/lit/ - Literature

Hobby is a surrogate activity and thus a cope. You either go all the way down or don't go at all.
Also, most of the activities depicted in your image aren't hobbies per se. How come drinking beer or going to work is a hobby? Can sleeping be a hobby too?

>>18304074
>Is it an attempt to find meaning in this world?
If that. The tinder NPC game is more about one-upmanship snobbery.

Guys can't be real about their real hobbies on there - 1d4, vidya, models, cars etc, because women can't relate beyond the basic 4 you see in corners prescribed by mainstream culture.

Dog

>>18304074
I used to feel awkward in school when we were to introduce ourselves by our hobbies. I had varied interests but no consistent leisure activity. I mean, other than reading autistic shit, that would make everyone instantly label me as such. So I would do my best to avoid it, making up some sudden illness or whatever. Now I know everyone was bullshiting, I was just too autistic to realize it at the time.

Also being afraid to admit to my interests was a faggy move that I don't recommend.

>A surrogate activity is an activity that is directed toward an artificial goal that the individual pursues for the sake of the “fulfillment” that he gets from pursuing the goal, not because he needs to attain the goal itself. For instance, there is no practical motive for building enormous muscles, hitting a little ball into a hole or acquiring a complete series of postage stamps. Yet many people in our society devote themselves with passion to bodybuilding, golf or stamp-collecting. Some people are more “other-directed” than others, and therefore will more readily attach importance to a surrogate activity simply because the people around them treat it as important or because society tells them it is important. That is why some people get very serious about essentially trivial activities such as sports, or bridge, or chess, or arcane scholarly pursuits, whereas others who are more clear-sighted never see these things as anything but the surrogate activities that they are, and consequently never attach enough importance to them to satisfy their need for the power process in that way.

>>18304074
Poor cats

>>18304097
What is not a cope?

Yes, people find meaning in doing things they enjoy doing you autist

>>18304104
>>18304126
>>18304097
>you can't imagine someone pursuing an activity just for pleasure
Truly sad

>>18304074
It's a form of boasting, they want the world to think they are living happy fulfilling lives and women should therefore associate with them.

Man you guys are either lame as shit or weird as hell, probably both. Getting together with the boys once a week to play some pick up basketball or learning to play the guitar recreationally is somehow an attempt to find meaning in this world? Watching old western films is somehow a coping mechanism?

Newsflash - people enjoy doing things beyond jacking off and arguing about marxism on an anime board

>>18304129
why is he always right about everything jesus christ

>>18304137
>you just know

>>18304175
being unwaveringly and uncompromisingly correct was his surrogate activity.

To piggyback off of OP...Any books about cyclical hobbies? I basically rotate hobbies 1-2 months at a time.
For two months I will do nothing but read and research literature. Then for two months I will do nothing but work on my guns and practice shooting. Then for a monty I will do nothing but research and trade crypto. Then for two months I will do nothing but play a video game. Then I go back to reading and repeat the cycle
Is this odd behavior?

>>18304212
It's a sign of an unhappy person looking for meaning in pastimes

>>18304212
It's called Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. No, it's not about misaligned tiles.

People mention books and writing more than the gym? /lit/ bros...you have a chance...

>>18304212
I do this too. Supposedly tied to my bipolar tendency - I burn through a new hobby during manic phase, or dust off an old one.
The "hobby" during downs is stable tho, just jack off and shitpost.

>>18304212
I don't know. I mean, I do this shit myself, I switch spontaneously between several different nearly-obsessive activities, but I also believe that most of normies don't do that.

>>18304212
A man needs something more in his life than just a hobby. He needs a religion or a family or a code, something that forces him into stability rather than just mindless self-indulgence.

>>18304074
"This subjugation can be clearly seen at work in the hobby ideology.
The naturalness of the question of what hobby you have, harbours the
assumption that you must have one, or better still, that you should have
a range of different hobbies, in accordance with what the ‘leisure
industry’ can supply. Organized freedom is compulsory. Woe betide
you if you have no hobby, no pastime; then you are a swot or an oldtimer, an eccentric, and you will fall prey to ridicule in a society which
foists upon you what your free time should be."

http://xenopraxis.net/readings/adorno_freetime.pdf

>>18304154
Why is the current culture obsessed with entertainment and pleasure? Why not just /exist/ ?

>>18304137
God I hate my stupid dog

>>18304285
Bread and Circuses

>>18304236
>mentally ill
So you’re saying I can become a great writer?

>>18304275
Holly based. Thanks, anon.

>>18304074
>based
Walks, family, God, work (yes, for men at least), hunting/fishing, books, dancing
>cringe
drink, eat, tattoo, music (yes)
>Instant write off
Travel, netflix
>you just know
Dog

>>18304097
True, and some are even worse. At least I could have an interesting conversation with a hobbyist rock climber, or I could have an interesting chat with someone about a place they travelled but how is 'dog' a hobby?

>>18304285
People have been pursuing pleasure forever, it's not some new development. Even a short life is a long time, gotta fill it with something.

>>18304626
>being so disconnected from your body that you can't appreciate a good meal or drink
You are the most miserable people on earth, I swear

hobby is just an invention of modernity that abandoned these activities in the domain of the frivolous where in the past food, drink, walking etc was just done. even things like music was done as an essential activity

>>18304129
Ted is impeccably based here. He doesn’t disparage surrogate activities, but calls for you to understand why you’re doing it, and to see it for what it truly is.

>>18304129
Wtf, how could Ted have the perfect answer to my 4chan post?

>>18304074
as opposed to what?
>hello i am a 4channer.

>>18304074
I totally agree with this sentiment and yet I get called a bugman when I point out that hobbies are literally not important and that’s precisely what makes them hobbies.

>>18304212
It’s normal

I like
> books
> manga
> anime
> movies
> theatre
> games
> drinking
What does that say about me?

>>18304074
Is having hobbies cringe now? Is it now not ok to do something and not be exceptional? Holy fuck OP not everyone wants to metagame their life, sometimes people just do things because its fun or interesting.

you should strive to find higher meaning and purpose in life but you also need things to take a load off at times.

>>18304074
Hobby is a time brag. Hence why the harder and more time investment a hobby needs the more prestige it brings.

>>18304982
This is a bit heavy on the consuming side.

>>18304982
Nothing much

>>18304275
This was actually kind of awesome.

>>18304275
This is the real one, hobbies are ideology and a form of auto-subjugation. More recently ideas like "productivity", "self-improvement" and "lifehacking" have taken the concept even further, by not only removing but even actively denying the purported pleasurable element of self-imposed structured activity.

>>18304982
None of your hobbies are a creative outlet. You should get into a hobby that creates an output. Some really simple stuff I enjoy are:
>cooking
>playing piano
>gardening
>mixology
Making stuff is rewarding, try it out

>>18304184
kek

Itt

>>18304074
You sound like a huge autist

A lot of the great texts on this are older than you thin. Veblen was writing about conspicuous consumption of the leisure class and identity back in 1899
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Theory_of_the_Leisure_Class

>>18304275
Adorno is one of the best on this subject, highly recommend OP

Could also watch the Adam Curtis docu series Century of the Self on Freud and Bernay's advent of psychological advertising to consumers as self-actualization
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJ3RzGoQC4s

>>18305094
Well I write and I draw too but those are professional ambitions

>>18305171
Most people don't have a creative career like that, so as long as your satisfied no worries I guess. You might want to take up something physical though.

>>18304074
life is just one giant cope from top to bottom and then you die

“Hobby” implies identity. I am a gamer. I am a reader. I am a foodie. These are all just propagandistic titles attached to an activity in order for someone to feel a part of a group, and subsequently spend money and time in that activity, surrounded by others that perpetuate the individual to continue consuming products related to that activity. It is the commodification of the human condition. I can’t just play guitar for friends around a campfire, I must be a “musician” and buy gear and pedals and amps and multiple guitars and sheet music and DAWs and convince others to join me so we can be a “band” and play shows with other bands and sell tickets and copies of our albums all so we can “make it” with our hobby we have now invested thousands of dollars and thousands of hours into. Look at all these Loomis books I’ve purchased and how ma y different types of pencils I have. Look at my ipad drawing set up and glove and proprietary brushes. Consume consume consume. I can’t just read a book or watch a movie, I have to join the fandom and buy funkopops and go to conventions and buy the manga. I can’t just like sex, I have to get the super pleasure lube and real leather choker and a swing set. I can’t just drink shitty beer, I have to get into hoppy lagers and cocktails.

