Do you enjoy a hobby that sort of takes over your living space? I am an avid knitter and I quickly found myself stashing yarn all over my home. It became a bit overwhelming when I tried to clean house and kept finding yarn balls in odd places and then tried to figure out where it would go. That’s when I learned that minimalism attitudes towards hobbies can be a very valuable thing.
We Get Lost In More Is Better
To this day, I cannot go into a craft store and not come out with yarn. I avoid yarn stores completely. I have no willpower when it comes to shopping opportunities. I get lost in all that good feeling yarn and lovely colors. My brain instantly concocts all these projects I could do but it ignores the fact that I cannot get to all of them. Whereas I enjoyed shopping to push my knitting habit, I had to reverse my attitude and shop to a project. Now, I am only allowed to buy yarn when I have a specific project in mind. I also cannot have more than 2 projects going at once. I couldn’t cut down to one project at a time because sometimes I get bored with a project and need to break it up.
We Buy Into The Consumerism
The truth is, some of our hobbies love to sell us things we don’t really need or will use that often. My favorite two examples are hiking and running. I have a friend who is an avid hiker and regularly runs in local 5k’s. When she first found enjoyment in these outdoor hobbies, she found herself buying all sorts of gear. She would spend a lot of money on running clothes that she didn’t need. She would buy funky socks, sassy running skirts, crazy headbands, and anything else that she thought made running enjoyable. One day, she realized she was spending way too much money on running clothes because she no longer had space for all this stuff. She has learned to spend better and more wisely. She spends good money on good running shoes and only keeps two pairs at any given time. She sold a lot of her running clothes and now she keeps just the essentials that can get her through the 4 days she runs each week.
We Don’t See The Excessiveness
Another friend loves to paint and she used to constantly buy all sorts of paint colors whenever we went to the craft store (while I would be lost in the world of yarn). She was self-taught and never realized that she didn’t have to buy those colors. She started stressing over her bank account and how she could afford her hobby. She found a video on YouTube that taught her how to mix colors to get those shades she wanted. Then she found another video on repurposing canvases bought at Goodwill and another on repurposing wood for painting. She was able to cut back and still engage in her skill without spending anywhere near as much as she was.
Hobbies are a good thing to have. We do not need to spend that much money on needs to enjoy those hobbies. Used items, repurposing, being mindful of what you will use and what will sit, are all important to ensuring we don’t spend too much.
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