Is it a hobby or a necessity?

Even if something has to be done, maybe it can be done for less time

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is that it is best not to mistake a
hobby for a necessity. We need to spend some time

(00:23):
on certain things, but perhaps not as much time as
people sometimes spend. So I love reviewing people's time logs,
partly because I am fascinated by the diversity of human
experiences and how we spend our time. We all need
to do certain things, such as cooking, cleaning, and getting dressed,

(00:46):
but people spend wildly varying amounts of time on these things.
Sometimes there are practical reasons. It's probably going to take
more time to cook for an eight person family than
just for yourself. But even if we are looking at
people in similar situations, say the person who generally cooks
for a four person family without any major allergies, people

(01:09):
can spend very different amounts of time on this task.
One person spends about twenty minutes each night preparing dinner,
and another spends an hour. Both families are probably not starving,
and both families are probably not eating total junk, since
cooking at home tends to wind up being on the

(01:29):
healthier side. Feeding your household is a necessity, but spending
an hour cooking dinner each night when it is possible
to make reasonable meals in thirty minutes just might mean
that cooking has become a hobby, same with tidying. Keeping
a home clean and orderly is a necessity so you

(01:50):
don't live in chaos, but spending both weekend afternoons scrubbing
so the place is ready for a design magazine photoshoot
is probably a hobby. Getting dressed is a necessity, but
spending time being on top of the latest clothing trends
and making sure those clothing trends are in your closet
is a hobby. I'd add that sometimes work can become

(02:14):
something of a hobby too. Working past the point of
diminishing returns on things that are not due the next
day because someone thinks it looks good to be seen
working late means that after hours work has basically become
a hobby. Now, hobbies are great, whatever people's hobbies. There

(02:34):
is a lot to be said for spending time on
things we love and that bring joy to our lives.
But if you would not actively choose weeknight cooking or
after hours work as a hobby, then maybe it's time
to re examine how you are spending your time. Consider
whether you could spend less time on these activities. Is

(02:56):
the full amount of time you are spending on them
necessary or past a certain point? Is this crossing over
into hobby territory. If it is, that is good to
know so that you can scale back the amount of
time you are spending on these things when life gets busy.
A rotisserie chicken and a bag salad is great as dinner.

(03:18):
Angel hair pasa that cooks in less than fifteen minutes,
plus a jar of sauce also works. As for getting dressed,
Maybe it's time for a uniform of sorts, something classic
you can wear in various versions over and over again,
so you can get dressed in five minutes. If work
has become your hobby, try taking up a real hobby,

(03:41):
like signing up for guitar lessons one night a week
so you have a reason to leave work on time.
My guess, as the work will still get done. Time
tends to be reasonably elastic. This truth that time is
elastic shows up in time data all over the place.
I study historic time amuse patterns, and One of the

(04:01):
most interesting is how much less housework women do now
than they did in the past. Sometimes people think this
is because of labor saving devices, but looking at when
the trends happened, I think the more powerful explanation is
that more women started working for pay, and so they
weren't in their homes all day. They spent less time

(04:22):
on housework because they weren't there. But people didn't all
start living in filth. Indeed, women who don't work outside
the home now still spend less time on housework than
women did about fifty years ago. When standards change, they
change for everyone. It seems that some of the housework
of the nineteen fifties and sixties was as much a

(04:43):
hobby as anything else, filling time when the kids were
at school if there wasn't anything else going on. In
any case, when you recognize that some things are more
hobby than necessity, then you can simplify if you want
this open up time for other things, like hobbies you'd
enjoy more. Personally, I prefer doing my puzzles or reading

(05:05):
to cleaning, so that seems like a good trade off
to me. In the meantime, this is Laura, Thanks for
listening and here's to making the most of our time.
Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas,

(05:29):
or feedback, you can reach me at Laura at Laura
vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia.
For more podcasts from iHeartMedia, please visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

(06:00):
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