setbacks have slowed my work on further developing the site, but thank goodness it's only a broken bone! 🤣 The healing path for that is a little more, shall we say, linear than my mental health journey.

Ukulele isn't the first instrument I've tried to learn. It's just the one that stuck. I enjoyed trying to learn piano, even though I didn't get very far with it. (I think I might have with a different teacher, although I'm grateful to the one I had for as far as I got.) Guitar wasn't an especially good fit. I tried multiple times, both folky (metal strings) and classical (I think nylon? but might have been gut for all I know - it was a looong time ago LOL), but I couldn't get it to stick. There were a few other instruments I tried, with the same result.

For ukulele, I think it was a combination of being easier to start with, and being smaller. There was something so sweet and cuddly about the mahogany soprano I started with that just made all the inner knots start unwinding. It helped a LOT that I was making something resembling music from the start.

I'm still exploring other sizes and woods, and suspect I may land on a 5 or 8 stringer as my daily driver some day, but it really does feel different than the other things I tried. Instead of a chore to learn, it feels like a balm. I'd like to get a lot better, and I'm happy enough with my progress...but I don't actually need to get a lot better to get what I need from the ukulele. That's pretty amazing to me!

It was also never the case for me with either piano or guitar. For whatever reasons, I just couldn't climb up to a skill level where I enjoyed hearing myself play. Starting ukulele forty whatever years later, less physically and mentally nimble than when I tried to learn before, I still was having real live fun almost immediately, and achieving genuine relief that I wasn't expecting. Kinda hoping for, mind you, but still. That seemed like an awful lot to ask from such a little instrument, but here we are.

Starting ukulele forty whatever years later, less physically and mentally nimble than when I tried to learn before, I still was having real live fun almost immediately, and achieving genuine relief that I wasn't expecting.

Absolutely. I think most people have a natural penchant to learn an instrument, particularly wanting to fulfill an innate musicality. Either we simply never find the "right" fit or even more, life gets in the way, one way or another. I simply decided one day to try ukulele after giving up on learning the ocarina (fun to play but I couldn't see what I was doing with my hands). Ukulele! As you describe it, "real live fun".

I've realized and happily accepted I'll never play like most- or all- of the youtube uke teachers. what I am doing is working and gives me great satisfaction. My poor cats will be kitty saints in heaven as they patiently tolerate my daily repetitions of F to Bb and "I've been working on the railroad".