From experience I know that knitting helps me cope with stress and depression. The calmness of the repetition of stitches and stress-relief that the act of knitting brings to me – the concentration blocking out negative or over- thinking, as well as the pride and satisfaction of achieving the finished article combatting feelings of worthlessness has helped me through tough times. I have found academic research that supports my theory, most of which I covered in my academic paper as part of my CERP. I will share it here as whilst it is a duplication, it is the basis on which my patterns were designed:
I have always turned to knitting or crochet to escape stress, anxiety and pressure. During my career in financial services – a very stressful working environment – my colleagues would think me strange for knitting in my lunch hour while they went to the pub for a glass of wine! I had always just thought of this as my way of relaxing or meditating – an instinct – I knew nothing of the concept of a ‘state of flow’ and it hadn’t occurred to me that this might be a subject that had been researched until I started reading academically upon my return to education and started my university degree. In his book “Creativity; The Psychology of Discovery and Invention by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, in chapter 5; The Flow of Creativity, he asks what is enjoyment in relation to tasks that we do because we enjoy them and not because we are rewarded with money or fame. He lists 9 main elements that were repeatedly mentioned in his studies, all of which I could relate to my knitting. This made me understand why I knitted and why it made me feel better when relaxing on a sofa or going for a drink in the pub didn’t.
- There are clear goals at every step of the way. When knitting from a pattern, it is clear what you need to do to complete each section.
- There is immediate feedback to one’s actions. You can see whether the stitches you have created are doing what they are supposed to.
- There is a balance between challenges and skills. I am an experienced knitter with a high level of skill, but there are always stitches or stitch combinations I haven’t tried before. I never feel that a challenge is beyond me or get bored at the lack of challenge.
- Action and awareness are merged. When knitting I am concentrating on the task at hand, watching the yarn, needles, my fingers and what I am doing with them in order to create the required stitch pattern.
- Distractions are excluded from consciousness. This one is a bit less clearcut for me – if I am working on a complex or challenging pattern then this is absolutely true – I am totally focused on the knitting, however if it is simple and familiar then I can think of other things. My thoughts tend to be calmer though and as he says, relieved of “the usual fears that cause depression and anxiety in everyday life”
- There is no worry of failure. I know my skills are adequate to complete the pattern and it never occurs to me that I won’t be able to. I know how to fix mistakes and adapt patterns should the need arise, so I never worry.
- Self-consciousness disappears. Despite the initial smirks of colleagues I was quite content to knit without worrying about what they thought – it took me a place where I didn’t care and wasn’t even really aware of anyone’s presence around me.
- The sense of time becomes distorted. A 10 minute knitting break could feel like an hour, an hour long break could feel like 10 mins.
- The activity becomes autotelic. I enjoy knitting more for the actual process of knitting than desiring the finished article. If I have no pattern I will happily grab yarn and needles and just knit with no end goal.
Laury Rappaport was recommended as someone that I should research, and a title of his “Focusing – Oriented Art Therapy: Accessing the Body’s Wisdom & Creative Intelligence” sounded appropriate to my research. From this I learned that from the perspective of an Art Therapist, “Focusing” is the act of deliberately clearing the mind and listening to the inner ‘felt sense’ rather than the mind.
As per point 5 above, sometimes when I knit I believe I do this instinctively. My mind focuses on my practice, my inner monologue is reading the pattern but in the background my inner ‘felt sense’ is often detachedly mulling over issues without emotions and without forcing a resolution.
I was also moved by reading ‘Why We Make Things and Why it Matters” by Peter Korn. Whilst Korns craft is carpentry, I drew parallels with my experiences in knitting. From reading this book I gained new insight – that achieving a state of flow by focussing on making an object from someone else’s instructions (which I interpreted as following a knitting pattern) is different from and fulfils a different human need to actually creating something without instructions (which I interpreted as designing my own knitting pattern). Introspectively I know I need to meet both of these human needs.
He also introduced me to the writing of others, for example this quote from Richard Sennett in The Craftsman. Korn says “In particular, Sennett critiques current social and economic conditions for depriving workers of the satisfactions inherent to “doing a job well for its own sake”, which is the essence he distils from craft.” (Korn, 2015, p11) This resonated with me as whilst I did get satisfaction from my career in financial advice, I get quite a different sense of fulfilment and satisfaction from making with my hands. Office jobs never really give a worker a sense of achievement – for every task completed, another 10 will appear and there is often no physical object to give a sense of accomplishment – a query resolved, a deal agreed or a meeting arranged is a very short-lived win. I feel this gives evidence to my thoughts that participating in crafts is a vital antidote to the stresses of a modern day working life.
Korn goes on to provide a reason why he agrees with Sennett, quoting Matthew Crawford as saying in his book Shop Class as Soulcraft (now re-issued under the title The Case For Working With Your Hands: Why office work is bad for us and fixing things feels good) “Creative thought and decision making are centralised into the hands of small cohorts of experts, so that only rote work gets distributed amongst the worker bees. As a result, the average white-collar employee feels, accurately, like a replaceable cog in a soulless machine”. Having now read the full book I have found much of what he says rings true with my own experience. What is valued in todays workforce is an ability to multitask and work cross disciplinarily. Expertise in a specific area is welcomed, as long as you can put your hand to other areas when needed. Great for the company, but creating additional pressures and anxiety for the individual – no-one is irreplaceable and there is always someone ready to step into your role.
So having evidenced that there was academic research into crafting helping combat the stresses of modern life, I wondered if anyone had actually tested these theories on people.
My research led me to an online article published in 2015 by Sinikka Hannele Pollanen regarding a study she conducted with 15 textile craft makers aged 27–57 who reported their life circumstances, stress levels and whether the stress was work related or not, alongside their crafting activity. “The findings show that crafts can have elements that help to manage stress through the production of an artifact and by giving peaceful time to intellectual work.”
I also found a journal by Jill Riley, Betsan Corkhill & Clare Morris published in 2013 entitled The Benefits of Knitting for Personal and Social Wellbeing in Adulthood: Findings from an International Survey. They posted a survey on a specifically targeted knitting website and received 3,545 responses from people all over the world and a broad demographic range. Their conclusions from the survey were that “engaging in frequent knitting has the potential to induce feelings of calm and relaxation and to raise mood. It can also contribute to stress relief. Knitting products are an outlet for creativity and knitting can help individuals to engage on a social level: virtually, through the internet, and in real time through knitting with others”.
The social aspect of knitting has been highlighted by the lockdowns associated with the Covid Pandemic. The regular Knit and Natter or Stitch ‘n Bitch groups that most villages and towns have, often organised by yarn shops obviously couldn’t take place, however they were easily moved online to Zoom or Teams, providing a lifeline connection to the world outside the home. There have also been many “KALs” (knitalongs) on social media, where people across the world have all knitted the same pattern at the same time, chatting and sharing their progress in member only groups set up especially for the project.
clairemaloney 