What is a hobby and whats essential to life?

With regard to reading it's something I do for several hours every day and have done so since childhood.

I don't watch TV, listen to music or the radio so it's no more a hobby for me than people watching TV is.  Passtime?

I see a hobby as something you do from time to time and you get great enjoyment from - it can be all sorts of things but often is practical.

Then there are 'special' interests which can be very absorbing - photography is something I'd put into that bracket (for me).

I think actually it's quite individual as a thing can mean something very different from one person to another.

'Essential' is a difficult word as if you were locked away somewhere without your books, would you survive?

If so, it's not essential for living but maybe essential for contentment (as it is with me).

I have a problem with the term "passtime", it's so belittling and suggests that the things you do that give your life meaning aren't important or have any value.

To get back to what I was saying after nearly being bumped off by the dreaded orange banner making me have to sign in again.

I might physically survive, but whether I would come out sane from a book free period is doubtful, like you I've read since I was a child. 

I do watch telly, but not as much as some and different stuff to most on here, I don't listen to radio as DJ's annoy me to the point of defenestrating the radio and I no longer listen to music due to lack of suitable listening time and more importantly uninterupted listening time.

I wonder if the thing about a hobby not being a hobby when you make money from it, is more about a warped sort of Protestant Work Ethic, where you must not enjoy yourself, especially at work, because work is some mad kind of punishment?

When a hobby is part of a coping mechanism, I think it's still a hobby, I don't see there being anything wrong with having or using a hobby to stablise your mental or physicla health.

I don't have a special interest so I can' treally comment on them

I note you mention trains and I wonder what describes a special interest. Do you have to spend every weekend working on a steam railway or noting down numbers of trains? Or can you like travelling on trains etc.

When I was younger I enjoyed going places on trains and had the full train timetable each year ( before they were privatised) so I could plan my own journeys. It had a map which I had on my bedroom wall and I used to plan journeys in the holidays that went on lines I hadn't been on before, then colour them on my map. I would see how far I could go in a day. On one occasion I went to a city and back a different way, involving a couple of changes each time. If I had the opportunity I would go on a steam train. I liked visiting model railways. When I went away to college and the diesel engines at the nearby city where I changed trains had names I kept a note of the ones I saw. I am a woman who also enjoys sewing etc.

Perhaps this was an interest rather than a special interest? Perhaps part of it is that you see a lot of beautiful countryside. When I have been abroad my choice is to travel by train and this included a trip which started with the Eurostar.

I note you mention trains and I wonder what describes a special interest. Do you have to spend every weekend working on a steam railway or noting down numbers of trains? Or can you like travelling on trains etc.

When I was younger I enjoyed going places on trains and had the full train timetable each year ( before they were privatised) so I could plan my own journeys. It had a map which I had on my bedroom wall and I used to plan journeys in the holidays that went on lines I hadn't been on before, then colour them on my map. I would see how far I could go in a day. On one occasion I went to a city and back a different way, involving a couple of changes each time. If I had the opportunity I would go on a steam train. I liked visiting model railways. When I went away to college and the diesel engines at the nearby city where I changed trains had names I kept a note of the ones I saw. I am a woman who also enjoys sewing etc.

Perhaps this was an interest rather than a special interest? Perhaps part of it is that you see a lot of beautiful countryside. When I have been abroad my choice is to travel by train and this included a trip which started with the Eurostar.