It’s all just to sell you more shit.

It’s all so that your own perceived identity is from the things you buy and do as opposed to the people you surround yourself with.

The only thing truly unique about you is the next work of community you have built. The individuals who are themselves unique and how those relationships play out.

Corporations having you define yourself by the fender acoustic guitar that several hundred thousand other people own, playing covers that several million people have already played while drinking micro brews that thousands of others have drank is not a personality. It is not who you are. Everyone else is the same as you. You become a demographic when you define yourself this way. You are defined by the times you got drunk with uncle Steve and hung out with the boys.

Hobby culture is a capitalist blight to decouple you from your humanity. To make you a slave to your things. To imbue your very being upon lifeless objects.

>>18305102
ding ding ding

>>18305304
You’re overthinking it. A lot.

>>18305339
I'm an overthinker. Y'know, it's what I do in my spare time. We're a growing community of people who just think a lot about things. There's a fantastic guide on nootropics in our subreddit FAQ if you like. I have a pretty great stack going on. Not to mention the guide for the best pens and paper for doing your overthinking on as well as some of the introductory literature in hardback with affiliate amazon links. We have overthinker conventions where everyone gets together and sells each other our manifestos that we overthought with presentations from famous overthinkers who recently published cutting edge overthinking books we all read and patreons we all subscribe to (have to support the community!) Obviously you would be pretty new to the whole thing, so you probably want to grind out a few hours of the basics of overthinking first before you start doing any overthinking of your own. Gotta get those fundies down, don't want a crumbling foundation, now do you? Anyway, once you get to intermediate overthinking you can start keeping up with most of us. The community has a monthly overthinking competition and the winner gets published in the overthinking magazine for the next month, isn't that cool? Someone also developed some overthinking apps that show you the process step by step in a gamified version of it, it costs a monthly subscription otherwise you have to save up the in game diamons you get with overthinking achievements. But that's just one of the apps, there's a ton you could look into! Anyway, overthinking might not be for you, but I wish you would give it a try just for a little bit. Maybe it's your calling. Maybe you could become the best overthinker of our time! Rank one diamond league here you come! Just imagine the sponsorship deal! Your name in lights at the national overthinking competition! Wow!

>no cars
One of the worlds largest actual hobbies and it isnt listed. And how is God a hobby? Religion is not a hobby.

>>18304648
>Even a short life is a long time, gotta fill it with something.
I feel sorry for you and at the same time jealous. For me time passes ever faster. I can feel death.

>>18305390
Notice how the top says "interests" and not hobbies? These are signifiers of personal identity people put in their bios when they want to FUCK. They are signifiers to let the parties know they will have arbitrary things to discuss for the two hours before they FUCK so they can believe they are compatible for a brief time. Hobbies are signifiers but not all signifiers are hobbies. Telling a woman that you work on cars is not going to get your DICK WET unless you are GAY and like BEARS.

>>18304074
Is creating garbage posts on 4chan a hobby?

>>18305102
I'm 35, thus everything else is, while still truth, invalid

>>18305304
>>18305388
Somewhat based

How can you guys use tinder?

I got 99 matches my first day and have had sex off of there but it’s so soul crushing. I legitimately cannot bring myself to open it and go through the motions.

>”hey”
>”hey”
>”wyd”
>”nm u?”
>”nm, Netflix”
>”haha watch watching x”

And so on. God it is fucking awful. And nothing ever comes of it. No meaningful conversation. Nothing. I fucked a girl at her dorm and barely said like anything to her. She said she had social anxiety but that didn’t stop her from letting me fuck her. What an awful, evil fucking app.

>>18305420
How did you end up like this

>>18305304
Holy fuck you are absolutely right. I can tell you’re right because you’re making soitards seethe. How do we fix this?

>>18305496
Apps aren't evil, people are evil

>>18305403
Thomas777?!?!

>>18305511
Yes, yes, you’re right.

>>18305498
Probably by overthinking life

>>18305496
Don't blame tinder, blame the culture that allows tinder to dominate.

>>18305496
Tinder is the commodification of the social relationships I spoke of earlier as the one the that defines us as unique individuals. If you can make a service in which all sexual relationships arise, then it becomes the dominate mode of operation. Too many use it for you to not use it. Then you have to pay for the good stuff. They make it simple. They provide all the signifiers for you to reach the result of copulation. No longer is it the family friends or a person at a bar or a meet cute at a park or a friend of a friend. It is purely algorithmic. It is the system providing as match maker. It is the system determining your connection to others through the symbolic transfer of the “hobbies” and “activities” I spoke of earlier. It is the false semblance of control of ones own reality, using the most primal urges to lure the masses into itself. Now the pair becomes both isolated from the world and each other, with no escape or sincerity attached. A transactional existence in which love becomes simply a number.

>>18304212
I do this constantly, have done it ever since I was 18 or so before video games were all I did
My cycle is
>building scale model ships
>reading books on religion/religious texts
>reading japanese books
>reading history books
>playing musical instruments
Currently I'm in the musical instruments phase, I'm thinking about picking up embroidery (traditional only) as my next obsession.
It's the absolute fucking worst.
I'm desperately trying to stay fixed onto my musical instrument phase but I have no real commitment to anything.
I'm the worst dilettante and I'm definitely trying to fill the void in, I'm a miserable shut in failed tranny with nothing going on in my life.

>>18305549
On the most basic level the issue is that with any given skill you plateau and it becomes more difficult to progress than it is fun. You no longer get into the flow state when performing the activity, and subsequently you switch to a different hobby.

On the next broader level it's probably because you no longer have a tangible goal to achieve with that activity to motivate you to get past that plateau. You aren't working on a major paper or you just finished a cool ship and don't have a next one or you don't have anyone to play music for. You are lacking deadlines and achievement in relation to those activities.

On the broadest level you are trying to find meaning in activities that you know lack any inherent meaning beyond the perceivable enjoyment you have in the moment of flow state. Stuck in an endless void of meaningless milieu, constantly surrounded by propaganda that makes you feel bad for not performing or attaining the asperations of a select few lucky people. Inherently programmed to want more and to consume something grander than what you already have obtained.

>>18305549
Why? You aren't a product and aren't supposed to be marketed.

>>18305498
I'm self-employed. I don't work regular jobs for years, now, need very little to live and have a lot of free time. I have an excellent computer and a decent smartphone, enough disposable income to eat out but I don't and the t-shirt I'm wearing is 10 years old. I'm not useless or a dead weight, I'm just not a normie.

>>18305523
I'm self-employed. I don't work regular jobs for years, now, need very little to live and have a lot of free time. I have an excellent computer and a decent smartphone, enough disposable income to eat out but I don't and the t-shirt I'm wearing is 10 years old. I'm not useless or a dead weight, I'm just not a normie.

>>18305187
>You might want to take up something physical though.
There’s nothing I like. When I was young, I played sports, was in the weight room, and I liked the outdoors. The older I got, the more I just lost interest. So I don’t even know what I’d want to do now.

>>18305549
Same. I think there are many more of us on 4chan that in the general population. My obsessive cycles started around puberty.

For me it was:
>solving the rubix cube very quickly
>playing musical instruments
>reading medical journals and physiology textbooks
>reading christian mysticism
>quantitative analysis + statistics
...

The only ones I penetrated deeply were medicine and music the others passed in a month or two each. I have a job as a code monkey that pays the bills but I honestly don't know what I would want to do if I had free time other than continue cycling interests.

>>18305669
>I think there are many more of us on 4chan that in the general population
It's what normies do. They just hop from one thing to another. Real autists focus on one thing.

>>18304129
His take on fitness is cringe.

>>18305705
One of my best friends became obsessed with 3D printers a few years ago and is now so far ahead of anyone else in our city besides commercial grade printers it's insane. I wish I had that kind of dedication ingrained in exchange for being unable to notice social proclivities.


