Speaker 1: Hello everybody, Welcome back to the show. Welcome back to
Speaker 1: the podcast, new listeners, old listeners. Wherever you are in
Speaker 1: the world, it is so great to have you here.
Speaker 1: Back for another episode as we of course break down
Speaker 1: the psychology of your twenties. This topic has been a
Speaker 1: long time coming. It has been on my list of
Speaker 1: things that I really want to talk about for a while,
Speaker 1: and today we are finally getting around to doing it.
Speaker 1: We're going to be talking about the psychology of hobbies
Speaker 1: and how essential they are not just for your wellbeing,
Speaker 1: but for this decade of life. I think personally that
Speaker 1: hobbies are just as important as our friendships during our twenties.
Speaker 1: But despite that, we really do struggle. You and I,
Speaker 1: both of us can acknowledge that we struggle to devote
Speaker 1: the necessary time to them to doing our hobbies. We
Speaker 1: wish that we had more kind of things that we
Speaker 1: love to do in our free time. For me, personally,
Speaker 1: I feel like I collect hobbies almost like their trinkets.
Speaker 1: Like I have so many hobbies on rotation that I
Speaker 1: adore and that I love doing, but I don't always
Speaker 1: get the chance to actually do them, And you know,
Speaker 1: I'll drop them every now and again and then pick
Speaker 1: them back up like six months later. And what I've
Speaker 1: really begun to realize is that the times when I'm
Speaker 1: not actively doing my hobbies are the times when my
Speaker 1: life kind of suffers. Often it's that my life feels
Speaker 1: like it's all centered on work and my relationships and
Speaker 1: my responsibilities, and we need something deeper than that. We
Speaker 1: need projects, we need creativity, We need to be using
Speaker 1: different parts of our brain. And there are just so
Speaker 1: many benefits that hobbies bring. You think that something so
Speaker 1: small and so playful of it and so fun couldn't
Speaker 1: be so powerful. But I think actually enjoying your life
Speaker 1: is one of those crucial, you know, secret parts of
Speaker 1: being healthy physically, of being more rounded, a more interesting,
Speaker 1: fulfilled person. Hobbies play a big role in that, and
Speaker 1: it's so easy to see. Our well being is like
Speaker 1: physical health, mental health, seeing friends, but having fun, being creative,
Speaker 1: doing something else with your time is significant. I also
Speaker 1: feel like hobbies are so great for reconnecting with your
Speaker 1: inner child. They make you feel curious, they're grateful, connecting
Speaker 1: with others. They use new parts of your brain that
Speaker 1: lay dormant whilst you're at work. You know the list
Speaker 1: goes on. So today we're going to talk about the hidden,
Speaker 1: the psychological benefits of the hobbies that you may not know,
Speaker 1: the different types of hobbies, different categories of hobbies that
Speaker 1: are really actually quite fascinating when you get into it,
Speaker 1: and why it is that we struggle so much to
Speaker 1: get engaged in them. Why it is so much easier
Speaker 1: to consume, to watch television, to watch Instagram reels, to
Speaker 1: watch tiktoks, why that has become the status quo, and
Speaker 1: how we can overcome the three major barriers that are
Speaker 1: stopping us from doing our hobbies. I'm energized by this episode.
Speaker 1: I am excited by this episode. I want us all
Speaker 1: to leave, ready to try something new, to get your
Speaker 1: hands dirty, to get playful, get active, whatever it is. So,
Speaker 1: without further ado, let's dive into all of the psychology
Speaker 1: behind why we need hobbies, especially in our twenties. Let's
Speaker 1: begin with the basics. Something so simple that it might
Speaker 1: seem silly. What is a hobby? What does that even
Speaker 1: mean in this day and age. That's where we really
Speaker 1: have to begin, And it's actually not a stupid question,
Speaker 1: because surprisingly, the very definition of what makes up a
Speaker 1: hobby is up for debate. I think the debate is
Speaker 1: actually best summarized by whether you think watch movies is
Speaker 1: a hobby or not, Because some people say, yes, of
Speaker 1: course it is. It's like quite educational, you can get
Speaker 1: quite intellectual about it, and other people would be like, yeah, absolutely, no, way,
Speaker 1: that's way too passive to be a hobby. Think about
Speaker 1: your answer, because it actually points to a really important
Speaker 1: distinction between what makes up a hobby and what does it.
