Latest / The Good Life: Style, Wellness, Home & Everyday Living / Why Your Hobbies Disappear When Life Gets Busy (And How to Find Them Back) | The Good Life
Transcript
- There is a specific, quiet grief in watching your favorite sweater gather dust in the back of the closet while you survive on takeout and screen time. It’s not just about the hobby; it’s the feeling that you’ve lost a part of yourself to the sheer weight of keeping everything else afloat. Let’s breathe into that for a moment. I want you to think about what you used to love doing before the world started spinning faster. Maybe it was watercolor painting. Maybe it was tending to your rose garden, or perhaps it was simply sitting with a book and reading three pages without checking your phone once. For me, it was the ritual of mixing my own face masks. I had this little stone mortar and pestle, and I would spend twenty minutes grinding dried lavender and oats, listening to the crunch, smelling the earth rise up. It was my anchor. But then, life happened. The deadlines piled up. The family needs grew louder. And slowly, almost imperceptibly, that mortar went into a drawer. Then the drawer got shoved to the back of the kitchen cupboard. Now, it sits there, hidden away, like a secret you’re too tired to tell anyone. We don’t talk enough about the invisible tax we pay when we stop making time for joy. It’s not just that we stop painting or gardening. It’s that we start to feel thinner. Less textured. We become efficient machines, yes. We get things done. We answer emails. We cook healthy dinners because we have meal-prepped on Sunday. But somewhere along the line, we traded our soul for efficiency. We forgot that the point of living isn’t just to survive the day, but to savor the moments between the tasks. When we lose our hobbies, we lose the spaces where we can be unproductive, unoptimized, and entirely ourselves. So often, I hear from listeners who say, 'Dearbhaile, I just don’t have the time.' And I understand that. Truly. I do. But I also want to gently challenge that notion. It’s rarely about the clock. It’s about the permission. We look at our days and see them as containers that are already full, packed tight with obligations, until there’s no room left for anything that doesn’t serve a purpose. But a hobby doesn’t need to serve a purpose. That’s the whole point. A hobby is a place where you go to escape purpose. Think about it. When you were a child, did you draw because it was productive? Did you build forts because they improved your home’s structural integrity? No. You did it because it felt good. Because it was yours. As adults, we have to relearn that permission. We have to carve out space not because we have extra hours, but because we refuse to let those hours consume us entirely. It’s about shifting from a mindset of scarcity—'I don’t have time'—to one of intentionality. 'What is essential enough to protect?' If your well-being is essential, then your joy must be protected too. Not as an afterthought, but as a priority. Here is what I’ve learned from my years in Ireland, surrounded by the rain and the quiet: luxury isn’t about having more time. It’s about deepening the texture of the time you have. You don’t need two hours to paint. You can mix one pigment. You can make one brushstroke. You don’t need an hour to tend your garden. You can sit on the porch and watch one bee pollinate one flower. These small moments are not insignificant. They are the threads that hold our sanity together. When life gets busy, we tend to abandon hobbies entirely because we think we can’t do them 'right.' We think if we can’t complete the project, if we can’t finish the chapter, if we can’t harvest the whole bed of tomatoes, then it wasn’t worth starting. But that’s the hustle culture talking. That’s the voice that tells us everything must be optimized, measured, and completed. Let’s silence that voice. Let’s allow our hobbies to be messy. Let’s allow them to be incomplete. A half-finished sketchbook is still a testament to your creativity. A single pot of basil on the windowsill is still a connection to nature. Don’t let perfectionism steal your peace. I remember when I first moved to the cottage, I tried to recreate all my old routines exactly as they were. I wanted the same morning light, the same quiet, the same uninterrupted hours. And when I couldn’t find them, I felt frustrated. I thought I had failed. But then I realized that the ritual wasn’t in the conditions; it was in the attention. I started making tea differently. Instead of rushing through it, I focused on the sound of the kettle whistling. I focused on the steam rising from the mug. I focused on the warmth of the ceramic against my palms. That became my new hobby. My new practice. It wasn’t grand. It wasn’t Instagram-worthy. But it was mine. You can do the same. Look at your day. Where are the gaps? Not the big blocks of free time, but the tiny slivers. The five minutes before the kids wake up. The ten minutes during your lunch break. The fifteen minutes after dinner when everyone is watching TV. Can you claim even five minutes for yourself? Five minutes to stretch? To write one sentence in a journal? To listen to one song with your eyes closed? These micro-rituals add up. They create a boundary around your soul. They remind you that you exist outside of your roles as employee, parent, partner, or friend. You are also a person who likes things. Who enjoys textures. Who has preferences. One of the hardest parts of reclaiming your hobbies is the guilt. You’ll feel guilty for taking time away from work. You’ll feel guilty for not cleaning the house. You’ll feel guilty for resting when there’s so much to do. This guilt is a liar. It’s a habit formed by years of conditioning us to believe that our worth is tied to our output. But here is the truth: rest is not the opposite of work. Rest is the foundation of work. Without it, we burn out. Without it, we become brittle. And brittle things break. When you engage in a hobby, you are not being lazy. You are being replenishing. You are charging your battery so that you can show up fully for the people and projects that matter. Think of it like watering a plant. You don’t water a plant because it’s convenient. You water it because if you don’t, it dies. Your joy is that plant. Your hobbies are the water. If you neglect them, you will wither. So give yourself permission to water the plant. Even if it’s just a few drops. Even if it’s just for a minute. If you’ve let a hobby slide, please don’t beat yourself up. There’s no shame in putting things down when life demands it. What matters is how you pick them back up. Start small. Choose something low-stakes. Something that brings you simple pleasure. Maybe it’s knitting a scarf that will never be worn. Maybe it’s cooking a meal just for fun, not for nutrition. Maybe it’s walking without headphones and noticing the way the light hits the leaves. Let’s breathe into that. Feel the weight lift off your shoulders. You don’t have to be good at it. You don’t have to share it. You don’t have to monetize it. You just have to do it. For you. In this season of busyness, may you find pockets of peace. May you rediscover the things that make you feel alive. And may you remember that your worth is not defined by your productivity, but by your presence. Slow down, darling. The world can wait. Your joy cannot. Thank you for spending this time with me. I hope you take a deep breath now, and maybe touch something beautiful today—a flower, a piece of fabric, your own hand. Until next time, be gentle with yourself. I’m sending you so much love. Goodbye for now.