don't spoil your hobbies

IMO it can be a risk to take your hobbies too seriously.

turning your hobbies into jobs or side hustles can suck the joy out of them - hobbies are supposed to be fun!

specifically, when you increase the stakes and do a hobby for money, what was once play can become stressful or draining.

you start attaching expectations to your hobby, and this affects your experience.

this doesn't apply to everyone. the way it works (i think) is that if you have high confidence, everything feels like low stakes to you. thus everything feels more like play, and less like work.

however for many people, they're a normal level of confidence. increasing the stakes does suck something out of the hobby. i've felt that with writing, coding, product.

(of course you can increase your confidence and we should all work towards that, but it's not an easy or overnight task.)

Derek Sivers' suggestion here seems more and more appealing to me:

For both of them, I prescribe the lifestyle of the happiest people I know

- Have a well-paying job.
- Seriously pursue your art for love, not money.

i'll clarify - i don't think this thought is right for everybody. but it could be right for you, so i'm putting it out there.