Speaker 1: We can all agree that a hobby is something we
Speaker 1: do with our free time that we naturally enjoy. It
Speaker 1: also can't be related to work, and some people would
Speaker 1: even say it can't be related to anything that you
Speaker 1: need to do, anything that is essential that you need
Speaker 1: for survival. So I love grocery shopping, right, and I
Speaker 1: do that in my free time, But it's not a
Speaker 1: hobby because it's something that is essential. So hobbies are
Speaker 1: their own unique form of, you know, leisure that is
Speaker 1: not purpose driven. The debate I mentioned before is also
Speaker 1: about whether a hobby requires some kind of effort or
Speaker 1: energy to be considered a hobby. So there is very
Speaker 1: little mental effort that goes into being on your phone
Speaker 1: or scrolling or watching TV and so people would say
Speaker 1: there's not an active commitment. You're not really getting something
Speaker 1: out because you're not putting anything in. But maybe you
Speaker 1: know foreign films that festivals would count because it does
Speaker 1: require some kind of cognitive expenditure. Hopefully that makes sense.
Speaker 1: It's really that debate abound what crosses the line, And
Speaker 1: if you want my opinion, I'm a bit of a
Speaker 1: hobby traditionalist. I do think that your hobbies kind of
Speaker 1: require something extra. They require you to like switch on
Speaker 1: your brain or your body or your creativity in a
Speaker 1: way that you know, a passive act like watching TV
Speaker 1: or being on your phone doesn't like it's active. If
Speaker 1: you don't agree, obviously, it would love to hear from you,
Speaker 1: because I know that there is differing opinions. But basically,
Speaker 1: it's something that you find fun, that you do in
Speaker 1: your leisure time, that you do regularly, which we'll get
Speaker 1: to later, and that uses some part of your brain
Speaker 1: or your body which is not related to work or
Speaker 1: something essential. Something really fascinating at least I think it's fascinating.
Speaker 1: But something fascinating that I discovered is about how certain
Speaker 1: people think about hobbies, especially sociologists, and how they group
Speaker 1: them so there are actually three different types of hobbies
Speaker 1: or hobbyists people who do hobbies. According to this book,
Speaker 1: which is a whole book on the psychology and the
Speaker 1: sociology of hobbies published in twenty fifteen, there is the
Speaker 1: casual leisure kind of hobby that is fun, you know,
Speaker 1: maybe short lived, doesn't really require a lot of preparation
Speaker 1: or money. So like you might go and play basketball
Speaker 1: at a community court once a week, or you swim
Speaker 1: at the local pool, you play board game, you make
Speaker 1: some kind of art like coloring in. That is casual leisure.
Speaker 1: Then we get a bit more serious, and this is
Speaker 1: very properly called serious leisure hobbies. These are the kinds
Speaker 1: of hobbies that require a bit more effort, a bit
Speaker 1: more money as well to be rewarding. Like ceramics there
Speaker 1: is do you have to pay for the tools, you
Speaker 1: have to pay for the equipment, or horse riding or
Speaker 1: scuba diving. It can also describe people who have taken
Speaker 1: a casual leisure hobby so like bike riding and made
Speaker 1: it a lot more serious. You know, you can get
Speaker 1: a fifty dollars secondhand bike on Facebook marketplace and like
Speaker 1: ride it around your neighborhood, and that can be a hobby.
Speaker 1: Or for example, you don't have a friend Felix who
Speaker 1: spends so much money on bikes and equipment and he
Speaker 1: does races and he has gels and outfits, like you know,
Speaker 1: he's at that serious leisure level. I'm going to make
Speaker 1: an argument that even like a hobby like reading can
Speaker 1: become serious leisure. And we're seeing that more with like
Speaker 1: the popularity of book talk, where like people build whole
Speaker 1: rooms for their books, they collect them, they have these
Speaker 1: long term yearly reading goals of like one hundred two
Speaker 1: hundred books like that has to cost money. And I
Speaker 1: was speaking to a friend about this recently who was saying,
Speaker 1: and she's like a huge avid reader, and she was saying,
Speaker 1: how that culture has really taken the fun out of
Speaker 1: reading and like and the fun of book clubs and
Speaker 1: of the community, because it's not leisure anymore. It's almost
Speaker 1: like work. It's almost like competition amongst other people in
Speaker 1: the community. Just a quick sidebar. I thought that was
Speaker 1: very interesting. But finally, we have project based leisure. That's
Speaker 1: our final category. And this is short term. It's often
Speaker 1: one off projects that are rewarding, like building lego sets,
Speaker 1: volunteering for sports events, or like building a really elaborate garden.
Speaker 1: You know, you just you can't do that every day.
Speaker 1: You might only do it like three to four times
Speaker 1: a year, but it is still like an ongoing project
Speaker 1: based hobby. So that brings us to another fascinating debate.
Speaker 1: How many hobbies should you have and how often should
Speaker 1: you be doing them? This definitely like varies on age.
