Hobby Choices

Hi,
At the moment I am having some issues deciding what I want to do as far as a hobby goes and this is starting to cause me some stress and problems in other parts of my life.

I work full time (Monday – Friday 8:30 – 5pm) in IT support so outside work I try to not spend too much time on the computer outside work (most nights I don’t even take my laptop home with me) I got right in to radio scanning about 11 years ago, this is / was something I really enjoyed and something I have spent a lot of time doing over the years, I help to run a forum for this (www.scanningtasmania.org) about 2.5 years ago my partner at the time (who I am no longer with) expressed a concern that this hobby was not “socially acceptable” and as such I took up photography to make her happy and left the radio scanning hobby for a while. Around 18 months ago we split up and while I kept doing photography I also got right back in to radio scanning again.

Now I have given up on photography totally and am back doing radio scanning as my main / only hobby but the “magic” seems to have left it for me since my other partner was so unhappy about me doing it and I am feeling less and less like doing it, it is to the stage now where I almost feel like I have to do it or else I just sit around doing nothing of a weekend. My current partner is very supportive of me and whatever I decide to do but I am sick of feeling unhappy about it and not knowing what I want to do.

I do have another interest which is Lego Technic design and building, I did this quite a bit growing up and am thinking about getting right back in to it again now but again this is not really a “social” hobby or one I could talk to other people about. I have spoken to a few people about it but everybody has a “vested interest” those people who I know via radio scanning think I should be doing that and people I know in the Lego hobby think I should be doing that as a hobby. I have tried to have a mix / balance of different hobbies but this never works very well for me, whenever I am doing one I feel like I should be doing the other one plus I live in a small unit so I don’t have a lot of room to have things setup.

Which hobby should I go forward with?

Paul

Hi Paul,

Hobbies should be about what matters to you. Clearly others in a particular hobby will be biased, because they love it. I think you are allowing the judgements of your former partner to rule your current situation, which is a problem, because you former partner shouldn't get a say anymore. Besides your former partner sounds more interested in "social acceptability" than in having any true pleasure. You don't do a hobby for others, you do it because _you_ enjoy it.

Perhaps since you are unsure of either at the moment, spend more time with your current partner and being social, and a little of both hobbies, and see which one you enjoy more.

Thanks for that, it makes a lot of sense. I guess I am a bit unsure about a lot of things in my life and this includes my hobbies.

I am going to try doing both and see which one I drift towards more after a period of time.

Paul

I agree with Peter there. Posting on a LEGO forum will obviously give you more LEGO-biased feedback, but to be brutally honest I think it all depends on what YOU enjoy. Sure there are factors such as cost and things, but the main thing you should be worrying about is what you enjoy doing.
If a previous partner says radio scanning wasn't socially acceptable, I think it's quite possibly for the best you split up! You should most certainly ignore people who have anything negative to say about your hobbies, because the people who badmouth what you enjoy doing probably aren't the best people to be around anyway.

Whatever you choose, I hope you'll maintain a bit of a presence on ANZFOL.

Thanks for that, I agree I am much better off without her in my life. Some really great advice which I am going to think about and do what makes ME happy.

Well I have spent some time thinking about things and working out what I want. I am now settled one some hobbies and I am feeling much happier about it all.

Paul
http://launcestonlegotechnicbuilder.blogspot.com/

Great to hear!

Just for the record I have 2 other major hobbies apart from Lego. I am finding as long as I don't make any of them "the only joy of my existence", they keep adding value/joy to my life.

Cheers,