But then again, sometimes I think I might be a bit on the spectrum.

>>18305388
>>18305496
>>18305533
>>18305587
Say more.

>>18305632
Doesn't seem like a lot of fun to me but congrats on being self sustainable.

holy fuck this entire thread is just deadend losers with literally nothing going on in their lives coping to the absolute maximum, reaching levels that were never before thought attainable
hobbychads stay based

>>18305886
This post is itself a cope fantasy to make you feel special

>>18305900
right back at you
cope

>>18305723
Is it? What we consider “fitness” is an absurdity in many other countries.

>>18305784
I'm not really sure what else there is to say without additional stimuli. For a shitpost I've now written more than 1k words replying to this thread in longwinded text. I am distracting myself from my own responsibilities by just being here. I see no benefit from a continued tirade when philosophers and other cultural critics have been far more detailed and articulate than I ever could be on these matters. The fact that you are seeking more stimulation of the sort but do not go out looking for literature of the sort is itself a manifestation of these flawed modes of being that perpetuate themselves in this horrible technological age. The pains to know that none of us in these threads would ever have been the literary or philosophical kind without the advancements of the internet to show us the way, but only to have that knowledge tell us how bad it all is. We would have been in the guard tower. We would have been the scabs. We would have been the illiterate peasants starving and stealing loaves of bread. But we also wouldn't. We wouldn't have been anyone back then because we only have who we are now. We are the amalgamation of our live experiences and our genetic lineage. The world we suffer through is the only one we will ever know. So I completely understand why someone would want to lose themselves in a hobby. Flow state is a drug without the hangover. It's distraction from understanding the world around us. I'm experiencing it right now typing this out, and just like that. I'm aware again of my current happenstance.

>>18305950
I read the Adorno link posted earlier in the thread. Where can I read more? Is it only Marxians who have commented on this issue? I want to see what range of critiques of the issue have been written from left to right.

>>18305723
you havent read him
he advocates for self discipline and he himself runs 5 miles 4 times a week

>>18305723
He only attacks bodybuilding and sports, not fitness in general.

>>18305970
I unno, I read zizek, baudrillard, DFW.
I pretend to read Sartre, Marx, Hegel.
I shitpost quite a bit. I read half a book and move on to something else quite often.
When I'm hungover I'll watch youtube essay bullshit at 2x speed all day.
I'm just regurgitating an amalgamation of what I've consumed. All we do is consume. I'm so tired of it.

>>18305396
Not that guy but God damn you're an insufferable faggot

>>18306028
I consume less than you do, but this is cool stuff.

>>18306028
>All we do is consume. I'm so tired of it.
Do you create anything?

>>18306084
I’m glad my posts could bring you some sort of joy/wisdom/entertainment value, anon.

I’ve started saving my tldr posts recently and it’s impressive the volume of decent quality writing I put out on shitposting while all my other projects have been at a standstill for more than a year. What do I do with a hundred posts like this? What do you do with a manifesto worth of shitposts without citations for the veracity of its claims?

>>18304097
>Hobby is a surrogate activity and thus a cope.
Based

>>18306099
Ive made some woodworking things. I garden. I write prose. I write songs. I had a photography show once. I doodle.

>>18306121
I also write legal documents and used to do quite a bit of graph design stuff too. Used to paint miniatures. Used to do 3D modeling. Landscaping.

>>18305304
Baudrillard called this sign value I think

The only acceptable way to spend your free time is in deep meditation.
I have a room set up in my house that is just pure white from ceiling to floor. Even the door is modified to blend into the wall on the inside when closed. I spend all of my free time in there sitting in the lotus position and thinking. That is my only hobby

>>18306121
>>18306139
Cool. Sounds nice.

>>18306103
You read through them, find the thread that connects them together, and try to edit them into a collection of essays that you can publish through a reputable outlet.
You should also consider establishing a regular work schedule if you're a graduate student. It is a job, after all.

>>18306154
Is that the bit that ties into the themes of society of the spectacle and American psycho where it’s the societal perception of the consuming of the thing that has been decoupled from the consumption of the thing that’s itself a simulacra of the original human activity?
>>18306166
I guess so. I find joy in doing some of it. Finishing projects and getting in flow state are some of the only things I look forward to anymore. Temporal joys in the blip of my life. No one else could figure out this mental blight, what makes me think I could figure it out.

>>18305549
Similar here, except I managed to continue playing guitar for over a decade every day, but even though I can now consider myself extremely skilled with the instrument, I don't even consider it a hobby. It's just something that I do when I don't know what to do or while doing stuff that doesn't require too much attention(movies, anime, easy books...), and I don't tell other people that I play unless specifically asked, and even then I never go into the details and pretend that I just "know" to play it. I've Also started learning Japanese 6 months ago and haven't missed a day yet, didn't tell this to anyone either(except folk on 4chan). Maybe the secret is to refrain from telling other people and just doing it purely for yourself?

>>18306174
Good idea. What’s that lefty outlet that fisher and all them get published in? Seems like they publish anything.

I should start going to bed earlier. When I start having 8am hearings I should probably be on time.

>>18304074
>people love their retarded dogs more than god
disgusting.

>>18306195
>Is that the bit that ties into the themes of society of the spectacle and American psycho where it’s the societal perception of the consuming of the thing that has been decoupled from the consumption of the thing that’s itself a simulacra of the original human activity?
Yes that one

>>18306226
Uhh dude im pretty sure God created Dogs?

>>18306203

you have to realize this is abnormal lol. people develop deeper connections w one another by sharing their lives and things they spend time doing. it's part of what helps bond us to one another. maybe guitar isn't that important to you, but if you're actively withholding multiple things you have interest in from people you talk to... idk bro that's antisocial and awkward. just sounds like insecure cope.

>>18306103
i’m sure reddit would appreciate them, big guy

>>18306303
UUUU

>>18306195
>I guess so.
Pretty much agree, although I'm definitely more optimistic than you seem from this thread. I just disappeared into playing guitar for a few hours before this thread popped up so that was pretty nice. It's one of the only things I've kept up since I was a child. I mostly agree with your original post regarding 'hobbies', though; I have a friend who has no real interests and he constantly wonders "how can I find meaning in things?" but he's obsessed with doing anything simply so he can share it on social media or with his family. I don't think he's done anything in the last decade which he hasn't shown to at least two people after the fact. People in general are really caught up in hobbies nowadays. I'm kind of in the same boat as you in that I don't define myself by any of the things I do—I prefer not to 'define' myself at all, the modern interpretation of 'identity' is completely lost on me and it seems everybody is fixated on attaching as many words to themselves as they possibly can; it's like every person is competing to write the lengthiest Twitter or Tinder bio—nor do I share them publicly unless asked specifically. That's the difference between 'hobbies' and interests though, I suppose. I can do the things I do because I genuinely enjoy them for what they bring me. Upholding an outward expectation for others is exhausting. It actually comes up a lot among my friends; they all see me as a complete shut-in (which is true to a degree), but my closest friend finds this perception of me to be sad because he knows that I'm indoors enjoying my time spread between film, playing/writing music, reading, learning a language and what have you. If you care how you're perceived by others, living must be completely draining. I used to be hung up on how I was perceived but I stopped caring after a decade-long period of depression. If you only do things that you actually *want* to do then you can probably make it a lot further than others do whilst being somewhat content. I have plenty of interests, but I don't do them every single day. That's at least how I feel as if my hobbies are genuine – there are days when I hate reading; just earlier I was reading Kafka and I was not having a good time at all, so I stopped. I'll probably feel fine tomorrow. I don't really know what I'm talking about at this point, and I've gone back and added things to this as I've written so it probably makes no sense. Rambling into the small hours as usual. Hope your night is going well.

>>18304074
For some reason this whole concept pisses me off. The reddit obsession and approach to life that has lead to their weird little hobbies.
I dont have time or money for hobbies. I do, but it would feel frivolous and I wouldn't enjoy it. I never feel happy or amused and I only ever feel satisfied when I know my work and family shit is on lock, I grow the work and family shit to increase my satisfaction.

>>18306157
Do you shit post from your white padded room, or from somewhere else

>>18306293
I don't form deep connections with others, I'd rather spend the time by myself.

