I don’t think hobbies feel empty because we chose the wrong ones.
I think they feel empty because something around them changed.
A lot of people start hobbies the same way now. There’s excitement at first. You buy the thing. You watch a few videos. You imagine the version of yourself who does this.
And then… it fades. Not dramatically. Just quietly.
You stop picking it up. You feel a little guilty. And eventually you tell yourself, “Maybe I’m just not the kind of person who sticks with hobbies.”
I don’t think that’s true.
I think modern hobbies come with expectations they were never meant to carry.
I saw a video recently of someone talking about how they’d been practicing tennis for a couple of months. Not to go pro. Not to become amazing. Just as a way to release steam after work.
They said they liked hitting the ball. They liked being outside. They liked the routine.
And the comments were brutal.
People were pointing out that their form hadn’t improved much. That they should be way better by now. That they were “wasting time” if they weren’t progressing faster.
And I remember thinking…
when did that become the standard?
When did even hobbies need a visible return on investment?
Most hobbies used to be private. You did them badly. You did them slowly. And no one knew.
There wasn’t an audience. There wasn’t a trajectory. There wasn’t a question of whether this would “go somewhere.”
Now, even before you start, there’s this invisible pressure. To document it. To improve quickly. To justify the time. To turn it into something.
Even if you never post it, your brain knows you could. And that changes how it feels.
It’s hard to enjoy something when it already feels like a performance.
A lot of hobbies feel empty now because they’re no longer allowed to be pointless. They have to lead somewhere. They have to be impressive. They have to be productive.
And when they’re not, we assume the emptiness means we failed.
But I don’t think emptiness is failure. I think it’s a signal.
It’s your mind realizing that something meant to be slow is being rushed. That something meant to be personal is being measured.
We didn’t lose hobbies. We lost amateurism.
We forgot how to be bad at things without apologizing. We forgot how to practice without showing progress. We forgot how to do something without asking what it says about us.
And once a hobby starts answering questions it was never meant to answer— Am I good enough? Am I improving fast enough? Is this worth it?— it collapses under that weight.
That’s when it starts to feel empty.
Not because it has no meaning, but because it’s carrying too much of it.
I think that’s why people keep hopping from hobby to hobby. Not because they’re inconsistent, but because they’re searching for a version of doing that doesn’t feel watched.
Something quiet. Something useless. Something that doesn’t ask for proof.
The hobbies that stay with us are usually the ones that don’t care if we’re good. They don’t care if we improve. They don’t care if anyone ever sees them.
They exist in the background of our lives. And somehow, that’s where they matter most.
So if your hobbies feel empty, I don’t think you need better ones. And I don’t think you need more discipline.
I think you might just need permission to do something slowly, badly, and without turning it into anything else.
Maybe the emptiness isn’t a sign to quit. Maybe it’s a reminder of what hobbies were supposed to be in the first place.