Speaker 1: I feel like we all have the experience of being
Speaker 1: a kid or a teenager and having seemingly like thousands
Speaker 1: of hobbies that are then replaced by work and replaced
Speaker 1: by like the other things that we need to do
Speaker 1: day in and day out as we get older. But
Speaker 1: then I think as we reach like an older age,
Speaker 1: almost becoming elderly, all of our hobbies come back. And
Speaker 1: I am going to use the example of my grandma
Speaker 1: as a prime opportunity to explain this. That woman is
Speaker 1: so busy. She is bustling doing sheet gardens, she paints, volunteers,
Speaker 1: she reads, bakes, go to the gym, even like seventy eight.
Speaker 1: So it's kind of like it definitely differs across our lifespan.
Speaker 1: But if we are following the law of averages. Researchers
Speaker 1: will typically say that two to five hobbies is the
Speaker 1: sweet spot. You should have between two to five things
Speaker 1: that you're really passionate about and then maybe a few
Speaker 1: other things that you do you know occasionally. So one
Speaker 1: study from twenty ten that was actually the first of
Speaker 1: its kind, it basically tried to find the golden number
Speaker 1: for hobbies and fascinatingly, interestingly shockingly, they found that the
Speaker 1: limit does not exist as long as you have the
Speaker 1: space and the time. The more hobbies you do, the
Speaker 1: more improvements you will see to your physical and psychological health.
Speaker 1: It's all so associated with less stress, lower blood pressure.
Speaker 1: That's what having more hobbies and more leisure time brings you.
Speaker 1: I think the more leisure time is also an important factor.
Speaker 1: These are all things that you know. We really want
Speaker 1: to say, so basically, as long as you have the space,
Speaker 1: you can have as many hobbies as you want and
Speaker 1: still be benefiting. There is another formula that you've probably
Speaker 1: heard as well, another like golden number for hobbies, and
Speaker 1: that is the formula of four. We need four hobbies.
Speaker 1: A hobby to keep you physically fit, a hobby to
Speaker 1: stay creative, a hobby to stay mentally fit, and a
Speaker 1: hobby to make money. I tried so hard to try
Speaker 1: and figure out who said this first. I think nowadays
Speaker 1: it's just common wisdom. And I love the first three.
Speaker 1: My hobby to keep me fit is boxing in the gym,
Speaker 1: and then I do ceramics to stay creative, and I
Speaker 1: read and I listen to podcasts, I read journals to
Speaker 1: like keep myself mentally fit. But the last one hobby
Speaker 1: to make you money. I do have a small issue
Speaker 1: with including that because I think when you make money
Speaker 1: from a hobby, you lose the implicit natural enjoyment that
Speaker 1: is meant to bring. And I actually say that as
Speaker 1: someone who made one of their hobbies like a full
Speaker 1: time job. You know, this podcast used to be purely
Speaker 1: a leisure activity. I posted what I wanted, not as
Speaker 1: frequently as I do now. It was just super random
Speaker 1: topics that I'd cover and I'd literally have my friends
Speaker 1: on as guests, and then a lot of you tuned in.
Speaker 1: Thank you for doing that, and it became my full
Speaker 1: time job. This is what I want to say about that,
Speaker 1: and I want to caveat by saying I absolutely love
Speaker 1: what I do, but when you start doing the thing
Speaker 1: that you used to do purely for enjoyment as a
Speaker 1: way to make money. You have got to love it
Speaker 1: at least like two hundred percent, because when money and
Speaker 1: fine answers get involved, it is naturally going to become
Speaker 1: stressful and you will lose I would like to say,
Speaker 1: one hundred percent of the love. So you have to
Speaker 1: be at a two hundred percent level to afford to
Speaker 1: lose one hundred percent of the love, so that you're
Speaker 1: still full of passion for it. So you you know,
Speaker 1: you've still got to make sure you have that motivation.
Speaker 1: You're naturally going to lose that when it becomes a job.
Speaker 1: And it's really really common that this happens, especially amongst
Speaker 1: people who are creators or musicians, or people who are
Speaker 1: sports people athletes. I love that. I didn't know the
Speaker 1: word for that. Athletes for me. I you know, I
Speaker 1: had like basically a hobby crisis when the podcast became
Speaker 1: my full time job, like almost two years ago now,
Speaker 1: because it was all I cared about. It was all
Speaker 1: I cared about. It was the thing I really loved doing,
Speaker 1: and then it became additionally my source of financial security
Speaker 1: or lack their and it made it pretty exhausting because additionally,
Speaker 1: I think nothing had taken its place in my life
Speaker 1: as the thing that I just purely did for the
Speaker 1: pleasure of it. There was nothing leisure based that I
Speaker 1: was doing outside of this because it was taking a
Speaker 1: while for everything to kind of line up or kind
Speaker 1: of settle into place. And that is when I think
Speaker 1: I had this whole crisis of like, who am I?