>>18306348
My night is alright, just kinda tired. Thanks for asking, bud.

While I agree that the social posturing of hobbies as an object of social approval isn’t a good thing, I think your monastic practices might be just as bad. Some of the best moments in my life have been playing music with others in a small group, getting drunk on a porch and having people sing harmonies and play complementary licks. When any of my physical art genuinely touches one of my friends I feel like I’ve almost done a good deed. I don’t think the issue is sharing in the fruits of your practice, but objectifying the practice itself as a point of reference. The meditative state of noodling around and playing jazz progressions is wonderful, but sharing that within a community, your actual community, not an online guitar community, is so wonderful.

>>18305498
Not him. But I'm also 35 and lived many years like that image.
In all honestly, without joking, unironically: it's autism. I can point all of my issues back to autism. I stopped engaging in physical affection because it was overstimulating. I learned how to cope with over stimulation by completely dissociating. This dissociation made me socially awkward. The awkwardness feeds back by creating new overstimulating situations. Which I continue to cope by dissociating.

Over time, I became isolated both physically and emotionally. This could have been avoided if my parents insisted that I hug or hold hands like normal kids. But they gave me space instead. Or if they insisted that I go outside and make friends. But they let me stay inside and play alone. Eventually, there's a turning point where avoidance becomes a habit. Your default way of thinking is just to exclude yourself. And then you begin concocting excuses as to why you're doing it, so it doesn't seem so pathetic. You end up as the 24 year old 4channer.

>>18304172
Social isolation really fucks a person's mind. I understand it entirely. I used to think doing things was pointless. I see now that mindset was just a form of depression. Honing a skill a sincere pleasure in life and saying otherwise is just a cope for being lame and untalented

>>18304254
>Supposedly tied to my bipolar tendency
Feel you anon. I only got diagnosed with 21. Now I always regulate myself in my manic stage by allowing only to get back at an already existing hobby (reading or drawing).

>>18304129
Congrats on finding out about buddhism, Kaczinsky

To be fair tinder or more broadly the modern nihilistic consumer society as a concept lends itself to viewing people as aisles upon aisles of consumable products. I noticed this with the gamification inherent to ones Spotify playlist. The power of Spotify is in its interchangeability between people, not in providing new or interesting music. Hence why it has a part on the tinder profile featuring more or less identical American negro and country singers without exception.

All of this is about AB testing what signals receive maximum results in the marketplace of people.

>>18306443
You're right. I probably should have stated that I do engage my interests externally in some ways; for example I have a guitar tutor, though I don't 'learn' from him anymore – we just became good friends over the years and I go to his place to jam some tunes every few weeks. Once Covid fucks off a bit further I'll be glad to get back to that. Unfortunately it's difficult to find people in the other hobbies as I'm from an extremely bland working-class town replete with people who consume and only consume, and hanging out with those kinds of people leads to a kind of disappointment that is simply crushing. I'm glad you've found some exaltation through these things, though. Your initial posts seemed very bleak, but it's easier now to see that it's not so bad.

>>18304129
This is an absolutely fucking retarded way of looking at things. I can't believe you people are dumb enough to agree with this horseshit.

>>18306543
refute it

>>18306485
So i go through mood swings. Sometimes I feel down and tirer and sometimes I feel happy and energetic. I've been feeling this since I was 14 and I noticed I went through emotional cycles which have remained consistent.
I dont really want to talk to a psychologist and get diagnosed because I don't want to be listed as mentally ill. Is there a way I can determine if these emotional cycles are just standard or if I have some pathology?

>>18304074
God really is dead, huh.

>>18306493
uncle ted is a venerated pratyekabuddha of our times

>>18304137
more like thank god

>>18306561
Not that anon but I think there is no other choice than to engage in surrogate activities otherwise it's like asking to a caveman he must burn his forest.

>>18304657
It's not about "appreciating" a good meal or drink, it's the fact that somebody thinks this makes them unique or that that appreciation is a meaningful description of themselves.

>>18304074
This is one of the more interesting threads in /lit/ I’ve seen in a while. I love reading discussion about this kind of thing, makes me feel human.

>>18304129
uncle ted please lifting heavy iron makes me happy

>>18306534
>Your initial posts seemed very bleak, but it's easier now to see that it's not so bad.
Don’t let my few attempts at finding joy and sincerity in a world overflowing with vile and detestable systems of sociability fool you. For every genuine moment ten more of insufferable ironic pain and simulacra take its place. The daily struggle to not just fall into a placated malaise is real, and I don’t win that battle nearly as much as I wish I did. But isn’t even framing it within that duality letting it win?

Super Consciousness: The Quest for the Peak Experience

R8 my hobbies:
>Piano
>Drawing
>Walking
>Writing
>Reading
>Learning languages

>>18306653
You need to read his work properly to know what he means by "surrogate activity." It is not defined as "every possible activity."

>>18306672
We must ask ourselves, how much of this thread is just pure cope? See >>18305102
I'm self aware enough to see that the 24 year old 4channer is me. Except I'm 23.

>>18306743
Wow you sound like a functional human being that has learned the skill sets expected of you but this time you actually stuck with them out of some longing sense of self completion, knowing that all earthly activities are simply tools to arbitrary ends and that we can’t take any of it with us. What does the void look like anon? Have you stopped playing Piano, Drawing, Walking, Writing, Reading, and Learning languages long enough to see that it stares back at you indifferently? Does the touch of your loved ones calm you long enough to get back to your playing Piano, Drawing, Walking, Writing, Reading, and Learning languages?

Why the fuck do you want us to rate anything? What do you mean by rate? Do you want a number? What metric are we judging you on? Or do you want us to judge you on? You could have said critique or asked what we thought about them, but you had to go and ask us to “r8” it from some trite forlorn 4chan tradition of autistically power ranking and comparing things without any actual deeper analysis into the things itself. Because it’s easier. Because there’s no thought in shit posting a quick (you). What do you expect us to say when your hobbies are such predictable bland garbage? Everyone but cripples walk. Even the blind can read. What the fuck were you thinking anon? What kind of mental box do you keep your contextual understanding in to be so utterly segregated from the part of your brain that knows how to type?

>>18306798
Urgh, sorry but I'm not gonna read all that.

>>18306743
6/10
Very patrician tastes but you need more physical activity. Try hiking, camping, or shooting

>>18306822
You're right, I barely do any physical stuff other than walking. Thanks.

>>18304074
'Hobbies' today are essentially another form of Adorno's culture industry, where the actual content of the hobby becomes ultimately meaningless. The purpose of the hobby now becomes as a social marker, as a sort of modern caste-marker who's only real goal is to align you within a larger social group. 'Doing' the hobby is a kind of conspicuous consumption to claim a space within the social position, the people involved only perform the hobby as a signal that they have the intelligence, money, time, etc. needed to do it.

This is why everyone interacts with their hobbies the same way. First is the basic level of performing the hobby, then the secondary levels around it, like purchasing new products for the hobby itself, purchasing ancillary products (like t-shirts or house decorations with hobby in jokes on them, for example), or attending meetings and conventions with other people involved in the hobby, all of which is further expansion of social position both within the hobby itself and within the wider culture. In other words, the work and money put in to the hobby allows you to claim the social rewards, both within the subculture and without, of an enhanced social position ('That guy plays the guitar, he's cool' 'She writes poetry, she's so deep').

However, since the performative stage of most traditional hobbies, like rock climbing or woodworking or, requires a base level of ability that not everyone has, the capitalist economy now provides hobbies based only around the secondary layers. This is why, increasingly, many people have hobbies of 'consuming' things. The stereotype is the 'fandom' where the performative layer of the hobby is based around consuming media and the real participation comes from buying things like posters and miniatures and so on, as well as strictly limited interactions with other fans where all conversation is limited to discussion of the media subject of the fandom. But now we are increasingly in a state where everything becomes a part of the 'hobby idea'. This is why OP's picture has people defining themselves by incredibly mundane, universal things like 'Food', 'Work', and 'Travel'.

