Too Many Hobbies? Here's What To Do | SimpleProductivityBlog.com

Too Many Hobbies? Here’s What To Do…

Posted on October 14, 2009 by LJ

Wednesdays are simplicity days at SimpleProductivity blog.

Photo by happyskrappy

Have you ever done an inventory of all the things you would like to get to “someday” that are leisure activities? What about all the things that you have bought supplies for? Or perhaps all the projects that are half-finished?

I have a lot of hobbies that fall into all of the above categories. I have enough needle projects for life. My yarn stash reaches avalanche proportions about once a year. And there are unfinished objects (UFOs) in several places.

When I cracked down on myself, I set some ground rules. These rules helped me get the hobbies under control, and keep me from going off the deep end again. Here they are:

One Thing At A Time

When I have a project going in every direction, I finish nothing. By holding myself to one project at a time, I finish the projects, and sometimes I get through them much quicker simply because I want to move onto something else. I recently completed an afghan I had lost interest in, simply because I wanted to try a new knitting pattern.

Get Rid of UFOs

I looked at all my unfinished projects. Some just needed a few finishing touches and framing. Others were stuck, nowhere near completion.

The UFOs (unfinished objects) that were very near completion, I took a few minutes and finished them up. I was surprised at how much I got done! It was a great relief.

Some projects I finally admitted I was never going to finish. The castle cross stitch on impossibly small fabric with blended thread drawn from a palette of 63 colors was trashed. That was also a great relief.

Don’t Buy Unless You Can Commit

I am a sucker for new fabrics, patterns and yarn. Oh the yarn! Since I have enough patterns to last a lifetime, I tell myself I cannot buy any more unless I have a specific need and nothing I already have will work. By specific need, I mean that I have no other projects in hand at the moment, and I have a recipient for the results. I cannot buy yarn unless I have a pattern selected, and then it has to be either the next thing I will do or one or two out (to take advantage of sales).

By holding myself to this, I don’t end up with as much yarn as I used to.

Purging

Once you have narrowed things down to what you will work on, purge your stashes. Get rid of materials you will never use, or you have forgotten why you bought. Most pre-schools and daycare centers are glad of art supplies and yarn scraps (ask first!). Freecycle things. Garage sale it. Gift it. Just don’t kid yourself that you are going to get around to doing something with it.

Slimming down hobbies can actually make you very productive in what you are doing.

Photo by happyskrappy

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