Speaker 1: What do I even stand for? That isn't work? And
Speaker 1: I made it a real thing that I was dedicating
Speaker 1: myself to. I was dedicating myself to my hobbies. I
Speaker 1: started pottery, I started swimming in the ocean again. I
Speaker 1: started boxing because I didn't want to lose myself any
Speaker 1: further in that process. So why do we need to
Speaker 1: do this? Why do we need to spend time, devote time,
Speaker 1: prioritize time for our hobbies and speaking from a psychological, emotional,
Speaker 1: even physical perspective, what are the benefit We are going
Speaker 1: to talk about all of that and more after this shortbreak.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna hold your hand when I say this, but
Speaker 1: your life will never be truly fulfilling if all you
Speaker 1: have is work and your relationships. Both of those things
Speaker 1: are really crucial, But you need something that's just about you.
Speaker 1: You need more flavor, you need more excitement. That is
Speaker 1: what hobbies are for. Especially in our twenties, there is
Speaker 1: this very important developmental transition we experience where work becomes
Speaker 1: the predominant activity in our lives, and naturally it takes
Speaker 1: over a lot of our identity. And that makes sense.
Speaker 1: If you're spending eight hours plus at your job every day,
Speaker 1: that is a big chunk of your time that it's
Speaker 1: going to be consumed with whatever it is you're doing
Speaker 1: data entry, talking to people, solving problems, helping people, moving things,
Speaker 1: whatever it is. There was a really great article from
Speaker 1: Yale University that spoke about how this is particularly a
Speaker 1: problem for those of us who are relatively early on
Speaker 1: in our careers because there's that implicit fear of failure
Speaker 1: that drives us to center our lives on work and
Speaker 1: achieving what is expected of us. This intense like drive
Speaker 1: and focus, it forces our identity to ultimately become synonymous
Speaker 1: with what we do for a living. I remember when
Speaker 1: I was working as a consultant, like someone asked me,
Speaker 1: like two years into working this job, what do you
Speaker 1: do for fun? And I had to really think about
Speaker 1: it and then I had to make it up because
Speaker 1: at that point work was everything to me. Yes, I
Speaker 1: wouldn't like see my friends. I would go out for drinks,
Speaker 1: I would go out for dinner, I'd go to the gym.
Speaker 1: But there wasn't much more. There wasn't much that was
Speaker 1: individual to me. And that is a big risk of
Speaker 1: not having hobbies. You stop being someone who has time mention,
Speaker 1: and that brings me to a huge benefit having a hobby.
Speaker 1: Having a couple allows you to build an intentional life
Speaker 1: outside of Korea and outside your work. Think of yourself
Speaker 1: and your life as like containing five buckets. You have
Speaker 1: your relationships, you have your work, your wellbeing, personal growth,
Speaker 1: and then you have fun, you have leisure. Your way
Speaker 1: to a balanced life is to pour as equally as
Speaker 1: you can into each of these buckets. But you kind
Speaker 1: of never get more water, So at any given time,
Speaker 1: the amount of water you have to distribute across all
Speaker 1: these things is going to be the same. You can
Speaker 1: pour from one bucket into another, you can empty a bucket,
Speaker 1: but when these buckets are uneven, we suffer. If you
Speaker 1: keep pouring into the work bucket, you have to pull
Speaker 1: from the health bucket. You have to pour from the
Speaker 1: personal growth bucket, from your leisure bucket, your relationships will suffer.
Speaker 1: By having those hobbies that we enjoy and make time for,
Speaker 1: we balance out all the other buckets. We make sure
Speaker 1: that no one bucket ever gets too big that it
Speaker 1: consumes all the liquid or the water, all the energy.
Speaker 1: One study, for example, looked at the relationship between when
Speaker 1: you work really long hours and how that impacts depression
Speaker 1: and well being. And on top of discovering the very
Speaker 1: obvious thing, which is that the more hours you work,
Speaker 1: the more significant negative impact it has on your health,
Speaker 1: what researchers did find was that having hobbies, even if
Speaker 1: you had limited time, actually helped mitigate those adverse side
Speaker 1: effects because you were still putting time energy, You were
Speaker 1: making an investment in yourself as someone who was not
Speaker 1: just an employee. You know, you had this place to
Speaker 1: go where your brain can think about something different. It
Speaker 1: can be stress, it can compartmentalize. That's also why I
Speaker 1: really often say that your hobbies should be different to
Speaker 1: what you do at work all day. You know, like
Speaker 1: if you're a nurse, your hobby there's going to sound santly,
Speaker 1: but it can't be like playing operation. You know, that's
Speaker 1: a silly example. But if you spend your day working
Speaker 1: in front of a screen doing like data or like
Speaker 1: marketing or whatever, you know, it's not great. If you
Speaker 1: come home and you have more screen based hobbies, you
Speaker 1: want it to be quite nuanced. You want to give
Speaker 1: your brain something more to play with. You know. Hobbies
Speaker 1: also just simply make you happier. We're just gonna say
Speaker 1: it from the most basic psychological lens. When you participate
Speaker 1: in something you love, your brain rewards you with dopamine
Speaker 1: that keeps you motivated to keep going. It makes you happier.
