What Lessons Can Anglers Teach Us?
Fishing is a popular hobby that millions of people around the world use as a way to escape the hustle and bustle of their busy lives.
In the United States alone, 49 million people go fishing, accounting for around 15% of the population. This is three times more than the number of people who play baseball and more than nine times more than people who play football.
It is a way to get out into nature, find peace and be away from the bright lights and congested streets of modern towns and cities. Fishing can also be a way to bond with friends and even learn more about the planet.
Fishing has many transferable skills that can be applied to other areas of life though, providing benefits you may not have previously realized. Here are some of those.
Stay Focused
An angler must learn to stay focused when fishing. By having a plan while out fishing and sticking to it, you’ll have much better chances of catching that trophy than you will when making mistakes due to a lack of focus.
Staying focused is an important part of many things in life, you must be able to maintain concentration while driving when taking a test, and focusing on tasks at work.
Decision making is also an important part of strategy games like poker, requiring the player to remain calm and focused. Instead of trying to win each game, they should focus on trying to play to the best of their ability in every game. Acting on emotion can result in undesirable outcomes, for example chasing a loss out of frustration, or getting overconfident after a few wins. These situations will only lead to more losses for a poker player.
In our modern world of instant gratification, served by smartphones, 1-day shipping, and social media, fishing can help us regain our ability to keep our focus.
Relieve Stress
Modern lives can be very stressful, particularly as we try to cram more and more into the finite amount of time that a day avails to us. Fishing is a great way to escape this, taking us out into the natural surroundings of the countryside, where the air is cleaner and the background noise is made up of the chirps of birds.
The lack of distractions and being disconnected from the outside world help anglers to clear their minds of their daily troubles, enabling them to stay in the present at the moment.
Self-Reliance
For millennia, humans had to hunt, scavenge and fish for their food, there were no convenient supermarkets or fast-food restaurants in existence, never mindsight. This meant it was a matter of survival for us to develop the skills required to live off the land. However, modern conveniences slowly started to make these skills redundant.
In many western countries, people don’t keep animals for food or grow their own vegetables. Fishing is a way to get some of these skills back. Anglers must be able to navigate through nature and survive in the wilderness (if only for a short period of time).
Experiences Are Better When We Share Them
Fishing can be done alone, but it is a much more enjoyable experience when it is shared with others. Anglers often enjoy fishing with their friends and loved ones and the skills are often handed down through generations.
It continues to be a way for friends to share experiences together, enjoying the tranquillity of nature and working together to get a good catch. This can be applied to other areas of life too, spending time with loved ones to make memories that we’ll cherish forever is an important part of our journey through life.
Fishing can teach us many things, from being more focused on being more self-reliant. It is a pastime that can help us get more from our lives practically, socially and emotionally. No wonder it is one of the world’s most popular activities.
