Ask HN: How do I balance all my 200 interests in life?

I'm like you, but I'm interested in solving problems in multiple domains.

One interest, multiple domains. haha

Realize you can’t do it all. Prioritize and perhaps put some of those interests as something for later on in life.

Write it down.

Have you tried the Eisenhower method ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_management#The_Eisenhower...

- "How do I balance all my 200 interests in life?"

You flail around for a bit and die of old age.

First get that growth looked at.

Then find a long-term project to work on that you can get back to whenever you get bored with one of the other 199 interests. That way you get to have a sense of progress without getting bored.

Pick 3-5 per year.

I don't know. I've largely failed at it. I have a ton of hobbies, and I feel like they're all not getting enough attention, and are taking up too much space. But every time I think about getting rid of my stuff for a hobby, I get more interested in it and actually do it for a bit, instead of getting rid of it.

The one hobby that I have massively cut down on is woodworking. I still have the tools, but I almost never do it now. It's noisy, dirty, dangerous, and expensive. So it's pretty easy to decide to give up on, in favor of other hobbies.

whats a 'growth guy' ?

I would just remind you of the paradox of Buridan's ass https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buridan%27s_ass

"It refers to a hypothetical situation wherein an ass (donkey) that is equally hungry and thirsty is placed precisely midway between a stack of hay and a pail of water. Since the paradox assumes the donkey will always go to whichever is closer, it dies of both hunger and thirst since it cannot make any rational decision between the hay and water."

If you have many interests it is easy to not make any appreciable advancement in any of them. Rate your interests. Pick maybe 2 and work those until you are content with them or find out you dont really like them.

It's because most of us are curious individuals. I had a lot of interests: coding, playing musical instruments, cars, woodworking, embedded systems, audio/video engineering, etc, but I had to pare it down to just a few after having had several bouts of burnouts. I'd recommend trying 200 interests at a shallow level, and eventually you'll find some of them are more interesting than others. And then start to focus on the few that you really want to pursue, or those that actually move the needle of your ultimate goals in life. I'd recommend the book "The One Thing".

I find it (a tiny bit) helpful to create a mind map of all my various interests. In doing do I realized that many are closely related, for example, AI coding is adjacent to shortwave radio as both are on a technology branch. Other branches could be the arts, history, languages, etc, This helps me feel that I am not neglecting some interests, I'm just focusing on different aspects of it for now and I can rest assured I'll look at other branches in due time. https://www.mindmup.com/

Being curious about the world is a good thing. The mental structure I created for myself is that accomplishing things is more important to me than following any of my interests so I focus on the things I really want to accomplish and chaos of interests is the place for play and self-development.

From my experience random good things happen when you can balance things.

This is hard.

When I asked myself this question, I had to face the uncomfortable reality that I can not follow them all. I started trimming hobbies. To pacify myself, I told myself that I am not stopping FOREVER, but just for now. It worked. Most of them are gone, I continue with a few, and I occasionally dabble with one or two that I put away.

It's OK to have 199 interests. It's also OK to have 100. Or 10. Or 5. Or 2.

There may be times when you can't give any attention to hobbies at all. Sometimes work, family, or health require your full attention. In life, there are important things, and really friggin' important things. Hobbies are merely important.

> In the book Refuse To Chose: A Revolutionary Program For Doing Everything That You Love Barbara identifies someone she calls The Scanner—someone who frequently has a multiplicity of interests, but finds it hard to create a successful life he or she loves because their passions and abilities are taking them in so many different directions. Contrary to popular wisdom, Sher tells Scanners that theirs is a unique ability, not a liability. She also states that they must do everything they love, not zero in on one pursuit at the expense of all others. With dozens of powerful techniques Sher has developed to free people from “goal paralysis,” readers will stop thinking of themselves as dabblers or dilettantes, and find innovative ways to live lives of variety, challenge, and joy. - https://barbarasclub.com/about/

I won't claim the book changed my life, nor is anything in it really revolutionary, but it did help me feel a bit better and finding some new tools for dealing with it, after struggling with exactly the same thing as you for 2 decades.

