I’m pretty sick of my content addiction, like watching youtube or netflix all the time. I would rather be spending my time otherwise so figured fun things are the best to start. Do you have tips for fun things to do? Or how I could search for them?
Some I came up with myself:
- Learning some magic tricks
- Learning some origami
- Thrift shopping
Everything is welcome!
Edit: thank you for the huge response!
Building things. Legos are super fun.
I like sewing my clothes, I usually put on some content in the background while I’m doing my mending. It helps avoid fast-fashion and is helpful with thrift shopping, since it allows you to purchase garments that don’t fit quite right or are slightly frayed.
In college I took aikido classes. I had thin gi pants designed for taikwando, not grappling. With all the ground movement the knees ripped open constantly.
So each night after class I’d cut new squares out of an old white t-shirt, and then sew those squares onto the ripped-open knees of those gi pants.
My sewing technique was crude: just two pieces of cloth pressed together, then a doubled thread wrapping around that seam again and again and again. The seams were tough and thick, like scars on the pants.
Each class, they’d rip open again, and I’d add more path material and more thread. Eventually the knees were many layers of torn and patched cloth, with thick scarlike seams criss-crossing all across them. The inside of those knees were very rough and it was kneeling and crawling on that roughness that was tearing up my knees.
I didn’t have money for laundry either so every class I washed that gi in my tub and wrung it out as best I could to dry for two days until the next class.
I spent nearly as much time tending that gi as practicing on the mat. It felt cool. The skin of my knees grew thicker and more leathery as I tore it up and it healed repeatedly, matching the uniform’s knees getting thicker and gnarlier.
Every night after class first it was hydrogen peroxide for the blood (always blood in the knees after a class) then scrubbing that with a toothbrush, then churning the gi in the tub. The water would get murky and surprisingly dirty and then I’d pull the thing out of the tub a few inches at a time, wringing it as tight as I could to get the water out, then dropping the dry end on the bathroom floor and grabbing another couple inches to wring out. My forearms would be just dead, my hands wanting to cramp from all the gripping and twisting.
I miss being young.
That’s a really cool story, thanks for sharing.
I’ll list some hobbies at the end but for me, I struggled feeling motivated after work to do anything but eat and be entertained. It got pretty bad until I decided I needed to figure out something different. I thought I was just missing hobbies but even as I picked some hobbies up (usually on weekends) I wouldn’t do them during the week.
Most of my issues revolved around stress (from work), turns out.
I still struggle with this so don’t expect a magic solution, but what I found was that my job was actually a lot more stressful than I thought. To the point where I’d wake up in the night thinking about work problems that for sure weren’t a big deal and that for sure wouldn’t be solved half asleep. So now I try and be more productive at work to make sure I avoid deadlines getting tight, and towards the end of the day I make sure my tasks are simple, if possible. I also try and take lots of breaks and I check in with myself “am I relaxed right now?” “would a break make me more productive” - and I unfortunately found that media isn’t a good break for me at work. Somehow the stress stays, while also adding in cravings for more dopamine-inducing activities. Good breaks for me include walking, actively listening to music, daydreaming, planning stuff (holidays, dinner, my upcoming evening, weekend), reading (pretty much anything), and learning new stuff (I’m studying Spanish and chess right now, recently learned all of my PLL algorithms on a Rubik’s Cube). I’m a software engineer for context.
The largest stress benefit for me has been biking to work. Yeah, I almost get ran over sometimes which is scary (even with bike paths 90% of my route, you still gotta cross roads, and even with a walk sign cars still won’t see you), but driving during rush hour is stressful (there are studies on this but I’m too lazy to link any). Biking is just fun. I even bike in winter (studded tires and poggies/bar mits). Since not everyone has the luxury of biking, exercising immediately after work is something to consider. It for sure helps me separate work from home. There’s plenty of studies on exercise lowering stress.
And if your job isn’t too stressful, there’s another issues with not committing to hobbies… For me, it was that I was/am addicted to media. Once I get started with some dinner and YouTube, it’s hard not to lose a couple hours. Best advice for easing out of it is audiobooks make it easy after eating to do chores/walk/not get more food. But other than audiobooks, avoid consuming media while eating. Also avoid media served by an algorithm. It’s so easy to watch a great video, and refresh the recommendations to look for another. Then you’re watching sub-par videos just hoping for a good one… Wasting tons of time. I use an extension to hide video recommendations. I can still search, and browse my subscriptions, but it saves me a lot of time (extension is called unhook I believe).
