I tried 17 hobbies in 1 year
Here's what I learned
Last fall, I helped cut down a tree branch with a hand saw, stripped the bark and used a bandsaw to carve it into a wooden pasta spoon. How did I get there?
Let me back up.
I’m a business school professor at an elite university. My specialty is Content Marketing. My responsibility is to understand the creator economy and I think of it in two pieces: storytelling and distribution. The science behind creating sticky ideas (the storytelling) does not change. Conversely, social media algorithms (the distribution) evolve so quickly that I study them by moonlighting as a creator.
Experimenting has served me well. My unconventional approach to teaching has won me industry awards like the Poets & Quants Best MBA Professor 40 under 40. For example, in my content marketing class I ran a challenge called “Go Viral, Get an A”. With 30 groups, 30 days and 1 TikTok account, we garnered 10 million impressions, 1 million engagements, and a New York Times feature.
I then tackled understanding LinkedIn. Using the same sticky ideas methods, I posted 5X a week for 3 months. In a 90-day period, I obtained 1M impressions and a thorough understanding of building a personal brand. But I burned out hard on LinkedIn and stopped posting regularly.
When it came time to tackling my favorite social platform, Instagram, I decided to protect my mental health by creating content around something meaningful. Coincidently, I had just returned from a summer research trip to Denmark. Like many before me, I observed how deeply hobbies were woven into the fabric of Danish life.
Case in point: Danes don’t ask about your job. They ask about your hobbies.
Why didn’t we do that in the US? I decided I would.
I started an Instagram hobby series in October of 2024 where instead of asking people what they did for work, I asked what they did for a hobby. For my first hobby, I joined a brilliant man in his woodworking shop. Y’all I made a wooden spoon! Next, an Emory student invited me to bake cardamom buns. Then a student convinced me, a tennis player, to try pickleball (and yelled at me for being in the kitchen). I climbed a 30-ft rock, picked up a golf club for the first time in 10 years, and learned to throw clay on a pottery wheel.
I fundamentally changed as a human being. I am braver, stronger and more confident as a result of getting uncomfortable and trying new things. If you try new hobbies, you will change too. In fact, by the end of this post, I want to convince you to make a commitment yourself: try one new hobby this summer.
Now that I’ve had a few months to reflect on the Try Your Hobby experiment I want to document my learnings.
5 Takeaways From Trying 17 Hobbies
Hobbies and scrolling don’t mix.
I tried everything from baking to rock climbing to embroidery. There wasn’t a single hobby that allowed me to scroll on my phone. While this sounds obvious, I just don’t think we are saying this loud enough: hobbies are one of the few natural antidotes to screen time. When your hands are covered in flour, holding a paintbrush, or gripping a climbing wall, your phone is unavailable. Not to mention, if there’s a hobby you can’t wait to do, you will stop wasting time scrolling and get your work done more efficiently.
Some hobbies are a ‘not-right-now’ hobby. Bookmark your joy.
I loved woodworking. But this hobby has a massive start-up cost and it’s not conducive to small kids bumbling around. So, I wrote it off. Ironically, another burly man invited me to his workshop so I got to do the woodworking hobby a second time. This time, instead of being overwhelmed by the amount of expertise and resources my perspective changed. Instead of writing it off entirely, I realized it’s a not-right-now hobby. Try things even if they aren’t for right now. Bookmark your joy and return back to it when life suits you.
One person's hobby is another person's work.
This one really surprised me. As a mother to two young kids, the most triggering question in my life is “what’s for dinner”, closely followed by “what’s for lunch.” For me, anything in the kitchen is work. But when I spent time with Sophie, an Emory senior, I realized that, for her, baking was the furthest thing from work. It’s what allowed her to decompress from the grind of being a student at an elite university. Once I thought about hobbies in this light, I understood that organizing is a hobby for me but it is work for others. If something doesn’t feel like work to you, go ahead and call it a hobby.
Don’t stereotype a hobby as being for introverts.
I used to think of hobbies like embroidery or baking as quiet, introverted pursuits. And yes, they can be. But what I discovered is that almost any hobby can become social. A lovely student from Georgia Tech invited me to learn embroidery. We met at the Paper and Clay studio on Georgia Tech’s campus and while we embroidered at our community tables, other students worked with clay and textiles. Dozens of students meet monthly to make things together! Find your hobby and you’ll find your people.
Americans are way more interesting than you think.
Every time I asked someone about their hobby, they surprised me. Literally, every time. I chatted with the Emory Dean of Admissions (a very no-nonsense professional) and she shared that her weekends are full of competitive sailboat racing! There are so many headlines about the loneliness epidemic in America but I’ll tell you who isn’t lonely: the hobbyists I spent time with. Each of them has a community built around their hobby and they are forming relationships and identities outside of work.
Get a Hobby
Very often, people I know will tell me they love the Get a Hobby Instagram series. They tell me that as soon as they find balance at work they’ll get a hobby. Unfortunately, balance doesn’t work like that. It’s not a shiny pebble you find on your way to work. If you want balance, Get a Hobby. You’ll naturally be forced to define your boundaries: as a worker, as a parent and as an individual.