Speaker 1: A life filled with hobbies feels more purposeful. One of
Speaker 1: my favorite, favorite, favorite, favorite pieces of research that supports
Speaker 1: this was conducted with almost and I'm going to say
Speaker 1: this number because it's astounding, one hundred thousand people. That's right.
Speaker 1: It was a piece of research on a hundred thousand people,
Speaker 1: all of them over the age of sixty five, and
Speaker 1: they'd all retired. And what they found was that when
Speaker 1: these older adults had hobbies and they did their hobby
Speaker 1: more than once a week, they not only were happier,
Speaker 1: they also lived longer. Because health is not just physical,
Speaker 1: it is mental, It is cognitive you will start giving
Speaker 1: up on your physical health. You will start not caring
Speaker 1: about yourself as much. If you don't have something that
Speaker 1: you actually want to live for, something that you actually
Speaker 1: enjoy doing, you won't feel as positive towards yourself. You
Speaker 1: won't feel as positive towards your well being and as
Speaker 1: active and protective. If you don't feel like you have
Speaker 1: a purpose, if you're not happy. And you know, we
Speaker 1: don't need like a study to tell us that, like intuitively,
Speaker 1: humans need recreational time, they need things to care about.
Speaker 1: But I do think it's really important that I remind you.
Speaker 1: I'm it's going to rattle off some other benefits. I
Speaker 1: know I've probably convinced you by now, but just quickly,
Speaker 1: Hobbies improve your focus. You know, even if you think
Speaker 1: I don't have time for this, I'm so busy with
Speaker 1: work or school, Like I'm not going to do my hobbies.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to go for a swim, I'm not
Speaker 1: going to go to the gym, I'm not going to
Speaker 1: do this that whatever. Actually setting a same time to
Speaker 1: do those things will mean that you perform better anyways.
Speaker 1: They make you less stressed, They make you more in
Speaker 1: touch with your authentic self and like depending on whether
Speaker 1: the activity is solo or group based as well, it
Speaker 1: can make you less lonely. It's a valuable part of
Speaker 1: our routine. It makes us more flexible. Every single thing
Speaker 1: points to us needing more time to do This. Scary
Speaker 1: finding though, from the last few years, is that this
Speaker 1: generation you know, you and me, people born after nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety five, we are not picking up hobbies the same
Speaker 1: way people used to. We're seeing a steady decline in hobby. Yes,
Speaker 1: the people who have a lot of hobbies who make
Speaker 1: hobbies a part of who they are. And a lot
Speaker 1: of our hobbies are based on consumption, so they are
Speaker 1: based on watching TV, they are based on collecting things
Speaker 1: that we have to buy, shopping, video games, movies, rather
Speaker 1: than production based hobbies, production based activities things that are
Speaker 1: about creating something new, expressing yourself, expending energy, giving something back.
Speaker 1: And it's not to say that certain hobbies are better
Speaker 1: or worse than others, or like more pure, but I
Speaker 1: think if all our activities are attached to consumption and
Speaker 1: spending money, you know, it doesn't feel as fruitful. You
Speaker 1: don't actually feel like you're connecting in the same way
Speaker 1: with what you're doing. This probably comes down to a
Speaker 1: few things, like this whole trend obviously, like the rise
Speaker 1: in technolog is one of them. Like that is just
Speaker 1: what we are being fed. Screens are always at hand,
Speaker 1: always available. I don't think that they're like the devil
Speaker 1: that we think they are. I think they're actually really important.
Speaker 1: But you know, our way of entertaining ourselves has shifted online.
Speaker 1: I also think we are busier than ever, We have
Speaker 1: more commitments, we spend more time at work. There is
Speaker 1: less community feel to our hobbies. This really sticks out
Speaker 1: to me. I think that people are craving in person
Speaker 1: activities and community building, especially after the pandemic, because everything
Speaker 1: that we were doing became so solitary, meaning that we
Speaker 1: don't have the same social motivation to do them. It
Speaker 1: is why personal opinion, book clubs, meetups, social sports so
Speaker 1: special but also so much more popular. I want to
Speaker 1: talk about how we can make our hobbies a priority
Speaker 1: even in our busy life, even when we're burnt out,
Speaker 1: even when it's so much easier to like turn on
Speaker 1: the TV or scroll on TikTok. How do we find
Speaker 1: the time? How do we make the time more importantly?