Horrible advice: find a way to blend your work with your interests so that you no longer understand where your core work hours start and the obsessiveness begins. Do this for > 12 hours a day, every day, holidays included. Tell your loved ones that you're busy with work, and take small satisfaction that what you just said was half true. Develop an unhealthy addiction to liquid stimulants and spring out of bed every morning with a burning curiosity that wont abate until you've tripped over enough hurdles to crush your enthusiasm for a few hours. Rinse and repeat for a decade until you're no longer a jack of all trades, but a master of most. Try to convey your interests to those around you, and failing that, retreat to social media where you will attempt to spin these as career developing STAR moments. Accept the disappointment you will feel in knowing that no one will appreciate the efforts you went to in achieving this level of tedious mastery.

I found one of the weird positives of going through a life changing crisis was during that period, what interests I did have at the time really were what I wanted to do. I kept just those interests up and it really helped give me some direction. But YMMV on that one.

Some people say they don't know what to do with all their time when they retire. I feel like I could live three lifetimes and still have plenty more I wanted to do.

You just have to prioritise and cull based on your own personal set of factors. Things along the lines of:

- what makes you (the most?) money?

- what keeps you healthy?

- what keeps you sane?

- what do you enjoy the most?

- what maintenance is necessary?

All the things you don't have time for, make a list of them as backups in case others fall through.

One somewhat odd thing of mine is to delay gaming until I'm actually less able to do physical pursuits that I enjoy and contribute to my physical health. This is partially a reaction to being essentially gaming-sober for a good decade and a bit; but I still hear the call every now and then.

P.S. just wait until you have kids...

Retention and maintenance is easier than progress. If you get a skill to some level, then stop constructively practicing it, then you’ll allow your ability to slide back a bit but it’ll stay pretty good.

E.g. if you train to run 5k in 15 minutes (vvv hard, will consume much of your life for a long time), then return to a lower volume program, you won’t be able to run as fast but you’ll still be much, much faster than average.

So you prioritise. Pick something to do now, and say ‘I am doing this for June. In July I shall do this other thing.’ Maybe a SMART goal for the month. Stick to your schedule. Once it’s over, don’t forget the skill, but prioritise your new focus.

Having a back-catalog of skills is so much fun. They may only be 80% of what they were but that’s enough for 95% of cases.

Relax. I think with the exception of a passionate few, were all that way.

I would say try something like invest a third of your time and stuff that will help your career.

And invest a third your time in learning new stuff.

And use a third of your time pursuing things that are keeping your interest.

The other piece that I think is really important is you don't have to do all 200 at the same time.

You gave the example of woodworking, it looks like you had a fun time doing it and you enjoyed the work. But you got to a point where it's not your primary passion. That's okay. You can always pick it up later.

I try to take the time to do one or two things in depth as a current interest. But when it ceases to be fun I set it aside.

One of my hobbies that I really enjoy is bicycling. There have been times in my life where I spend 10 hours a week. And there are times in my life where I kind of let it lapse, but I'm back to doing it again and I'm enjoying it.

In general, we live a long time, and the stuff we're interested in will change over time. And the stuff you learned today, will always provide a foundation for your future interest tomorrow.

So give yourself a pass. You don't have to do it all at once. Interesting stuff isn't going away.

[dead]

You could follow Warren Buffet’s method.

1. List all your interests. 2. Circle the top 5. 3. Do those 5. Avoid the other 195 at all costs.

There are a lot of articles about it. It’s called the 5/25 method.

I agree with the sentiment that you should simply reduce and focus. With that in mind, I would also encourage you to write down things related to the interests that you don't give any focus to — inevitably, they will come up. Random ideas, articles, people talking about it, etc. And I think they needs to be processed to get them out of your system.

Personally, I enjoy at least writing down the ideas, passions, or motivations I have towards them somewhere and collecting them. Then, if the time comes when I choose that interest or topic, I already have a good bunch of well-marinated ideas. Of course, that can also overwhelm me, but then you just go to step 1 again!

I have a list of things I'd like to learn, which I sort periodically based on my priorities, then ignore it and follow the nearest shiny object.

First, you take a yellow legal pad and create a pros and cons list.

Just fucking with you.

Try one thing at a time. If you have 200 interests, I guarantee you that you've never actually done most of them. Pick one, any one, and do it. Set aside some time (ideally 90 minutes) and do it every day for two weeks. You may find that you like the idea of the thing more than you like actually doing that thing. If you really enjoy it, keep doing it and ignore the rest! If you don't like doing that thing, pick another of your 200 out of a hat and try that for two weeks.