Hobbies
Call me stupid, but for a long time, I don’t get the point of hobbies. Everything I enjoy — economics, science, geopolitics, finance, numbers, philosophy, research, technology — they are my hobbies and fully integrated into the company and in the every day work I do. So to find a new hobby, initially, meant that I’m just adding more areas of perspectives into my work. Truth to be told, I’m very very very happy and comfortable with the domain knowledge so far. I’m not too thrilled about adding more domain knowledge because it stresses me out. But I also don’t want to be a boring person that always integrates her hobbies into work. Until I finally figured out the point of hobbies. Context: I’m quite competitive as a person.
The point of hobby is to strive for excellence in the unconscious competency knowledge level.
As opposed to what I do, I have to think about scaling the skillsets, documenting the knowledge and training the know-how to the rest of the team. It is intentional conscious competency so as to replicate it in greater scale. Having a hobby releases this stress of conscious competency and I can learn for the pure joy of learning while still striving for excellence. As always, it’s pointless if you’re not in the best category. By that, I mean being the best version of yourself, allowing the mechanical know-how be transferred to muscle memory and then well, outperform an average person in this field.
When I got back to Singapore in 2022, I told myself to pick up a few hobbies. Mainly because I want to move towards a healthier work-life balance and to do something that takes my mind off work. We all need that sometimes.
So far, I’ve done — golf, surf, shopping, more cooking/baking, reading fiction. I’d like to experiment with more hobbies (obviously I have a list) before focusing on the ones I really enjoy for 2023 to hone the skillsets. Golf is definitely on the list. I started playing golf always because I want to spend more quality time with my dad. As much as each hobby is a reason to take my mind off work, to expand my skillsets, it also allows me intentional time spent with people I care about. Tennis for W, cooking for mum, entrepreneurship for X and beach sports for J. I enjoy them too, and optimising the utility function of the chosen hobby is by understanding the second and third degree utility it brings me.
Sometimes I wonder if I’m too weird for being so intentional and rational about making decisions. But so what if I’m weird. I enjoy the way I live my life and I wouldn’t choose another way. 24 hours, 8 billion ways of experience it. I like my way.
Love,
L