Speaker 1: We're going to talk about all of that and more
Speaker 1: after this short break. I want you to pause for
Speaker 1: a second and ask yourself an important question. How many
Speaker 1: hobbies do you actually have, like that you regularly do
Speaker 1: more than once a fortnight, and how often are you
Speaker 1: actually doing them? A lot of us might come up
Speaker 1: with a few things, maybe nothing. I think that is
Speaker 1: the major problem we're facing here. We like to think
Speaker 1: that we're doing our hobbies, but actually they tend to
Speaker 1: fall of our prioritization out to do list. Something I've
Speaker 1: seen a lot recently is like even amongst my you know,
Speaker 1: even within myself, being like, oh yeah, I love reading,
Speaker 1: I love hiking, I love rock climbing, And then you
Speaker 1: go back through your recent memories and you're like, I
Speaker 1: kind of actually remember the last time I did those things.
Speaker 1: Can't remember when I last finished a book, when I
Speaker 1: went on a nice hike for the weekend. I think
Speaker 1: it comes down to three major problems. Firstly, there is
Speaker 1: a genuine lack of time. You know, life is really
Speaker 1: busy at the moment. We've got places to go, we've
Speaker 1: got people to see. A lot of us are embracing
Speaker 1: hustle culture, and when there always seems to be something
Speaker 1: more urgent to do. You just don't have the same
Speaker 1: capacity time wise for your hobbies. That's problem one, the
Speaker 1: very serious problem. Problem two is that we just think
Speaker 1: we don't have enough time, but actually we do, we
Speaker 1: just don't have the motivation. Number two, a lack of motivation.
Speaker 1: This is often linked to procrastination, which we know can
Speaker 1: also come down to perfectionism, like I can't do my
Speaker 1: hobbies because I'm not as good as other people are.
Speaker 1: I'm not as good as the people I see in
Speaker 1: the studio, online, at the gym. That's what gets in
Speaker 1: our way. Or we just don't prioritize our hobbies because
Speaker 1: there is something easier to do, something easier that we
Speaker 1: want to do, like maybe scroll on our phones. Whatever
Speaker 1: that gives us that instant dopamine and that instant gratification.
Speaker 1: Where it's pursuing our hobbies takes more of a time
Speaker 1: investment to get the reward. You may start out your
Speaker 1: night like wanting to do some painting or like wanting
Speaker 1: to do something fun, but then pretty soon you get
Speaker 1: pulled in by your phone. It's ten pm, it's time
Speaker 1: for bed. That is a really common dilemma. Something interesting
Speaker 1: that I found in some research conducted in the UK
Speaker 1: a few years ago, is that our failure to do
Speaker 1: our hobbies is actually a cycle that comes back to
Speaker 1: motivational fatigue or a motivational deficit, whereby our hobbies would
Speaker 1: actually motivate us to do the more, but the more
Speaker 1: we don't do them, the less motivated we become. So
Speaker 1: really the high hardest step when you've fallen off your hobbies,
Speaker 1: when you've stopped doing them, the hardest step is the
Speaker 1: first one, you know, just doing the thing, just committing
Speaker 1: just by all the other distractions. That is where you're
Speaker 1: going to struggle the most. But then you get the motivation,
Speaker 1: you get the wheel rolling again. I think that's like
Speaker 1: any habit. It's always hard at the beginning, Like the
Speaker 1: first five minutes of a run, the first hour of
Speaker 1: starting an assignment. There is just like so much time
Speaker 1: ahead of you. It just feels so long. But then
Speaker 1: you get going, it becomes more enjoyable. That is the
Speaker 1: motivational process of doing your hobbies more regularly. Finally, it
Speaker 1: may be that actually those hobbies that you've fallen away from,
Speaker 1: they just aren't fun anymore. They're just not something that
Speaker 1: you want to do we're not particularly keen on doing them.
Speaker 1: I remember trying so hard to like be into rock
Speaker 1: climbing back in the day and like make that my
Speaker 1: new hobby. I even had like the shoes and everything.
Speaker 1: I just couldn't. I couldn't do it. It was like trying
Speaker 1: to fit into the wrong relationship. I think at those points,
Speaker 1: obviously you're not going to want to participate, but you
Speaker 1: still have this like almost hypothetical, like fake foe idea
Speaker 1: in your mind that that is still an active hobby
Speaker 1: for you. When you haven't done it in like years,
Speaker 1: maybe even months, maybe it's time to start something new,
Speaker 1: Maybe it's time to refresh the hobby roster. And that
Speaker 1: brings me to the final reason that you're not doing
Speaker 1: your hobbies. It's because you're not excited about them. It's
Speaker 1: because you lack inspiration. Let's address that issue first, because
Speaker 1: I actually think that is the biggest culprit of all
Speaker 1: these reasons. I want to give you some ideas of
Speaker 1: some hobbies that you maybe haven't considered. I think we're
Speaker 1: all pretty used to the basic copies that people will list,
Speaker 1: and if you're not really into running or reading, sometimes
Speaker 1: it's like, well, kind of what else is out there,
Speaker 1: But fear not, there are so many other things out there.
