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Juggling
In my personal life, I have several different kinds of hobbies and interests. Obviously, you can see from my site that I love to write, and so it probably isn’t surprising that I enjoy reading as well. Additionally, I enjoy sports as a whole, but specifically I have a knack (and a love) for running, basketball, hockey, badminton, squash, and many other ones as well. However, if I had to choose which sports I participate on a serious basis, it would have to be solely running. I like all the other ones mentioned, but running is the one where I put a huge portion of my time and energy in. Likewise, I spend a good amount of effort writing and reading, so I would consider those my three big areas of my life.
But that’s just my personal life. Of course, my education is also extremely important to me, and in terms of my professional life, I’m working on becoming a better teacher. So that’s a quick list of the things that are important to me in my life, and they are what I spend most of my resources on.
Now, that’s not to say that I don’t have other interests. I’m the sort of person who is curious about many different fields. My interests include things like technology, AI and computer science, design, photography, typography, music, and video games. I imagine that I am like many others in the fact that I know a lot of geeky and seemingly random information concerning fields and areas of life that people would not expect me to have any knowledge about. I know a bit about the characteristics of type, the call-outs of many maps in Halo, principles of design, and many things about computers. Yet, my “big areas” are physics, mathematics, running, reading, and writing, not exactly applicable to the other things I listed above. But the point is that I have only dabbled in these other interests. I haven’t dug deep into them like I have with my core interests, and it makes all the difference.
Last year, I tried to learn a bit more on the guitar. This didn’t go so well. I learned some chords, but nothing came of it. Ultimately, I shelved this interest because I didn’t want to dedicate as much time to it as I did with my running. I saw that the two were competing for attention, and that I cared more about running, so I gave up my musical ambition.
Likewise, you cannot expect to simply add a new hobby into your life without encountering issues. More likely, you’ll have to make a decision between something you already do. The simple reality is that we have a limited time to do what we want each day, so we have to choose what to spend it on. That means making a difficult decision between things you enjoy. If you split your time, you’ll also split your focus. You can go that route, but you will always be limiting yourself.
There is always a juggling act going on in your life. Some things get more attention than others, and that’s alright. The important part is that you choose which things you want to be a focus in your life. Spend the time on things that interest you, and remember that it won’t be locked in stone forever.