>>18306690
Interesting. I'm glad you at least haven't stopped trying entirely. I can't really give any sort of advice as I'm just as lost as anyone else and you've also likely heard it before. As you said: the brightest minds haven't figured much out, so what chance do we have? I can only hope you continue to shift the dial closer toward the direction you wish it to move as you get older and are able to relish more frequently in those brief moments of light. Hesse believed that they were what made the years of darkness tolerable, and I tend to agree.
Do you have any book recs (pertaining to what we've briefly spoken about here, or in general)?

>>18306853
What is the alternative? How do you reconcile your interests and not falling prey to what you're describing here? Or do you just accept the fate of modernity and let it subsume you entirely?

>>18306818
>>>/v/
>>18306855
My favorite nonfiction book recently was Graeber’s 5000 years of debt. As far as fiction goes I enjoyed Infinite jest, but white noise covers this thread on a far more tangible level.

>>18306867
I think it's impossible to avoid getting drawn into it, unless you're a recluse who does everything by and for himself and never talks to anyone about it. And the idea of getting social rewards from practicing and mastering a skill isn't really bad in itself, it's just the way that modern society has accelerated and distorted everything so that the whole thing becomes about maximum efficiency and cost-benefit rather than anything intrinsic to the hobby itself.

The solution is to get off the internet and go outside

>>18306867
I’d assume have only one “hobby” and make sure it’s a skill based one when you fall head first into what that anon described, so as to not ostracize yourself from modernity. But that every other activity besides that one should act as a tool to improve your own local community.

Did ancient people have hobbies? I know that music has been big throughout history.

My only hobby is flight simulator. After 20 years of sim flying I have finally accepted how cringe and unimpressive it is on the whole. I can spend weeks learning departure and approach procedures for specific airports, months practicing with very realistic detailed aircraft simulations with advanced aerodynamics and detailed flight systems, and in the end I am too ashamed to tell a single person about my sim flying, no matter how realistic and detailed. It's surrogate and shameful. I will never be in command of a real world aircraft even if I have a fairly advanced understanding of the theory and practice of flight. I will never fly around the world or any of the places I have been in the sim.

>>18306905
Confucius used to say every men needed to learn an instrument, art, calligraphy and a board game.

>>18306914
Anon, who said you have to fly a real plane? Who cares about what other people think?

>>18306914
Why not anon? Amateur flying is pretty big in America.

Mostly money. Never had enough for flight school. I could theoretically get a hobby class license which is basically ultralights. But again money, which I have none.

>>18306939
Everyone cares what other people think. Even Uncle Ted cared what people think. That's why he wrote a manifesto for them to think about.

>>18306977
He didn't care what people thought of him. He cared what they thought of his work because in order for it to work people would have to care.

>>18304074
>Fellas, is it cringe to enjoy doing things?
Go outside.

>>18306993
Go suck a big black cock.

>>18304074
I lift to stay strong and healthy. I read and play chess to stay sharp. I don't like doing these activities. They aren't my "things".
If I don't do them, I will become weak and unhealthy because of sitting around all day staring at a screen working, and I will become dull because eventually every job will become repetitive and maintenance oriented.
My friends don't even know I play chess and read. They can see I workout though.

>>18304074
The most cringe thing I've read in awhile

>Why people do things they like?? Even if they not good??

Faggot

>>18306895
>it's just the way that modern society has accelerated and distorted everything so that the whole thing becomes about maximum efficiency and cost-benefit rather than anything intrinsic to the hobby itself.
Aka ellulian technique

Once I was on a Discord for English learning (I go there to talk when I wanna talk, because it's easy to find people) and once this girl joined and asked me what my hobbies are. And well I do like to do a lot of things, but I said the main ones, so programming and math and she replied "that's it?"
I mean, I thought I was quite general, because it's impossible to know all of math, let alone math and computer science in one lifetime, but apparently it's not enough and for normies quantity>quality when it comes to hobbies. If someone asks you you're expected to say everything that you've ever tried and they will try to beat your number

>>18307034
she was trying to find common ground you esl aspie. christ, you people are hopeless.

>>18307041
I don't care, truth is more important than friendship

>>18306575
Definitely sounds bipolar - assuming the cycles are reasonably long (at least weeks and longer). Bipolar often stabilizes to seasonal cycles of depression/activity.

There's no point of getting it officially on record, as no real treatment exists. All that various drugs can do is just dampen the mania, and perhaps shift the cycle boundaries a little.

If your swings are short and unpredictable, changes in span of days or even hours, its something different, and probably much more severe.

>>18307034
It would be no different with other asspie hobbies. I can say "machining", and normie has no idea about the large spectrum that entails - save for few popular memes like 3d printing.

For women its even worse because their hobbies are so few and with not much surface for an asspie to find enticing. Weeb stuff, /lit/ and pseuding may seem like a good common ground with women, but not really as their interest doesn't span beyond few shitty anime, YA/mystery/slashfic and rote memory of marx and hegel drivel and feminism, with no chance to go full sperg mode with any of that.

>>18307034
Most people don't see those as being hobbies

Some people really don't have any hobbies except working.

how do i get matches on tindr bros... i need to find a companion before I go too far down the rabbit hole
I'm 5'6 so it's difficult for me, I also don't have very good photos because I'm too self conscious to ask someone to take some BS staged photos.

>>18304097
Yeah some add sleeping as a hobby. As you can see even laugh is a hobby. Fucking zoomers should be sterilized

>>18307492
u don't

>>18304097
>t. Ted K

>>18307505
my grandma says i'm handsome and that a girl would be very lucky to have me

cant remember where i read this, but i like this definition:
> an interest is your passion. a hobby is your expense.

>>18307513
where u from

>>18304074
>God
holy based

>>18307517
Australia

>>18307523
just learn Japanese or sth, I'm 5'6 too and I wish Asians lived in my country because then I would have a chance

>>18307531
I met a Japanese girl on a holiday but she lives in Japan and I can't travel there. I don't think I can learn Japanese it's too difficult.

>>18307538
Even if you try and get interested in the culture and find some English speaking Japanese girl you'll be cute to her by trying to speak etc and showing interest

>>18307541
>Japanese """culture"""

>>18306203
Hmm yeah I'm the same
I play an instrument that basically no one irl has heard about and so it's not as if I can find other people with a similar interest or who are musicians themselves. I basically cannot talk about it with anybody since I don't speak or understand the right language.
There is no real sense of community for me and it's extremely demotivating.

>>18307546
find the discord or forum, surely there will be one

>>18307548
I've tried but there isn't any in english.
There used to be a forum in english 20 years ago made with one of those ancient defunct webhosts I guess but that website is long gone.

>>18305723
"Fitness" is cringe.
Our lives in the contemporary world are such that we have no practical use for it and no opportunities to organically engage in it. So instead it gets commodified and sold back to us in the form of equipment, protein powder, and gym memberships. This allows us to engage in weird ritualistic routines in which we are accomplish nothing that has any practical import in our lives nor does it help us to accomplish any useful skills or develop ourselves as people at all.
What it is is a contrived supplement that only has instrumental rather than intrinsic value. We do it because of the health benefits that it cashes out as and because humans are designed to actually use their bodies throughout the day for more than just filling in spreadsheets.
It's a very weird and poor solution to the fact that modern society and technology have removed the physical component from most people's labour.

>>18307557
when that's what you get for picking some sort of faggy fucking instrument that no one plays

>>18307164
autism speaks

>>18307565
I don't want friends that are uncomfortable by my autism, so I just don't make compromises from day one. If someone sticks around that's fine, but if not I don't really care

>>18307560
Kek
It's popular in the middle east at least so there's thousands of vids on youtube, just not in english.

>>18306927
Do video games count as board games

>>18304129
>A surrogate activity is an activity that is directed toward an artificial goal that the individual pursues for the sake of the “fulfillment” that he gets from pursuing the goal, not because he needs to attain the goal itself

Ah ok so we're not supposed to have any hobbies, outside of: eating, shitting, and working.
I feel like Ted just never knew what it means to be "fulfilled" because he's broken.

This thread is kind of bizarre considering it's on a board dedicated to literature desu

>>18307589
i haven't finished a single book this year

>>18307611
Kek
I've finished 2 this year but iktf, started about 9 already and obviously they won't be all finished

>>18304640
It's just boring people being boring. As long as they're happy I guess it doesn't really matter.