Speaker 1: I want to give you some of that inspiration you
Speaker 1: might be lacking. You could go shell collecting. Maybe your
Speaker 1: hobby is to go to the beach once a week,
Speaker 1: have a swim and find some shells and make cool
Speaker 1: jewelry out out of them, like make cool ceramic dishes
Speaker 1: using the shells. Baking for a new person each week.
Speaker 1: I was really into this a few years ago. Like
Speaker 1: each week I would choose someone new, like my neighbors,
Speaker 1: my roommates, some person I was going over to have
Speaker 1: dinner with, and I would make a new recipe for them.
Speaker 1: During a social sport team that like plays a new
Speaker 1: sport every week. I used to do this last year.
Speaker 1: It was super super fun. Letter writing. You could make
Speaker 1: like really beautiful letters for your family or like your
Speaker 1: internet friends, or like your long distance college friends, and
Speaker 1: send them back and forth. Hosting. You could host like
Speaker 1: a little dinner party every Sunday, as like your hobby
Speaker 1: is literally hosting, like your hobby is to create nice
Speaker 1: events for people to come and like hang out together.
Speaker 1: Make a little veggie patch or a garden that you
Speaker 1: tend to or a bondside tree, go to a ceramics class.
Speaker 1: I'm doing this currently. Actually I've done three now and
Speaker 1: they're all like six weeks long, so you have to
Speaker 1: keep going because you pay at the beginning and you've
Speaker 1: committed knitting. This is one of my favorites. It sounds
Speaker 1: so like grandmar Core, but when you get into it,
Speaker 1: you can like sit and listen to a podcast and
Speaker 1: just get so stuck into it. There's also people who
Speaker 1: like upsyde call, which I love. That's something that me
Speaker 1: and my boyfriend Tom do, like once a week we
Speaker 1: might go for a little walk around our neighborhood. Maybe
Speaker 1: this is just like an Australian thing, but people leave
Speaker 1: stuff out on the street all the time for like
Speaker 1: people to take with like little notes, so they'll have, like,
Speaker 1: you know, everyone will have like a little box of
Speaker 1: stuff that people put things in. And I don't know,
Speaker 1: it's just some people call a garbage. I think it's treasure.
Speaker 1: You know, you could start a podcast just like documenting
Speaker 1: your life and learning how to do all the sound
Speaker 1: editing and the uploading and the publishing and just not
Speaker 1: even tell anyone. It's just gonna be like your own
Speaker 1: personal audio journal. There is just so much out there.
Speaker 1: That's really what I want to remind you. There is
Speaker 1: a lot that you can do. You might just need
Speaker 1: to invest a little bit of time to get things
Speaker 1: off the ground and to feel excited by it. And
Speaker 1: that kind of brings me to my next barrier, which
Speaker 1: is a lack of motivation. This is probably the hardest
Speaker 1: one to overcome. If a lack of inspiration is the
Speaker 1: most common, a lack of motivation is the hardest. I
Speaker 1: think if you're in this position, you need to treat
Speaker 1: the next month as like an exploration phase for you.
Speaker 1: So like set a personal challenge, set a goal to
Speaker 1: just try heaps of new things, even if you don't
Speaker 1: have high expectations. Make it like a way to socialize,
Speaker 1: Like instead of drinks, go and like get a jewelry
Speaker 1: making set, or like go and get a puzzle, do
Speaker 1: a board games now at a pub, go for a hike.
Speaker 1: You don't have to commit to anything. All you're required
Speaker 1: to do is to have a taste. Is to just
Speaker 1: have a little palate cleanse, is to just fill your
Speaker 1: days with activities rather than just lounging passive consumption. On
Speaker 1: another note, returning to your old hobbies often does start
Speaker 1: with just remembering why they brought you so much joy
Speaker 1: in the first place. We can forget that it's very
Speaker 1: easy to lose touch with the things you love when
Speaker 1: life gets busy or when other priorities take over. But
Speaker 1: hobbies are a form of self care. Think about how
Speaker 1: great you always feel afterwards, even if you have to
Speaker 1: kind of like mentally drag yourself to the starting line.