My username is actually centered around the idea that the more passive an activity, the less valuable it is to you. I personally want more active hobbies in my life. It is weird to me that so many fulfilling hobbies exist, but I regularly waste evenings on YouTube…
If you can have low stress and minimal cravings for YT/Netflix, here’s some hobbies:
- Get a dog (huge commitment, consider a cat if you’re too busy) but mine forces me on 3 walks a day, and I’ve love training her
- Learn something on your bucket list (I mentioned Rubik’s cubes, chess, and Spanish already), cooking has been mentioned by others
- I enjoy free diving (diving with goggles, but you hold your breath instead of scuba). I enjoy training my breath hold, and everyone thinks I drowned when I first go underwater at a lake or something (I can only dive for around 40 seconds but that impresses people (this includes swimming)). I can also dive pretty deep which is fun. It’s also a bit surreal to be deep underwater with good vision and be comfortable
- I recently dipped my toes into making music, I have a guitar, trombone, and someday I’d like to learn piano
- Having/riding a motorcycle is a great hobby. Seems like it wouldn’t be, but in summer I’m often looking for excuses to go ride.
- Bike commuting is great fun. Get some saddle bags to pick up groceries and enjoy the weather when you run out of eggs
- Mountain biking was the easiest hobby for me to dive completely into. Spent loads of money, built my current hardtail part by part. I’m even thinking about traveling south to bike in the winter cause I miss it so much. I live in a place with good trails close to home. Easy for me to go riding before or after work.
- Camping, Fishing, Backpacking, Hiking, Snowshoeing, Back-country skiing/snowboarding, all great fun. Make great weekend trips too. Go explore your state
- Check out letterboxing. It’s a bit like geocaching but no GPS, just clues/puzzles. My letterboxing journal always makes people ask questions
- My wife and I like getting hotels in small towns nearby (within 2 hours). We’ll walk the town, get food, and have a lot of free time to read or play board games, or other adult activities
- Read. I try and read a book a month. I find that reading before bed helps me sleep WAY better. If I go to bed early and stay up late reading, I think I sleep better than if I went to bed somewhere in the middle without reading.
- Write. I love writing. Sometimes don’t know what to write about, but even typing out how I’m feeling today and what I’d like to get done - and then deleting it - lifts my mood
- I’m into software, I run a homelab. Huge time suck. I love it.
- Video games. Might seem super passive, but I think I actually play less than I want to. For sure different than watching YouTube. Some games are challenging even. I have a huge backlog. Tons of fun to play with friends. My wife and I just started Baulders Gate 3 together
- Exercise can be great. I love running in good weather. Some friends of mine got big into cycling. My wife likes the gym. My favorite workouts are to run to the college track and then do body-weight exercises there (and practice my handstands) before running back. I also enjoy Yoga, but do a lot less than I’d like
- Board games/Card games - I enjoy Magic, but the company has made it hard to be a fan (same for DND). Flesh and Blood has been fun, but I haven’t played a lot of it. On the board game side; Starwars the deckbuilding game, chess, dominion, and cosmic encounters are all good. You’d be surprised how many people want to play board games. In the few game nights I’ve hosted we barely got to play anyone’s games they brought.
Adventure is out there. Don’t waste your youth. Some of these might not seem like ideal after work hobbies, but most are totally doable in an evening.
This is amaziiiing. Such a great response! Thank you, I recognize a lot! I will go running right after finishing this comment ;) Will also definitely try the audio books to get unhooked while eating.
Happy to share! And glad you found value in it
Forgot to mention that slow-living or whatever you want to call it is valuable. Just spend a while doing nothing. Thinking. Chatting with a friend. Be bored. You’ll probably knock out some chores, and get really motivated to do something big (humans do not like being bored)
Edit: gonna put more hobbies I think of here
- Skateboarding/longboarding, roller blading - pretty meditative once you get into the flow
- kayaking, paddle boarding, canoeing - as a kid I went on a week long 100 mile canoe trip that I think heavily impacted my life. I’ve always wanted to do something similar again, but not been able to make it work yet
- I tried paragliding, but it wasn’t as fun as mountain biking for me so I dropped it
- I’ve had a lot of fun making dumb games and publishing them for the web, hosting that on GitHub, and using netlify to make it into a website. I bought some domain names for family members so that’s where I put them. I want to spend more time with Godot to get better at making games
- Engage in the communities of the hobbies you enjoy - you’ll learn and make connections and share your own insights
Thanks for the amazing lists of other things to do. I’ve got to agree that any form of exercise is the best alternative! Are you up for sharing your dumb games with us? I’d love to have a go!