To Get Started
I personally like the adage, “For optimal well-being have a hobby for your body, a hobby for your brain and a hobby for your creativity.” To get you inspired for summer, here’s a snapshot of all the hobbies I tried.
Writer’s note: On June 25, 7:01am I opened up this paywall. There’s a lot of excitement for this topic and, in this case, I don’t want to do any gatekeeping.
What Hobbies Stuck
Tennis was already a beloved part of my life. As was home DIY. You’d think that would be enough. But, nope. This is what I’ve added after the series:
Mahjong: The very first time I played mahjong I knew it would be an addiction. American Mahjong is a tile-based game with 4 players and you try to be the first to complete a winning combination from the play card. There’s a rhythm to the game that allows you to go into flow. I like having a hobby for my brain. It gives me a small break from the natural thought patterns I’m typically contending with that involve to do lists.
Golf: I’d like to become a (very) amateur golfer. My goal is to be comfortable enough to do a Nine & Wine with my husband and friends. A few of our close couple friends are golfers and the idea of riding around on a golf cart on a Friday night summer, surrounded by good company and oak trees, is just so appealing. My daughter and son are learning to play and my long-term vision is the four of us on a golf course as a family at some cool destination. Family hobbies!
What Hobbies are Not For Me
A lot actually!
Horseback riding: It sounds very cool but the idea of taking care of another living thing absolutely overwhelmed me. I’m not sure if I’m more selfish than most people, but I can’t imagine signing up for this emotional and financial responsibility.
Leather making and pottery: It was too hard! It was slow moving and hard on my hands and unlike a home DIY project, I wasn’t motivated by the end product.
Collage making: I’d rather wallpaper and end up with a stunning wall than a piece of paper that will get thrown away.
Painting: I thought I would love this one and I did love my painting session with Carmel, but on my own I didn’t know how to keep going. I’ll stick to painting walls.
Weekly Hobby Time Allocation
Hobbies are my insurance policy against burnout so I take scheduling time for them seriously. I am generally planning 1-2 weeks out, specifically blocking:
Tennis 4X (1-3 hours): Monday evening practice with my team, Sunday match, 1 hitting session with my husband or son, 1 more friendly hitting session or tennis cardio.
Mahjong 1X (2 hours): 4 player game or Siamese
In addition to those 5 time blocks, I weave in micro-hobbies that take as little as 20 minutes: home DIY projects, making granola, organizing.
Currently, I’m doing at least 10 hours of hobby-ing per week. Based on the best research we have available, the optimal amount of leisure time for happiness is 2.5 hours per day so really I could do even more!
How I Find the Time for Hobbies
I took a massive pay cut to go from corporate to academia and the trade off is I acquired a flexible schedule. I’m currently working unconventional hours. I put out some of my best work between 600am-730am and 800pm-930pm. That frees up at least half the 9-5 day.
Having a husband that supports my hobbies. Every single Monday night he is on point for the kids. Every Sunday he adventures with the kids while I have a match. Similarly, he is on a tennis team (and a summer golf team!) and I support him.
I don’t go to the gym or workout classes. I battled with myself to work out for the better part of two decades and never could find the discipline to stick with it. Tennis is my hobby but it is also my workout.
If you begin to prioritize hobbies (and I hope you do!), I recommend getting the support of your partner, look for ways to get work done more efficiently (no scrolling!) and see if you can turn a hobby into also serving as a healthy habit.
The Hobby Video that Got a Hard NO
Dancing. The truth is: I’m tone deaf. Or at least close to it. I can’t hum a note to save my life. I feel super exposed sharing this human deficit but I try to remind myself we all have strengths and weaknesses. Instead, I appreciate the great thing my body can do: balance, hand/eye coordination, quick reflexes. But dancing? You’ll never see me do it.
Your Turn
What’s a hobby you’ve tried that immediately made you realize ‘not-for-me’?
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Sewing and quilting! I have sewn my entire life. I loved it so much, I opened up a sewing studio and fabric store in my neighborhood to teach others how to sew! And it worked, we teach all ages 5 - 85, we also sell fabric, notions, kits, sewing machines, everything to keep you sewing. We also have weekly open sews, and people love to come and sew for the afternoon or evening. It’s a fun few hours of sharing, learning and making new friends. I love to read, and find listening to an audio book while quilting or sewing perfection. I also learned Mahjong this past year and play weekly. I also started golfing again, we go to the driving range and play an easy nine at the local public golf course. I needlepoint too. Yes, hobbies are the key to a good
life! Thank you so much for this interesting article!
I’m working on fly fishing this summer. I heard years ago, “Trout only live in beautiful places,” and that’s true. But it’s difficult to get good at, which reminds me how uncomfortable we adults often are with being incompetent at something.
Your research dovetails well with studies on happy retirees. People plan a lot for the financial end of retirement but often haven’t thought about building an identity for themselves outside their work.
I like being serious about my hobbies, even if I am not that great at them. I have played piano since childhood, and a couple of years ago I started a monthly “play for each other” gathering in my home. It gives each of us something to work toward in our practice, plus a social component focused around our hobby. Two of the participants are 80+ years old!