It’s 7 am. That dreaded alarm goes brrrring. It jolts you out of your dreams. You jump out of bed, take a shower and run out the door. You hope to make it on-time to the office. Maybe grab something to quickly munch down in your tiny cubicle while you try to get yourself into work mode.
In the evening, you get home, turn on the tv, and indulge yourself into a show. It gives you tons of laughs to escape from the monotony of your life. Ironically, you do this everyday.
Eventually, you can’t tell the days apart. So you look at the calendar on your phone that buzzes every time it’s Friday. TGIF you say, as now you can go out, and relax with your friends.
If only the weekends could be longer, you think to yourself. You ask this every Sunday as you go to bed, trying to prepare yourself to do it all over again the next week.
Does this sound like your life? Are you trapped in the same situation like the rest of the world? There isn’t any time to do anything else, and by the time the weekend comes, you really just want to escape your miserable job.
Hobby
This is a word that we are taught in primary school. Then asked to give a generic response to. Usually we develop hobbies when we are growing up based on our school and social group. The sad part is that most of us lose interest as we make our way into adulthood.
We become busy with the bills, and responsibilities. We settle into the mundane existence that tricks us into believing that we don’t have time for hobbies.
But one could argue that there are many reasons why, especially as adults, we should carve time out of our schedules for a Hobby.
A Hobby Makes You Interesting
Two weeks ago, while on vacation and trying to reduce my awkwardness when meeting a new person, I asked my guide a qustion. “What do you do for fun, when you aren’t working?” She looked at me with a look of confusion in her eyes, shook her head and said, “nothing.”
Now you can imagine, what a loss I was for words since this is usually my go to back pocket question (read the blog post on this HERE.)
So, in an effort to change it, I asked if there is anything that she is interested in learning or doing.
With even more confusion, she looked at me and said. “No, I’m done with school.”
The next day, I met a guy in a cafe. Between sips of coffee and the breaks we took while rattling away on our keyboards, I asked him the same question.
His eyes lit up, and his face got a warm smile as he proceeded to tell me about his love for trail hiking.
He told me about the trails you could hike in the northern parts of the country. He shone with excitement as he told me how unique they were. In the end, he even pulled out his phone to show me the pictures he took while he was in that part of the country.
This led to a captivating conversation where I learned a lot about trail hiking, and the best countries in the world to do it. I got the opportunity to appreciate the beauty in the pictures he took while doing his hikes.
Moral of the story? Having a hobby, being passionate about something, and doing something that makes you happy translates into you becoming a more interesting person.
Which of the two conversations do you think I enjoyed the most. Which of the two people do you feel like you are most similar to?
This brings me to the next benefit of having a hobby.
It Develops Confidence
Whatever hobby you choose, there is a 95% chance that you will expeience a learning curve. Starting with being really bad at it at first. Yet, if you are committed, allocate time to do it and you don’t give up, you will slowly start to see yourself improve.
With more practice you will get better, and subsciously, you will start believing in yourself more.
This helps to build confidence. As you see yourself getting better, you will be more willing to try out new things.
You will know that it only takes you getting over the initial hump to see some real improvement.
When you get started and suck at it, remind yourself that nobody gets better overnight.
As you build confidence, and get better at the hobby you choose to pursue, you will be more inclined to take advantage of the next benefit.
Exposure to New Social Groups
Living in the age of the Internet makes it a lot easier to meet and interact with like minded people who have the same interests as we do.
Facebook groups, meetups, twitter, Instagram and so on, help us to find people who are like us.
Now, imagine you live in a town where you love gardening. You start a group to meet other gardeners. Very soon, you are spending time with other people who have the same passion as you. The internet has really made it easy for you to find your group.
Choose your hobby and find the group where you feel at home.
A Hobby Reduces Stress
Having a hobby gives you a break from the life of monotony that was described at the beginning of the post. It gives your brain time to relax, removing concerns that go along with things like work, family life, paying bills and so on.
Getting lost in something that you are passionate about is a feeling that cannot be replicated by anything else in life.
As you get better at it, maybe you can even make money from it some day.
The challenge:
This week, I have two challenges: Choose the one that resonates with where you are at.
1. If you don’t have a hobby, do some research, and pick a hobby to stick to for the next month. Do it at least 3 times a week. And start reaping those benefits.
2. If you already have one, head over to our IG, Facebook or Tiktok and drop your social handles. So that we can follow you as you do the things that make you shine in your eyes.
About GiggedBz
Being an entrepreneur or managing a household can be very stressful. Somedays you really just need some help. And I'm sure we can agree that good help is hard to find. This is why we made, Gigged.bz.