Kinda hesitant to share because the URL’s are the names of my family members (kinda a gift to them, kinda me just holding on to the domain names in case they want them someday). But they’re definitely not impressive. One of them I’d like to spend some time to make more fun, but as it is now, it’s mostly a gimmick (zombies walk towards you and you walk away - 2d, score is just how many seconds you can avoid getting touched). Pretty rewarding weekend project though, and you can easily show it off
Ah, that’s understandable, we don’t want Uncle Jim doxxed over the zombie game.
Thanks for sharing, I think a lot of people can relate to feeling unmotivated to do their hobbies after work. I read a blog post recently (struggling to find the link) that paradoxically feeling too tired for hobbies after work can be a vicious cycle, and you’re better off trying the hobbies anyway to increase your motivation for doing them. That’s really helped me with a game I’m working on. When I can’t work on it for a while, I lose motivation. But once I make some small progress each day, I feel motivated to keep working on it.
I can definitely relate to this. It seems like even a little time with a hobby has a large impact on my evening. Sometimes I’ll do something a little hard like studying Spanish for a few minutes, which leads to guitar and then chess and then I feel more accomplished come bed time. Some how makes me feel more recovered from work
Thank you for taking the time to write this up. It’s very inspiring and I have some ideas to try
Life is pretty boring, which is why content addiction works… :/
If knitting/crochet is not metal enough for you, make chainmail instead! It’s so easy that you can let your mind wander while doing it. So it basically doubles as active meditation!
lockpicking
Fun ways to spend your time:
Walking, running, hiking, cycling, transitting to a nice spot in town you’ve never been. Fairly cheap, and fun way to get out and forget the rest of your problems for a bit.
Sports and Yoga, cooking and baking, sewing, learning an instrument like guitar, piano/keyboard.
For things that aren’t mindless fun but useful long term: Try learning a new language! It’s kind of difficult but it’s cool when you start to figure out tiny tidbits of other languages.
Painting miniatures, 3d printing to make it more affordable in the long run
Playing (optional) single player board games - picked that one up during the pandemic. I enjoyed some free print and play (or basic playing cards) games like:
Utopia Engine (both parts or expansion, whatever Beast Hunter is) - pretty much an exploration rpg? Very simple to setup and learn.
The Quiet Year - a map drawing game that gives you prompts to expand the map and lore of a small commumity/civilisation. Very peaceful.
Gridcannon - a single player puzzle/tactic game played with a standard deck of cards. Been a while but I enjoyed it a lot in pandemic times.You can also play games like Gaslands or even Warhammer by yourself if you’re into that sort of stuff. I enjoyed gaslands by myself the other day :)
Making things, learning things.
E.g.:
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painting
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clay/ceramics
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learn a language
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learn the history of a region
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visit a museum
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grow vegetables
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make pickles
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learn a weapon
learn the history of a region
I’m currently reading about the Mississippi River and it sparked a obsession in me. Like, knowing the history of how the natives used the river, the used of it during colonial times, how we use it today. The states that border it. The people that live near it. Water, pollution, fish.
I’ve been going a mile deep for weeks now in understanding it and it’s so fulfilling.
Yes! It’s really satisfying. Something like a river would be extra cool, thanks for the idea!
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Sewing is a nice thing to learn because you can always touch up your own clothes and if you like you can buy a cheap sewing machine and do your own shirts, pants etc
Drawing and reading are both time consuming, cheap and good stuff that can make you grow too. Can flow over into painting and writing so watch out.
Chess is even cheaper (free online with matchmaking: lichess.org also a gazillion youtubes to get you running like chessbrahs or chesswibes) if you want to be humbled but also like tactics, strategies and history.
Go for daily walks in nature.
Do yoga
Play a recreational sport that interests you
Read (I guess that’s still consumption)
Write
Volunteer for a cause you care about
I’m with the opinion that one should always read more than one writes. And they all kith and kin to reading out loud, speaking, memorizing text, and listening. All things one doesn’t need a teacher to direct.
Anything you enjoy that you could improve on!
Currently I’m spending more time learning guitar.
I think as long as you’re genuinely interested, learning things becomes a lot easier.
Go for out to an interesting place and take some cool photos.
Whittling and woodworking are both extremely rewarding hobbies - depending on how much space you have.
Whittling seemed like something I could do indoors more easily without too much mess. We have a furnace and a giant woodpile so you’d think it’d be perfect, problem is when I try to carve something it’s too seasoned* to do much more than carve the bark off. Probably doesn’t help that I’m using a gas station knife, but it’s probably the wood itself being most of the issue.
I usually had luck with the rotary tool (probably because I usually don’t need to get rid of too much material), but once I tried to use the angle grinder with a cheap toothy power-carving disk on a small-ish log and I could barely put a small bevel on it.
*= Requested for carving even, not just something I picked out.
