Cutting out my bad media habits worked for me (social media on my phone every minute of free time, and hours of Youtube in the evenings). Days feel longer, I've been reading a lot, finding time to exercise and finish projects (even during the work week). Also, my sleep has improved.
Both my brother in laws have huge modified trucks, both live in cities, both complain that the road infrastructure and parking doesn't cater to their large vehicles... Also both have (probably) never used the truck bed.
They are so huge, tons of room in the cab. Feels like driving in a living room. Have to ride over curbs to get out of parking lots though
I was raised Mormon (LDS) and there are parallels; basically they believe Mormonism is the one true and complete denomination of Christianity and once you learn this, you need to spread that truth (mandatory 2 year missions for men, and a STRONG culture of missionary work through life), also, no one goes to hell in Mormonism except those who learned this truth and then later denied it/left it (called a son of perdition).
So my parents believe I'll go to hell without the likes of Hitler because he never was taught "the truth" lol
Only thing historically significant about the 10 commandments is that the founding fathers didn't want them in classrooms
I actually bike to work also, but just got this under desk bike and am really liking it. Don't feel like its distance calculator is super accurate, but supposedly I biked 30 miles yesterday. Much better than nothing either way!
Did have to tighten the bolts on my desk chair and lube it to get it to stop squeaking though
At this point I just stopped buying chips. Feels like such a waste to fill the bag less than half way...
There is a hill to the left so it's actually really hard to walk through. Don't wanna go in the parking lot cause of my dog. It's a great trail connecting 2 parks but the section by the mall is not respected by the snow plows.
Would be such a shame to have to keep their snow on a row of unused parking spots! (This is the back side of our mall so no cars almost ever)
Got this because I don't like carrying cash (weird because I'm pretty into privacy, but I have a minimal wallet and am scared to hold lines up at stores lol)
It actually has to be broken to open which I love. The "MTG Fund" part was a joke at first but it's been a while since I was excited for a set and actually wanted to spend money on it. Bloomburrow seems promising, loved Redwall as a kid.
Might just be product fatigue. I've been very into pauper commander lately which holds me over
I'll list some hobbies at the end but for me, I struggled feeling motivated after work to do anything but eat and be entertained. It got pretty bad until I decided I needed to figure out something different. I thought I was just missing hobbies but even as I picked some hobbies up (usually on weekends) I wouldn't do them during the week.
Most of my issues revolved around stress (from work), turns out.
I still struggle with this so don't expect a magic solution, but what I found was that my job was actually a lot more stressful than I thought. To the point where I'd wake up in the night thinking about work problems that for sure weren't a big deal and that for sure wouldn't be solved half asleep. So now I try and be more productive at work to make sure I avoid deadlines getting tight, and towards the end of the day I make sure my tasks are simple, if possible. I also try and take lots of breaks and I check in with myself "am I relaxed right now?" "would a break make me more productive" - and I unfortunately found that media isn't a good break for me at work. Somehow the stress stays, while also adding in cravings for more dopamine-inducing activities. Good breaks for me include walking, actively listening to music, daydreaming, planning stuff (holidays, dinner, my upcoming evening, weekend), reading (pretty much anything), and learning new stuff (I'm studying Spanish and chess right now, recently learned all of my PLL algorithms on a Rubik's Cube). I'm a software engineer for context.
The largest stress benefit for me has been biking to work. Yeah, I almost get ran over sometimes which is scary (even with bike paths 90% of my route, you still gotta cross roads, and even with a walk sign cars still won't see you), but driving during rush hour is stressful (there are studies on this but I'm too lazy to link any). Biking is just fun. I even bike in winter (studded tires and poggies/bar mits). Since not everyone has the luxury of biking, exercising immediately after work is something to consider. It for sure helps me separate work from home. There's plenty of studies on exercise lowering stress.
And if your job isn't too stressful, there's another issues with not committing to hobbies... For me, it was that I was/am addicted to media. Once I get started with some dinner and YouTube, it's hard not to lose a couple hours. Best advice for easing out of it is audiobooks make it easy after eating to do chores/walk/not get more food. But other than audiobooks, avoid consuming media while eating. Also avoid media served by an algorithm. It's so easy to watch a great video, and refresh the recommendations to look for another. Then you're watching sub-par videos just hoping for a good one... Wasting tons of time. I use an extension to hide video recommendations. I can still search, and browse my subscriptions, but it saves me a lot of time (extension is called unhook I believe).
My username is actually centered around the idea that the more passive an activity, the less valuable it is to you. I personally want more active hobbies in my life. It is weird to me that so many fulfilling hobbies exist, but I regularly waste evenings on YouTube...
If you can have low stress and minimal cravings for YT/Netflix, here's some hobbies:
Adventure is out there. Don't waste your youth. Some of these might not seem like ideal after work hobbies, but most are totally doable in an evening.
My first Pi got me into computing which led to my software career now. Won it from a YouTube giveaway and kept it a secret because I wasn't allowed to have a computer. Put retroPi on it and told my parents it was for gaming. Coded my first game in Python (from a tutorial). I once put it in a crayon box and used that as a portable handheld. Later. Made a janky arcade cabinet. Sad that my kids may need to use a different brand device. I have no love for public companies
Not sure how badly you want it back, but it is possible to restore. Non-sugically. Basically skin under tension causes Mitosis (skin cells dividing to make more skin) - think putting on weight, gaining muscle, getting pregnant, or ear gauges. You tug the skin long enough and eventually have your hoodie back. The results are surprisingly impressive. r/restoring_foreskin has a bunch of info
Try a used laptop. Cheap, power efficient, built in UPS, small. Can be quite powerful and some are even upgradable
Cycle to work every day, 3 miles one way, I know in my bones from repeated experiences that the bigger the vehicle, the less likely they see you
Last weekend I talked my wife into trying Linux on her desktop on an extra SSD I had, she loves it. Loves that she can customize everything, says it's faster (especially boot time), we put it on her laptop last night
Have to use Windows for work (I've asked), the ads have been getting worse and worse on my work laptop. Today got a game ad notification... That's clearly too far, right? Like I have to clear notifications, so I have to see it
Oh also, I snack a lot less and have lost weight. The initial reason I cut out media was in the evenings all I would do is snack and watch stuff until bed. And I NEVER actually felt ready for bed. Maybe I'd be tired, but there was some existential dread or something that I was wasting my life and not pursuing my interests.