KEEP THE LOVE ALIVE (Pt. 02)

Part 1 of this article series spoke about how to spread love to others in our spaces, about us all being a light of wholesomeness and love in our little worlds during this time of lockdown and uncertainty in the big world, but what about ourselves?

Welcome to:

Hey Imagine's 21 Days of Goodness:

Over the next 21 days, we're going to share with you the things that the boys are using to try to develop good habits, in order to help you to use this quarantine period to look after the person we care about most (and you should too) - yourself! We're going to focus on four types of skills - fitness, cooking, creative (musical, obviously), and mindfulness. Each segment will be presented by one of the boys, and we'll all be following one another's tips in order to try to look after ourselves as well as possible, and we think you should too!

"It takes 21 days to form a habit" - Maxwell Maltz

What are we on about?!

Most of you will have seen the above mantra, a quote from cosmetic surgeon and author of 'Psycho-Cybernetics' (1960), Maxwell Maltz. To be honest, we don't know exactly how true it is, but the 21-day lockdown that has been instated by our government seems like a good time for us all to test out this theory, so we're going to use it to try to develop the habit of looking after ourselves - body, soul, and mind. We'd love for you to join us, because it's much easier to keep doing this kind of thing when we've got our friends doing it with us! So what will we be doing exactly? Well, reader, read on!

Fitness Friday with Hugo

Starting TODAY, our resident pretty-boy and drummer, Hugo Janssens, will be leading all of us in a good old, home-based workout! We'll post the routine on our Instagram each Friday morning, with video examples of each exercise, for you to follow along to! In addition to this, we'll post a blog post with the full routine, as well as different levels of difficulty for each exercise so that everyone can take part!

Separated Studio Sessions

Every Saturday we're going to post a video on YouTube of the whole band playing a track together remotely. We understand that this sounds a bit unrealistic, but we've got our ways and means. No lock-down will stop us from playing tunes together! Once we post the first one, you'll get what we mean. Whilst this isn't quite as participatory as the rest of the stuff we're going to be up to, this is a reminder to entertain yourself with the things that make you happy, and that nothing is impossible if you really want to do it. Adapt. Improvise. Overcome. We won't be posting one on the 28th of March, as this operation needs time to be done right, and we don;t want to rush it, but we will have one for you for next Saturday.

Soul Sundays with our favourite person, yourself

Yes, we know that that sounds a bit cringe, but seriously. It's super important that you look after yourself during this time of isolation. Consciously make an effort to create a moment of silence for yourself, whether that means sitting at the end of the garden, in your room, or on your roof (if that's safe). It's important to evaluate where you are emotionally, physically etc. during this time, and we want to make sure that you're checking in with yourself on the reg. We'll post some prompts on our story on Sunday morning for you to think about, if you want them, but do your thing.

Musical Mondays with Jono

Every Monday, our favorite musical genius, and the man behind all of our tuneski's, Jono Greyling, is going to teach you one of our songs on the guitar with a YouTube video! He'll show you the chord fingerings for the basic chords, and teach you the words. We'll also post the chord diagrams, along with the lyrics, as a blog post, at the same time as the video. Those of you who have always had your mum's old guitar lying around and never done anything with it, now's your chance to be taught guitar by Jono . . . for free. Learn a new creative skill whilst you're locked away! When you learn it, pop it up on your story, or on Insta, and tag us! If you're really nervous, just send it to us, no matter how shit you think it is, each one genuinely has a chance of reducing four grown(ish)(not really) men to tears.

Thoughtful Tuesdays with Brad

On Tuesdays, our dad-ager, Brad Farrell, will post a blog post with just a couple tips curated from world-renowned authors, designed to help you to bring some order to the madness that three weeks in lockdown is going to bring into at least one part of your life. Whether that's tactics to implement in order to try to bring some normalcy to your day, some basic personal management tips, or some thoughts on quieting our minds in an increasingly noisy world, these will help you to bring some calm and peace to your space.

Whip-up Wednesdays with Greg

Sheesssshhhhh now we're talking! We're all going to be locked inside and eating arguably too much, so you might as well learn to cook a nice, easy, healthy meal, and our bassist (also engineer-in-training, regular pursuant of knowledge & enlightenment and spiritual leader), Greg Dixon is going to take us all on a culinary adventure, each Wednesday. Each Wednesday, we'll post a video where Greggle will teach you how to make a tasty, easy-to-cook vegetarian meal that you can wow the family with! Along with your tutorial video, we'll simultaneously publish the full shopping list, recipe, and any tips that dear Greggy has to offer you, as a blog post. This is a great way to keep yourself busy, learn a new and long-lasting skill, and make sure you're eating at least one tasty, healthy meal in lockdown!

Lockdown Live with Jono

The final installment of the week, each Thursday we'll host an Instagram Live with our frontman Jono. Inspired by the legendary Chris Martin of Coldplay (and now pretty much everyone else), we wanted to be able to provide a little bit of the Hey Imagine experience from the comfort of your couch/bed/garden/attic/wherever the fuck you're hiding from your family. There'll be renditions of some of your favourite Hey Imagine and This Wall Stays tunes, as well as maybe some pre-release teasers, performed as they were written, just Jono and his guitar. We might also get one of the other boys in for a brief moment to say hi, and maybe answer any questions you have, who knows?

We're all in this together, and like we said, it only makes sense to use this time as productively as possible, and its' much easier to develop good habits together! So join us as we try to spread love and kindness, both to those around, us, as well as ourselves.

Keep the Love Alive,

Hey Imagine