With more free time than ever on my hands this past year, along with the necessity to stay inside, I quite quickly realised that I would need to find some more interests to entertain myself with. Though I usually find myself terrified of facing long periods without some kind of work to do, this past year it became partly a blessing in disguise, forcing me to try things I probably would never have started if it were not for being stuck inside.
The first hobby I tried picking up was art. I have always loved art and drawing especially, up until I seriously studied it for GCSE and A-Levels when it became more of a chore than a true hobby. At the beginning of lockdown, I tried picking up the literal and metaphorical paintbrush again by doing some small watercolours and following the Bob Ross tutorials that my friends are so fond of. Unfortunately, my love for experimenting with art myself might have been permanently stolen by Art A-Level as I found I had little patience for it as a hobby anymore, and very swiftly moved onto something else.
The next hobby I tried out was a dubious one for me. Baking was something I saw everyone doing at the beginning of the first lockdown, baking bread especially was all the rage. Though I had never liked baking when I was younger, I wondered if time would have changed my feelings about it. After watching many of my friends fall in love with it and a couple of inspirational YouTube videos later, I thought I’d give it ago. My brownies turned out good and tasty, but I found the process of baking tested my patience as much as it had when I was younger, and so baking became another hobby stricken from the list.
Working out was not something I had considered at first in the midst of lockdown. To be honest, I hadn’t been that concerned about how fit I was last year. I was more intent on using my new inside time to relax. But, after many months of limited exercise, I realised exercise was something I needed to seriously try. And it’s definitely something I’m still trialling. There are so many different ways to exercise and I feel like I’ve tried the lot at this point. My first port of call was Chloe Ting but, when I found it difficult to keep up due to the limited space in my bedroom, I moved onto running, and then onto pilates, and now I’m trying running again but this time with a friend for company. So, let’s say this one is a work in progress (and will probably continue to be for a while) as I try to find what works best for my body.
So far, the most impulsive and yet surprisingly fun hobby I have discovered has been learning a foreign language. I began language learning purely on a whim after my friend taught me about foreign alphabets, and figured I’d continue since it filled up my free time with something that also felt productive. After multiple months now, it has proven to be the most fun yet I’ve had with one of my hobby experiments and is the one I’ve continued the longest (which I also don’t see myself stopping anytime soon). It’s something different and feels rewarding and productive since I’m constantly learning.
I think lockdown has been an eye-opening experience for many of us in both positive and negative ways. One of the positives that I am grateful for today has been the opportunity to spend time and energy on things that I wouldn’t have considered doing otherwise, and that I have been able to turn what felt like a disaster a year ago into a period of self-discovery, having fun trialling and erroring old, new and different things.