>>18304097
>Hobby is a surrogate activity and thus a cope
what are people supposed to do with their time exactly then? work and sleep? its genuinely embarrassing how smart you seem to think this statement is

>>18307664
by dismantling the technological system one phone tower and power line at a time anon (in minecraft of course)

>>18304097
The distinction is made when you frame a pursuit as a mere hobby in your mind, you treat it like something slightly inconsequential, something light and attendable like watering a plant. But watering a plant is taking care of life and not a hobby. Its also a way for people to continue their desperate desire for Work and thus manifest a reality where genuine free time no longer exists. There is only work and play, and nothing in between, and very few actually know how to do either.

>>18305304
This was decent until the beer and sex part, everything else is fairly based.

>>18305587
Well done, I think you are right on

>>18304074
People are trying to construct a sense of self in a world where religion and national identity have become meaningless.
So they construct their identities around the only thing that is really concrete - what they spend their time doing.

I did it with my job, for years I referred to myself as my job title when introducing myself to people.
Now I have removed it from identity.

>>18306463
Holy fucking shit, you just described my life since I was 13. Did you manage to somehow move on and plug back into reality?

>>18307558
>>18307558
Shut the hell up fatty. Fitness is good for you mentally, and physically. Only someone who hasn't been truly fit would say such a thing, you have no idea what it's like to be able to tackle the elements like a beast capable of any challenge, any hurdle. You don't know what it's truly like to feel like an athlete. Trust me it feels great. Not just for sports but for any practical thing. There are plenty of ways to engage the benefits just get outdoors more.

>>18304074
Just like you spend time reading.
cringe and jewpilled thread, 2/10

>>18307687
>The distinction is made when you frame a pursuit as a mere hobby in your mind, you treat it like something slightly inconsequential, something light and attendable like watering a plant.
This is abominable. Life is so short and human energy is so precious. Imagine spending huge chunks of time and energy for an activity that is "slightly inconsequential, something light and attendable" in which you only participate out of boredom.
One shouldn't confuse hobby and entertainment. Humans should play and have fun — with each other. But it seems to me that hobbying is a surrogate of having fun, it's something you do out of inability of having fun. Which is often due to atomization of society. Who would spend his free time glueing battleship models if he had friends and/or a significant other?

>>18307853
>blah blah beast blah blah challenge blah blah hurdle
yawn

>>18307558
>"Fitness" is cringe.
>What it is is a contrived supplement that only has instrumental rather than intrinsic value.

No, exercising is one of the few activities which actually has intrinsic value. Sure, you can criticize the commodification and all the expensive clothes, supplements and so on, but once you reach a certain level of fitness the activity in itself evolves into something beautiful and life-affirming.

I started running because of muh' fitness, external validation and so on, and in the beginning you may need that to push through the boringness and uncomfortable experience. But eventually, I reached a point where I stopped tracking runs on Strava to share with my friends and all that other external bullshit. Nowadays I just put on my shoes, go out the door and see where my legs take me. It is the only time of the day where I don't have a bunch of thoughts occupying my mind and it is wonderful. I absolutely think that fitness has intrinsic value.

Some people that are into fitness may be cringe, but the concept as a whole is not. If the fitness culture can push more people into finding something that actually has intrinsic value in their life, I am for it.

>>18308039
>something beautiful and life-affirming
you started out strong but fell into spooks soon after

>>18304184
lmao

>>18304129
as if surrogate activities are radically separated from the power process. Ted should have read Nietzsche more closely.

>>18308089
I agree with Ted in principle, but this.

Also people often forget Ted was a literal autistic high IQ genius retard. So he saw the world in purely logical terms -- not considering the metaphysical aspects of certain surrogate activities (e.g. would we really discount someone like Bach for investing all their energy into music despite it not being, as per Ted's view, part of the power process). But on a basic level certain surrogate activities uplift the soul and ones fellow man, which is just as important as eating and drinking in a world of unknowable chaos.

>>18304097
Based tedposter

>>18305420

That pic is old, you were 24 when it was made.

Threads like these proves that the sighs of pessimists rising from the graveyard of philosophy still haunts the civilizations. Deny the truth as much as you can but this world is in degenerative state since it's start. Everything is rotten in existence and yet you faggots talk like these are the fruits of modernity. It's all a cope from death anxiety and the wretched state of existence. How shitposting is different from any normalfag hobby?


>Zapffe arrived at two central determinations regarding humanity’s “biological predicament.” The first was that consciousness had overreached the point of being a sufferable property of our species, and to minimize this problem we must minimize our consciousness. From the many and various ways this may be done, Zapffe chose to hone in on four principal strategies.

(1) ISOLATION. So that we may live without going into a free-fall of trepidation, we isolate the dire facts of being alive by relegating them to a remote compartment of our minds. They are the lunatic family members in the attic whose existence we deny in a conspiracy of silence.

(2) ANCHORING. To stabilize our lives in the tempestuous waters of chaos, we conspire to anchor them in metaphysical and institutional “verities”—God, Morality, Natural Law, Country, Family—that inebriate us with a sense of being official, authentic, and safe in our beds.

“3) DISTRACTION. To keep our minds unreflective of a world of horrors, we distract them with a world of trifling or momentous trash. The most operant method for furthering the conspiracy, it is in continuous employ and demands only that people keep their eyes on the ball—or their television sets, their government’s foreign policy, their science projects, their careers, their place in society or the universe, etc.

(4) SUBLIMATION. That we might annul a paralyzing stage fright at what may happen to even the soundest bodies and minds, we sublimate our fears by making an open display of them. In the Zapffean sense, sublimation is the rarest technique utilized for conspiring against the human race. Putting into play both deviousness and skill, this is what thinkers and artistic types do when they recycle the most demoralizing and unnerving aspects of life as works in which the worst fortunes of humanity are presented in a stylized and removed manner as entertainment. In so many words, these thinkers and artistic types confect products that provide an escape from our suffering by a bogus simulation of it—a tragic drama or philosophical woolgathering, for instance. Zapffe uses “The Last Messiah” to showcase how a literary-philosophical composition cannot perturb its creator or anyone else with the severity of true-to-life horrors but only provide a pale representation of these horrors, just as a King Lear’s weeping for his dead daughter Cordelia cannot rend its audience with the throes of the real thing.

Ligotti, The Conspiracy against the Human Race

Holy shit this thread is peak retard.
I haven't read this many dumb opinions in quite some while.

>>18308358
Post your big brained take. I hate people who call posts retarded but then post nothing substantial themselves

>>18308433
I will answer but only because you got trips.
First of all I find the premise of this thread already incredible grating because OP starts off by immediatelly making the connection hobbies == söy, thus making every further discussion basically useless.
Then it continues with the tiring argument of basically everything being "cope". Finding meaning? Cope. Spending your free time? Cope. Drawing breath in this world? Cope.
Everyone who keeps saying this kind of shit should immediately kill themselves because they are just coping.

>>18304129
>>18304104
>hobbies are surrogates
Surrogates for what? No one has an answer for these even though it would be integral to even start an argument. We are all shitposting on a Vietnamese basket weaving forum that takes immense hours of our time. Is this any way better than spending time with your dog or whatever?

>>18304115
God :O

>>18306786
I can see how this would happen to people, in a space like this one, often the only right answer is to not participate. If you don’t participate, you can’t be made fun of, insulted, stereotyped, bashed, etc.

The 24 yr old 4channer described in the pic is so afraid of others thoughts about him, he’s ruined his own life. It’s no way to live.

>>18308358
Same here. I'm always amazed that anyone actually thinks like this. Hundreds of posts are made describing and understanding how a complex social phenonomon occurs, but almost all the posters are so jaded and self-defeating that all it amounts to is a nihilistic circle jerk.The people in this thread are making themselves miserable for absolutely no reason and with no goal in mind whatsoever while also denouncing anything that could bring them out of the hole.

Threads like this remind me that not everyone is going to make it—a lot of people are simply too mentally ill and have wasted so much of their lives that they are incapable of functioning or even enjoying life's simple pleasures. It pains me to think how many people will die in the coming years with nothing to show for their lives.

