ADHD and Hobbies

Everyone has hobbies right? Or if they don’t they want one. Hobbies are the things that keep us sane when work sucks, or life sucks, or whatever. Having a thing you do that makes you happy is important.

One of the hard parts of having ADHD is that I am not great at finishing things. I am an expert at starting projects, probably one of the best in the world at starting things.

I am unclear if my passionate curiousity is part of my ADHD or if it is just who I am, but I am in love with learning new things. Not enough that I will ever have a bachelors degree, but I am constantly researching and learning new things.

Take those first three paragraphs and you can imagine what my hobbies look like. I have many hobbies, I rarely finish projects, and I constantly aquire new hobbies. It has taken actual will power on my part to not continue buying things for hobbies I don’t actually do.

What is great about this “problem” is that I am never bored. If I don’t feel like doing one hobby, I can jump over to another without feeling guilty or anything.

Here is the list of current hobbies that I am activly participating in:

• Puppet fabrication
• Minecraft
• Music production
• Quilt piecing
• Dungeons and Dragons
• Ukulele Playing
• Knitting
• Writing
• Drawing

Each one of those branches off into its own little side branches. Which leads me to new things to research and try out.

One of the “problems” I currently have is I am in a place where I can spend money on hobbies, instead of just looking and never buying. Because of my ADHD I lack impulse control so not buying things is super hard.

Since the internet makes buying things so easy and a lot of the equipment I need to do things I am fascinated with is no longer hard to optain I have been able to explore things I couldn’t before.

Puppet building is the greatest example of this. When I first made puppets about ten years ago I used inferior materials. The good stuff was to difficult to obtain and so I made do with what I had on hand. Now I can find amazing materials that take my puppets to the next level and they show up in a couple days.

I have often thought that I should prioritize my hobbies. Pick the ones that are my favorite and focus on those. I have even read that focusing on multiple things makes you mediocre at all of the things. But I do it all for fun so who cares. Just like when I was entertaining I will be a Jack of All Trades, Master of None.

If you look at the list of hobbies that I work on and take out the games, you are left with a list that is all about visual story telling. Making puppets, making clothes, making music, drawing storyboards, and writing a story. If I would take the time, I could make a movie. I probably won’t, but I am developing the skills to do just that.

What I need to do is figure out how to make my hobbies into a Voltron like hobby. Combine them all into one super hobby. That would be so awesome. Or maybe I should just make a mascot costume.