Tips for Trying Out New Hobbies for Our Independent Living Communities

Picking up a new pastime in your retirement!

One of the biggest perks of retirement is the freedom to fill the majority of your time with joy-filled activities! From spending time with loved ones to relaxing, there’s an abundance of activities to partake in – including picking up a new hobby. While we might be tempted to stick to the pastimes we know or have done in our youth, retirement is an excellent time to try something new.

At our Sunshine Retirement Living independent living communities, we love seeing our residents discover new passions and interests. With a few simple tricks to help you identify a potential new hobby and get started, you can easily develop a new passion in your retirement. Check out our tips below!

Know Yourself!

The first and perhaps most important tip is to be honest with yourself about your interest in a particular hobby. One of the worst mistakes you can make is to choose a hobby that seems achievable but you have very little interest in it. It takes interest and drive to inspire you to practice your new pastime. If you have never once enjoyed spending time with animals, volunteering at an animal shelter or starting a pet-sitting venture might not be the right choice for you. However, maybe you have always had a passion for gardening beautiful flowers. If so, consider taking up floral arranging as a new hobby, or even act as a “consultant” with friends and family to help them plan their spring and summer gardens each year. Think about the things you have loved to do in the past and make a list of related hobbies that could be of interest to you. Not only will some of these hobbies have transferable skills, but you are far more likely to find a hobby you love and therefore, will stick with it far longer than a hobby you simply tolerate.

Patience

It can be very tempting to see a hobby and think it’s easy to pick up and master immediately. Remember, mastering something takes time and practice, so don’t expect to be instantly good at knitting a scarf or painting, or nail those yoga poses on the first try. Patience is incredibly important here. Mastering one step at a time is key to developing your skills and sticking with your new pastime. Beethoven didn’t write his iconic 5th Symphony on his first try at writing music. Skills have to be honed. If you’re brand new to a hobby, try reading a book for beginners or find a tutorial on YouTube or a video from a library. We also find that having a sense of humor is important when learning something new. If you play a wrong note on the piano while learning, have a little chuckle, start again, and continue until you master that little section!

Group Learning

For some hobbies, especially physical hobbies like yoga, pilates, strength training, or cycling, it’s actually better to learn these with a group or with a teacher. Not only will working with an instructor allow you to have more clarity on how to do the moves properly, but they will be able to correct you in real-time. Another benefit of learning in a group setting is that you can bond with the other students, bounce ideas off of one another, and hold each other accountable for progress and attending the learning sessions.

Schedule

While scheduling time to do your hobby might seem boring, or even unimportant as your schedule might be wide open, a schedule can help you stick to learning your hobby. One of the best ways to schedule time for your hobby is to back into it from your ultimate goal. First, find your reason for taking up your hobby (your why), then set your due date for your main goal (your when), and then break your schedule into sizable chunks with mini-projects and key performance indicators along the way (your how.) Schedule the time in a calendar you see every day, and set regular alarms and reminders to practice your hobby. Sticking to your schedule and committing to learning is one of the toughest parts of learning a new hobby, but at the end of the day, it is the most important!

There are so many ways to enjoy your retirement, and we think picking up a new hobby is an excellent way to do just that! We hope with our tips, selecting a new hobby is a piece of cake!

If you’re looking to learn more about our amazing independent living communities at Sunshine Retirement Living, please give our wonderful team a call!