>>18304129
>no practical goal
>getting laid is not a practical goal
>achieving social status is not a practical goal
Ted is too socially autistic to understand how practical goals underlie all activities even ones that seem impractical

>>18306662
>it's the fact that somebody thinks this makes them unique
Unllike God and work, eh?
Fuck off you brainlet drone

>>18309025
At least blowing people up got him into a long-distance relationship
Babysteps

>>18309025
>practical goals underlie all activities
press x to doubt

>>18304097
In normie world, everything except working could be considered a hobby.

Wagies don't have hobbies, they don't have time for them. Why do you think normies made such a big deal about quarantine and the whole 'I actually have time and can do things'

>>18305240
Truth

>>18309001
>I’m so intelligent for I actually understand the pleasures in life like cooming and eating food!

>>18306597
Was God ever a method to get laid?

>>18307664
go be hunter gatherer

>>18307892
That's just fetishization of relationships. You have to be highly extroverted to fill all your waking hours with friends and the SO. Most don't do that.

I’ve always wanted to surf but I don’t live near a beach :(

>>18309414
God was always the incel cope

>>18309001
>Threads like this remind me that not everyone is going to make it
O physicochemical being, the tasty food for worms.

>>18304129
>>18304097
>>18304074
>>18304807
Ted Kaczysnki's analysis of leftist feelings of inferiority and oversocialization are correct, but his analysis of surrogate activity is too simple-minded and ignores individual complexity of motives. Karen Horney does a better job of analyzing this.
If someone adopts a hobby for the purpose of attaining glory, impressing others, and so forth, then yes, that is a "surrogate activity". However, a hobby that is adopted simply out of one's own heartfelt interest can lead to self-cultivation, and it, thus, does not constitute a surrogate activity.
For example, someone can adopt the hobby of bird watching in order to further understand avian social complexity, experience emphatic/vicarious joy, and enchantment, but doing it so others see you as "deep" is, indeed, a surrogate activity in the power process.

>>18304074
how is beer a hobby

>>18306157
thinking isnt meditation

>>18304074
shitting on hobbies is pure edgelordism. when you get to be an adult most of the other adults you meet are strictly work-sleep-work, and their jobs are boring. it's rare to meet anyone who's really devoted to a hobby and always refreshing

>>18307892
>Imagine spending huge chunks of time and energy for an activity that is "slightly inconsequential, something light and attendable"
you've literally described the genesis of art

>>18309692
It's like wine.

Anyone else get put off of hobbies they once enjoyed because of this hobbyist cult that’s formed around it?

>>18309922
wine culture is way different than beer culture. if you want to be a sophisticated wine connoisseur you need to make the effort to travel to places like Napa, the French countryside, South Italy etc and experience the nuances firsthand. whereas most people who like drinking beer just pick up a six pack at the corner store.

>>18309962
https://youtu.be/3PciBRQXoFg

>>18304996
This.
The rest of this thread is nihilist cringe.
>It's just cope until you die.
>It's a waste of time because you don't completely devote yourself to that activity
>Any attempt at pleasure, even when edifying, is wrong
&c., &c.
Like fuck, get a life you faggots (and enjoy it while you have it!)

>>18304640
>durr hburr i purchased an animal and spend thousands of dollars on said animal every year
>this is a heckin valid hobby lifestyle i swear
The absolute state of w*men and r*dditors.

>>18304129
Just like that 6' mark behind him ted falls short of grasping the whole picture. Surrogate activities are allowed to us because we have dominated and shaped our environment to such an extreme extent we have abundant free time. These surrogate activities are an enhanced endulgence of an activity that was once essential to survival, fitness activites relate to hunting or traveling, crafts to building, martial arts to real combat. But now we are in a world where specialisation of tasks allows us to be free of most of these, so we have the surrogates so that we can still gain the pleasures of the original activities, often more efficiently/safely/practically with the surrogates,

>>18310040
Dogs are not that expensive

>>18305304
Horse before the cart.
People grouping around a hobby is just human nature, it happens independently of consumerist propaganda. The marketing vampires don't drive the hobbyist nature of us, they just see it and latch on to suck their dollars out. Yes they try to sell you more shit, using something you love as an excuse to consume, but that's the oldest trick in the book. Take something people like and attach your product to that positive emotion.

Don't throw the baby out with the bath water, just enjoy a hobby the social aspect that comes with it while being conscious not to get sucked in by marketing wankers

Many of my friends are addicted to having an assortment of hobbies. They spread themselves so thin they're not truly great at anything. Seems like a very new way of coping from their deadend wagie lives.

>>18306028
>When I'm hungover I'll watch youtube essay bullshit at 2x speed all day.
Are you me?

>>18306575
I was worried about being diagnosed. But it really has only been helpful for me. Also its not like they tattoo you or have some centralised data base on people. If it ever comes up and I think it would hurt my chances like for a job or something I just lie. Other than that it's helped me get take proper steps towards stabalising the problems

>>18304154
3/4 of people don't extricate pleasure from their short lived lifestyle alterations beyond the social media posts they make about it and their purchase decision. It's an egoist pursuit fundamentally rooted in increasing their perceived social value by remedying an absence which they believed they had because they saw influencers and people in their own shoes "improving"

Lo and behold, their tools, clothes, bicycle, golf club, lifted truck serve no purpose other than the collection of dust after the expiry of the season.

>>18309025
This is it. Everything is to get laid. Every time you see someone doing something, keep in mind that it's because they think it'll get them laid by more attractive people in the future. They work to get laid. They get hobbies to seem more interesting to get laid. All ambition comes from the desire to impregnate an attractive woman. Women just do things for attention from men.

>>18306139
I'd recommend making something purely practical, sometimes making something of total utility can be a nice change to consuming and making expressive artistic things. Build a staircase, dig a drainage ditch.

>>18304640
>but how is 'dog' a hobby?
It is if you fuck it

>>18304275
Your link isn't working

>>18310319
>or have some centralised data base on people
But they do desu. If I get diagnosed I think i'll lose my gun rights. Further, if anything ever comes up legally for whatever reason it may, it could be used against me. Especially since i'm such a vocal contrarian. There is a very real stigma around mental illness and I dont want that haunting me.

>>18308631
The cope discourse is tiresome yeah. I was hoping the thread would focus more on identity and authenticity. OP is not perfect but if you've been on those dating apps it is strangely dehumanizing to see so many carbon copies of people with the same arbitrary interests. In this atomized age of the hyper-individual there's a lot of focus now on what constitutes who you are and it's causing dissonance with lifestyle commodification. Who am I if not what I do? What I buy? How much choice did I actually have in choosing what to do with my time, did I just default to something that was easy (media consumption), did I adopt a commodified ready-made lifestyle and all it's aesthetic trappings as a substitute for individual persona? Can these choices meaningfully differentiate me from others? I think the notion that everyone has a "passion" and if you 'do what you love' you will be happy implies a sort of analogue to 'soul-mates' in relationships in that there is some hobby out there, that if you can find it, will fill you with meaning and contentment but what if I have passing interest but no strong attachment to any of them. Nothing that justifies the 40 hour grind. Am I a sort of developing persona-non-gratis in the interim? That's kind of how we look at teenagers right, someone for instance obsessed with anime and video games because they haven't had the life experience to grow outside of it yet.
>>18305304
>The only thing truly unique about you is the network of community you have built. The individuals who are themselves unique and how those relationships play out.

I think this anon's correct and how I try to center my values of self and humanism but even then how many of our casual relationships and interactions with people these days are transactional or predicated on exchanging information about these shibboleths and signifiers?

>>18310102
that's basically what he said in the book, did you even read him? Surrogate activities are a replacement for those activities that satisfy an individual's power process. It's just that it doesn't truly satisfy that need.

>>18310670
They only justification he used for that argument is that once someone achieves something major he moves onto another project. The fact that he's making a universal psychological evaluation on all humans based on this one line of reasoning comes across as very weak. His argument is very elaborate and interesting and could be eclectically absorbed, but taken on its own it rests on a foundation of sand

>>18304074
>few hours each week
still counts. that's more than what most other people can feel pride for.

I actually agree with Ted on the fact that a surrogate activity always is or will feel less meaningful than an activity you do for your survival. But to me that's not enough reason to not indulge in them as much as possible, especially if they give you skills.