Speaker 1: Be like, Okay, I'm gonna let myself watch TV in
Speaker 1: twenty minutes. But before I do that, the same way
Speaker 1: that I make time to exercise, I make time to
Speaker 1: clean my house, I make time to talk to my friends,
Speaker 1: I'm going to make time to do my hobbies as
Speaker 1: a part of my hygiene routine, as a part of
Speaker 1: my wellness routine. This would look at this perfect segue
Speaker 1: into talking about a lack of time, because that is
Speaker 1: another big conundrum, another big problem that we hear a lot.
Speaker 1: I hate to say it, and I'm going to be
Speaker 1: very gentle when I say it, but we can always
Speaker 1: make time for what we care about. And just to
Speaker 1: prove that, I want you to just think about your
Speaker 1: screen time for a second. How many ten twenty minute
Speaker 1: increments do we have each day that instead we spend
Speaker 1: scrolling or watching. You know, you could switch that up.
Speaker 1: You could make time for something else, even if it's small,
Speaker 1: even if it doesn't initially feel significant. Think about like
Speaker 1: when you're on the train. I saw this woman the
Speaker 1: other day knitting. She was only on for like four stops,
Speaker 1: but she pulled out her knitting needles and she was
Speaker 1: making I don't really know what she was making. Looked
Speaker 1: really really amazing. Though. You could bring your book and
Speaker 1: your goal for the next month is to instead of
Speaker 1: go on your phone on your twenty minute commute on
Speaker 1: the barsa on the train is to read. Try and
Speaker 1: find small pockets of time. Just because it doesn't feel
Speaker 1: like it's an extended hour or two hours doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that it's not a significant investment, because the habit is
Speaker 1: really being built. I also think try and reframe the
Speaker 1: activity not as an obligation, but it's like something that
Speaker 1: you have the privilege of doing, something you want to do.
Speaker 1: It's a chance to unwind, it's a chance to explore.
Speaker 1: It's a chance to have real fun, like real true enjoyment,
Speaker 1: taking real, true enjoyment from something that you're doing and
Speaker 1: you'll notice, like when you fall asleep at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, you're like, wow, I just feel so
Speaker 1: much more fulfilled because I didn't do what was easiest
Speaker 1: I do. I did what I knew was going to
Speaker 1: fill my cup the most, which was my hobbies. You
Speaker 1: can notice that change. Give yourself just thirty minutes a
Speaker 1: day to prioritize this, even if it's not on all days.
Speaker 1: You're allowed to obviously have breaks. We can't all be
Speaker 1: disciplined with new habits. But ask yourself, at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, when you've tried these things, do I
Speaker 1: feel better? Do I feel better? And the days that
Speaker 1: I have the time but I choose not to do them,
Speaker 1: am I going to feel worse? And is that something
Speaker 1: that I've kind of allowed myself to feel Knowing that
Speaker 1: I could have done something that was going to make
Speaker 1: me feel more energized and inspired and happier, choosing not
Speaker 1: to do that, that was a choice I made, And
Speaker 1: I could make a different choice next time. I could
Speaker 1: do something that actually fills my cup, makes me interested,
Speaker 1: makes me interesting, like makes me happy, fulfilled, someone who
Speaker 1: has nuance, someone who has dimension to them, who isn't
Speaker 1: just work and responsibility. So I do know it's really
Speaker 1: really hard. I'm saying this to someone who's definitely struggled
Speaker 1: with this. As I've got and older, there's just less
Speaker 1: pieces of the pie to give out, and it's always
Speaker 1: like a it's always like a balancing act of like
Speaker 1: what part of my life, what bucket is going to
Speaker 1: get more from me? But I do think that this
Speaker 1: is the bucket we should be pouring more into than
Speaker 1: we actually are. Hobbies are spectacular, they're amazing, They're so
Speaker 1: valuable for your twenties. So I just hope this has
Speaker 1: inspired you to get back into something that you used
Speaker 1: to bring you a lot of joy and a lot
Speaker 1: of freedom, and that you just really love doing, whether
Speaker 1: it's music, sport, art, whatever it is, find a way
Speaker 1: back to it, see how your life improves. Hopefully you
Speaker 1: enjoyed this episode. If you did, please feel free to
Speaker 1: leave a five star review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever
Speaker 1: you are listening right now. I say it every time,
Speaker 1: but it does help the show grow, meet new people,
Speaker 1: reach new people. Sorry, and I do read every single
Speaker 1: one of your reviews. They often end up in my
Speaker 1: little smile Phile. They're often the thing that I feel
Speaker 1: very grateful for at the end of the day. So
Speaker 1: thank you for the support if you have done so already.
Speaker 1: If you have an episode, suggestion, questions, follow ups to
Speaker 1: this episode, you can DM me at that Psychology podcast.
Speaker 1: We would love to hear from you as always, and
Speaker 1: until next week, stay safe, be kind, to be gentle
Speaker 1: with yourself, and we will talk very very soon.