Re:Ask HN: How do you deal with having “too many” hobbies?
by otras on Friday July 13, 2018 @03:02PM
(#17525740)
One thing I've come to terms with is that there's no "finishing" my hobbies. How would you quantify finishing something like drawing? I'm always reminded of the Geoffrey Chaucer quote[0]:
The lyf so short, the craft so longe to lerne.
I like to create small chunks that have a clear stopping point and a neatly defined goal. For writing, it may be the process of creating a blog post. For drawing, it could be a 20 minute sketch of a tree. For guitar playing, I wouldn't count noodling, but I would count learning a new song all the way through. Breaking it up into these chunks makes it more manageable, and each one is a small, enjoyable step forward.
The other question is which one to choose. Each hobby is a craft you could spend a lifetime mastering! I don't worry about this as much these days, and I'll do whatever I feel like on any given day. If I want to focus on one section (say I want to stick to a regular writing schedule to get better at writing), I can set a clear goal for one of the chunks and work my way through it. If I worry too much about fitting everything in, say by giving myself a quota like do these five tasks daily, I've found that it quickly becomes a chore I try to avoid, not something I look forward to. Worrying about moving everything forward means I barely move at all. Letting that go, I can move one forward at a time as I please, which I've found makes for much more enjoyable progress across the board over time.
The lyf so short, the craft so longe to lerne.
I like to create small chunks that have a clear stopping point and a neatly defined goal. For writing, it may be the process of creating a blog post. For drawing, it could be a 20 minute sketch of a tree. For guitar playing, I wouldn't count noodling, but I would count learning a new song all the way through. Breaking it up into these chunks makes it more manageable, and each one is a small, enjoyable step forward.
The other question is which one to choose. Each hobby is a craft you could spend a lifetime mastering! I don't worry about this as much these days, and I'll do whatever I feel like on any given day. If I want to focus on one section (say I want to stick to a regular writing schedule to get better at writing), I can set a clear goal for one of the chunks and work my way through it. If I worry too much about fitting everything in, say by giving myself a quota like do these five tasks daily, I've found that it quickly becomes a chore I try to avoid, not something I look forward to. Worrying about moving everything forward means I barely move at all. Letting that go, I can move one forward at a time as I please, which I've found makes for much more enjoyable progress across the board over time.
[0] https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Geoffrey_Chaucer