A distinguished actor appeared on TV and talked about their love for juggling. They had taken lessons at various times and always sets aside time to practice because they enjoy it so much. They then recounted how they recently met their juggling teacher of ~10 years past, displayed their current juggling skills, and was met with astonishment at how they had not improved one bit in all that time!

It was a funny story, but what struck me was just how nice it was that juggling was a constant source of enjoyment for this person despite apparently being no good at it. That’s a hard thing to do.

I think that the internet is partly to blame, since the entire world’s top talent is now at our fingertips. It is too easy to see the best of the best, compare ourselves to them, and end up thinking, “Well what is the point of me doing this at all, then?”

But we must allow ourselves to enjoy things, even in the face of our clear mediocrity. Is there anything I enjoy doing – and let myself enjoy – that I am not good at? Am I denying myself of any hobbies just because of a lack of skill? Let’s dig in.

Hobby: Web development

This one is tricky, because I used to be decent at it but am now well behind the curve. I can slap together some HTML + CSS + JavaScript and make an OK web page. I was adept at Ruby on Rails 10 years ago and can still fuddle through making a web app.

But I touched python for the first time last year. I used Docker for basically the first time last year. I have no idea how to fix a Linux server when things don’t go exactly according to Getting Started guides. I have never touched a JavaScript framework. I have a small comfort-zone and am totally lost outside of it.

These things don’t bother me though, because I enjoy the time I spend tinkering. Occasionally I decide I want to try something new, and I stumble and fumble my through it and maybe learn a little along the way. This is possibly the only creative activity that I can enjoy in a pure, for the love of the craft kind of way. I like that.

Not-yet-a-Hobby: Drawing

Sometimes I get a hankering to draw a picture, and I always enjoy the time I spend doing it. But I am not a good artist. I’m especially terrible at drawing faces. Awful.

I can’t call it a hobby, since I rarely make time to draw. I have a suspicion that I would enjoy it if I let myself, and that the main thing holding me back is that I think I’m no good at it.

Hobby: Haiku

A few years ago I developed an interest in Haiku. The hyper-minimal structure makes it so that changing just one preposition, or modifying the word order a little, can have a huge impact on the poem’s overall meaning and impact. I think that’s fascinating.

I was lucky to find a group of people that meet regularly for Haiku. We decide on a few prompts, spend a month writing 3 Haiku each, and come together to comment on each other’s pieces and have our teacher critique us.

I think that I’m not bad at Haiku, but to be honest, I thought that I would’ve gotten a little better at it by now. This isn’t discouraging though, as I find myself not really caring how skillful I am. The exercise of distilling a scene to its barest core and painting its picture with my words is fun. I feel like there are some low-hanging fruits for improvement if I put more effort into study, but I’m pretty happy just puttering along at my own pace.