Published on 12, July, 2020
Anyone else have a series of obsessions that seem to come and go in rotation?
When I get into a hobby, I throw myself into it fully and pursue it with passion whilst I'm learning at a decent rate. Then when the learning slows down because of the plateau that inevitably comes, I lose interest and move on to something else, often an old hobby.
Because I value efficiency, I'll often sell all of the hobby equipment - sometimes regretting it shortly afterwards.
I've been through astronomy, photography, shortwave radio, ham radio, electronics, hifi, religion, piano playing, guitar playing, motorcycling, advanced motorcycling (to the point where I was qualified to teach this). On the odd occasion that I find myself without a passion I get into a hell of a mess with addictive behaviours too.
Yep, love research, learning, and gadgets - then get bored as soon as I master something and move on. It's loads of fun but a pain for developing specialism/career etc. I finished a PhD but move across sectors and disciplines, enjoy problem-solving and research and make a living from it but it's a choppy and stressful process. Wish I could figure out how to sell researching and solving problems to make a living from it without having to deal with 'teams' and getting bored :D
Hi Extraneous, I can relate to moving around; I haven't moved between companies but I have moved across Engineering, Business Development, Product Management, Process Improvement etc. Like you I get bored so easily and much prefer starting on new stuff and making sense of it, but am tired and looking forward to retirement as soon as I possibly can (but it will be 10 years still, I think).
When I got bored at work I got involved with the company's non-work activities like community volunteering so I did careers evenings at secondary schools, literacy mentorship and became a STEM ambassador. I also became a pivotal person within the company doing energy audits, GxP training, LGBTA supporter etc. - all on the company dime.
It meant I had lots of diversions from the tedium of work - there was always something interesting dropping into my inbox that wasn't just another avoidable problerm that had just become my problem.
Think outside the box - there's lots of things to get into like becoming the fire safety officer, electrical senior person, emergency planner and a host of other non-jobs that can fill your day, give you transferable skills & qualifications and pad out your CV.
It also makes you harder to get rid of because you would leave so many vacuum spaces that would make the company operation impossible or even illegal.
@plastic thanks, useful - but I find job ads so very specific these days and they don't generally want to pay you for stuff like stem ambassador (I did a lot of work on women and STEAM but burned out, I'm not good at funding stuff). Finding things to do is never a problem, it's getting paid that's more challenging!