Specifically: Collecting Hobbies.
I find that following my ADHD hyperfocus until the next shiny thing comes along has led to a massively diverse array of introductory knowledge and mediocre skills (as well as a garage stuffed full with bins of unfinished projects). Specifically in the last two years I have dabbled in:
home automation (incl. Node Red, LoRa, MQTT on Raspberry Pi)
weather stations
terrariums
greenhouse climate control
making wooden boxes
Minecraft
mechanical pencils
fountain pens
notebooks
bookbinding (custom notebooks)
Dungeons & Dragons
I have found that I learn something and increase my skillset with every unfinished project. That leads to, over the long run, being able to get more accomplished in less time on newer projects. The real treasures are the friends you made ^h^h^h^h^h things you learned along the way.
My day job is in deep tech working with machine learning and robotics at a startup, and the industry is constantly shifting with rapid advancements in the tech, unpredictable markets, plus the stress of being early stage, so it's incredibly refreshing to have part of my life be very stable and grounded, and provides me purpose and perspective on those things that matter most.
We've tended towards fantasy series, but have done some sci-fi and other works as well. Currently reading through Malazan: Book of the Fallen in one group (Near the end of Memories of Ice (book 3)) and Mother of Learning in another. The third group is currently on hiatus but we'll vote on the next series soon and resume next year.
I'm also very into music (both listening and playing). Recently restrung my 7-string guitar with heavier gauge strings and have been learning some new stuff in lower tunings than I'm used to (Drop F and Drop G#).
Haven't engaged seriously with it in some time, but I used to be really into Yoyo's, specifically 1a style throwing. Super rewarding hobby that can be fun for beginners to advanced throwers.
Finally, I really enjoy video games. Lately I've been into MMO's (WoW, FFXIV, OSRS, GW2+1, etc.) but love puzzle games, factory building games, and RPGs/ARPGs.
It's also great to be able to go to pretty much any reasonably sized city, head to a dance and immediately start building a new social circle.
Besides this, I have been making live programming videos on YT for a while, but more recently I've started experimenting with using video as a medium for storytelling and highlighting things I appreciate in the various communities I am a part of.[1]
It's such a different dimension than any other kind of video game, with the size and physicality. As a WFHer since Covid, pinball is huge in giving me something to do that isn't sitting on my butt staring at a screen. It's not a cheap hobby, for sure, modern machines run around $6k and up, but then again they can be resold and traded for close to what you paid.
- germinating native trees in my yard to replant in the wild
- trying to increase biodiversity by attracting pollinators and pests, and covering with native plants.
- trying to improve the soil health of my yard: cover crops, low-till, (vermi)composting
I say that my studying is a hobby too though. I have been to university 5 times, and everyone in my life gets mad at me for always studying (I have a job, so i'm not sure why anyone cares if I study) so for my defense, I always say "studying is my hobby". It probably is... I like being in pursuit of stuff and working towards something. I don't know what i'd do with myself if I wasn't working towards achieving something. Perhaps I just need to reframe what it is I want to achieve, but studying is comfortable.
I used to commute via the South Shore Railroad to Chicago, and had about 50 minutes each way with my laptop. Most days, I'd be processing photos. Some are aligned in a focal plane, some are aligned other ways. Here's an old gallery on Flickr.[2]
I got into this after seeing a demo of Marc Levoy's work at Stanford, where the demo showed a number of subjects in a virtual focal plane, then a subject behind a hedge, focused THROUGH the shrubbery.... which seemed like magic.[3,4] I didn't have the funds for a 128 camera array, but what I did have was time... so I improvised.
Stand in a spot, with your DSLR or smartphone.... look at a non-moving subject.... take a cluster of pictures within about a dinner plate size area
Then take all those photos, and using Hugin[1], align selected points in the scene that will be your virtual focal plane, across all the photo pairs
Use Hugin to transform all those images into the same virtual focal plane
Use a small python script to average the photos into a single image
If you like, you can chose different points to get a different focal plane from the same set of images.
[1] https://hugin.sourceforge.io/
[2] https://flickr.com/photos/---mike---/albums/7215771858512354...
[3] https://graphics.stanford.edu/projects/array/
[4] https://graphics.stanford.edu/projects/array/videos/crowd0-s...
The goal of a hobby is to have fun. If it's not fun, then stop doing it. Start doing something else. Dont think of it to same way you would a career.
So don't look at your ex-hobbies as failures, or things you didn't master, but rather as things you enjoyed for a season. They're not a marriage "in sickness and in health".
Yes, some are productive, some are not. But the-producing- should not be the point. The journey is all that matters.
Feel free to sell all the junk in your garage. Or better yet pass it on to someone who's interested themselves. That guitar I don't play anymore us someone's dream Christmas gift. And when they're done either it, they can pass it on too.
Ham radio, in particular tinkering and construction - I am an RF engineer by education, but work outside the field - so the hobby is a good way to at least retain some skills.
Oh, and I do traditional textile dyes for my mother and a few handfuls of her fellow weaving artisans.
It gives me chance to get off computer (so only physical boardgames - no BGA) and meet new people (so no solo games). And since I like collecting stuff it also plays nicely into this quirk of mine (my collection just passed 140 mark).
The world of modern boardgames is really fascinating and totally different than I remember from childhood - playing boardgames in early 90s in Poland was geeks territory (up there with math and computers) and nowadays its almost badge of honor and all the coolest people will happily play boardgames (just to be clear I do not claim people playing games in 90s were geeks, it was just the prevailing opinion of my peers)
Woodworking - My first in between high school and college was at a fine furniture shop. We built 18th and 19th century reproductions. I spent years without a shop not doing much with this but just this fall finally got my own shop space setup and just finished my first project.
Mountain biking - like skiing but for the summer
The gym - If I can't get outside, at least I can move my body a bit
Electronics - My dad showed me how to solder when I was very young. He had some electronics kits that I would experiment with. I know have a very basic setup and am working on some cool personal projects. I'd like to combine woodworking and electronics on a future project.
Hiking - used to do this a lot more. biking and skiing have taken most of my outdoor time recently
- gaming. Since I was a child, I've been gaming. I don't consider it as a "productive" hobby, but it's one nevertheless. It's almost an addiction, so I try to not have all my free time filled by that.
- wrenching on cars. That's my current main hobby. I've bought my first car (I didn't own one before) specifically to have one I could go as far as I'd want without the responsibility of breaking someone else's car. Though I do minor repairs/maintenance for friends and family. On my own car, the most complicated/time-consuming jobs I did so far was a suspension overhaul (including rebuilding struts towers with new shocks) and changing the gearbox.
- track days. It's an aspiring hobby. I can't currently own a track car (parking spots are too expensive where I live), so instead I do the next best thing: paying for "track experiences" and doing a few laps on track-ready cars. I've done 2 so far, planning a 3rd, and really want to own a track car at some point.
The other hobbies are past hobbies I've wound down because I'm not that interested in that anymore:
- cocktail mixing. I have a full-size bar at my home (that could be put regular bars to shame) so I can mix anything I want. I used to be more socially active and try new cocktails every week but now I only do one every few months, generally from my list.
- bartending. I used to do bartending in a non-profit bar for a few hours each week.
- electronics. A friend got me into it, I dabbled with Arduinos, Raspberry Pi and have lots of parts that got gifted by that friend. Nowadays, I use those skills for appliances repairs and car repairs.
- woodworking. This was very short, as I do not enjoy it that much, just don't have lots of needs nor the space to do that, but a lot of my furniture is home-made, out of pallets I found on the streets (I got help from a more experienced friend luckily). That includes the aforementioned bar and sizeable wood chests to store the electronics and miscellaneous tools.
So I've changed all that and tried a few things. I've settled on golf (used to play as a child - I'm 49 now) and playing piano (played that as a child too).
Anyway... I'm happy af now (only way to put it).
Not to sidetrack this but I reckon unfinished stuff is a definite cause of mid-life crisis: I realised that I start many things but don't finish them and often use the excuse, "meh, it wasn't for me!" to justify it and funnily enough, from the middle of last year to this year I was decidedly unhappy but couldn't put my finger on it. Since I picked up the piano and golf again (both things I quit at before), I've never been happier.
Anyway, golf and piano :-D
I'd like to pick up an instrument (played several, decades ago) or cooking. Maybe when I retire.
- Gamedev (same TD game project for like 10+ years, off and on)
- Building random things with PIs and a 3d printer (remote controllable FPS robot, cat laser toy, etc.)
- Photography
- Hiking
- Random home improvements (most notably a budget theatre setup)
- Reading for self improvement
It can be difficult to find time for work :)
Guitars
DJ sets
Jiu Jitsu
Exploring the uses if LLM AIs in education.