>>18310630
>I think the notion that everyone has a "passion" and if you 'do what you love' you will be happy implies a sort of analogue to 'soul-mates' in relationships in that there is some hobby out there, that if you can find it, will fill you with meaning and contentment but what if I have passing interest but no strong attachment to any of them.
I have a friend like this, with zero 'passions', and I've never known anyone so utterly lost. I don't know how to help him at all, or if there even exists anything that can. I'm lucky in that I have almost zero responsibilites and unlimited free time, thus I can engage my interests as and when I please, so I deduce that they are mostly 'genuine' (whatever this means), especially when I choose to spend a lot of my time doing nothing but sitting and thinking. I don't know how it would be to live with no drive to do anything born of a pure interest rather than simply to post about it on social media, but that's where this friend is stuck. It's fucked, really.

>>18310019
best post

>>18304097
>>18304129
So the only thing that leaves is work in exchange for survival and sex? What about hedonism? What if these things genuinely make you feel good, that is a practical motive. Imagine being this retarded

>>18306687
he cant stop you anon

>>18310773
We're (at least, most of us sitting here shitposting) living in a epoch further along in the hierarchy of needs, so doing things (leisure activies, that is) purely for survival is almost nonexistent to us now.

>>18310808
>I don't know how it would be to live with no drive to do anything born of a pure interest rather than simply to post about it on social media
Are there really people like this?

>>18304074
The only hobby I really have is riding motorcycles and camping. That's all I really do. I just collect money so I can go on motorcycle camping trips. I don't really care about anything else. One day I will drop out of society with a rifle and live for as long as possible as a nomad.

>>18310853
you should try to find a camping buddy

>>18310872
I think about it from time to time.

>>18310840
it could be your reality if you went out in the wilds but like... that's just creating artificial difficulty for yourself and you could always just walk back in the city i guess. in any way ted also talked a shitton about why there needs to be a revolution in the whole world specifically and that's another reality of the situation, if we don't all decide to limit our use of technology and do so anything else is a compromise. i'm fine with compromises in this context but these /lit/ niqqas seem to be repulsed by the idea.

>>18310849
A lot of people are without realising it, I think. People can't help but do things and also take out their phone to snap a picture and put it on their story. The friend I'm talking about has been called out by most of his friends for always interrupting things to take pictures, and these pictures are never for him. They literally always, without fail, go somewhere that other people can see them. 'Living in the moment' sounds kind of cringe these days, but people like this are totally incapable of it. I find it really sad.

>>18310901
This. I cut ties with almost everyone I know because they're all addicted to social media. There's no fun in just enjoying a night out when everyone's making Instagram stories. I lost interest in most people. Until social media is destroyed, I don't really care about people.

>>18310808
i think he's an extreme minority then but meh i dont know much

>>18310915
Just stop hanging around normalfags. I know plenty of young people who dont even have instagram

>>18310808
Try being from a family of doctor's where the only thing anyone ever even talks about is their work. Day in, day out. Every gathering, every dinner, every beer, every meet up. I cut ties with them.

>>18310900
It does seem like a lot of people in this thread simply want to sit in a pure white box with nothing but access to the internet while being kept on life support until they can no longer bear it. I know this whole site is for social pariahs but fuck it's sad to read sometimes.

>>18310901
"living in the moment" does not sound cringe precisely because of this. because it sounds like it should be common sense and a universal practice... but it isn't.

>>18310944
They got us, they won. Social media will never go away. It's over. Look at China. Interconnected TikTok cancel culture 24/7 for free surveilliance over every human being for the rest of time. We live in a nightmare. I just want out.

>>18310901
Hmmm. Well I suppose I'm lucky that I don't know anyone like that.

>>18310915
>>18310933
sounds absolutely awful. i too would prefer loneliness in that situation.

>>18310915
It's hard not to be repulsed by. I'm lucky to have a few friends who aren't really like that to any noticeable degree, so socialising is bearable.
>>18310924
He is. Most people don't think with this much depth about their lives to the point that they go insane and start arguing online about the fucking origin of their hobbies and whether they are justified as 'meaningful' experiences or not lmao.
>>18310933
I don't blame you. I come from a family practically defined by unstable mental health, alcoholism and idiocy. I really only keep contact with the 'normal' people in my family, and if I didn't have to see them in person, I doubt I would at all.

>>18310971
It sucks more because I'm not really an anti-social person or someone that hates humanity or anything like that. But I don't know where to turn. So I just spend my time with my motorcycle and my tent and go out whenever I possibly can away from it all.

>>18310952
>lose hope
never. the universe is but a cycle of gigantic scales. anything can happen and it never ever benefitted any man to abandon hope.

>>18310933
My roommate once took me to a party of young composers, classical musicians, and ballet dancers. Everyone had to get completely plastered before they talked about something other than their respective CVs. I understand the impulse to network but damn it was weird to see how people in the "academy" play the game.

>>18310952
The best thing you can do is not use it.

>>18310944
Yeah, I meant the phrase sounds cringe, but you're completely right. It took me a long time to get there myself, but my life has become a lot more enjoyable since I severed the ties to online services entirely. I'm sure someone in this thread will tell me it's just cope, though. It's better than the alternative, at least.

>>18310977
i hope you will find better company one day then anon

>>18311010
>I'm sure someone in this thread will tell me it's just cope
I never understood what the problem with "cope" was supposed to be. It's something everybody has to do in their own way.

>>18310996
>My roommate once took me to a party of young composers, classical musicians, and ballet dancers. Everyone had to get completely plastered before they talked about something other than their respective CVs. I understand the impulse to network but damn it was weird to see how people in the "academy" play the game.
Yeah exactly. No wonder why most of them are alcoholics. Sober, they sit and talk about CVs, work, money, etc. I understand that this is an element of small talk but it never ends - ever. It's been this way since I was young. I cannot recall a single time when my family spoke of something different, and they harshly judge anyone that isn't also in medicine. They really believe themselves superior to most of humanity, and if you aren't in their sphere you don't exist except to be a "patient" - a word that I've come to associate with total dehumanization.

>>18311030
People are just vexed by others around them doing what they wish they could, I suppose? It's probably why incels are so fucking bitter; why old people get annoyed by young people doing innocuous things; why a lot of 'jealousy' or shit-talking even exists. If you're content in yourself, you likely have little reason to concern yourself with what others are doing, much less reason to be bothered by it emotionally. Idk though, just rambling lmao

>>18311060
Not always. Imagine being surrounded by topics, subjects, and concepts that are not only alien to you but repulsive. You don't go out of your way to deal with them, but they are embedded in your day-to-day life. At some point, you hit a wall anon. The only thing to do is cut off what you can to salvage your life.

>>18311073
>Imagine being surrounded by topics, subjects, and concepts that are not only alien to you but repulsive
Yeah that sounds awful but also incredibly vague

>>18311073
I feel like it's quite easy to avoid most of it. If you're a complete normalfag and hang around people most hours of the day, maybe not, but you can always go and do what you want to do and not engage. You'll just pay the price of being seen as a bit weird, probably. Not the end of the world, and certainly not something to let ruin your life.

>>18307853
>>18308039
I'm the guy you're responding to.
To tell you the truth, I'm in great shape.
I run ~8k through the woods every other day.
I feel better because of this and sleep is more restful.
But my ability to run ~8k through the woods has zero practical import in my life outside of my ability to run ~8k through the woods. Nothing else that I do requires me to run through the woods. It's an a completely contrived activity that I only participate in because I have to artificially supplement my day with "physical exertion time" according to a schedule.
Why do I do this? Because modern technology has completely deconstructed the original unity of traditional life. In the pre-modern world, physical exertion was simply a natural part of your day to day activities. You would walk instead of drive, you would carry things from place to place, hew wood, draw water, etc. Physical activity was organically and harmoniously integrated into your the day-to-day life.
The idea of running on a treadmill or "power lifting" would have seemed utterly bizarre to a man living on the peasant commune in medieval Europe. He never would have thought to himself that he needs to start jogging to lower his cholesterol and there's no fucking way he would have felt the need to try overcome his deeply compromised sense of masculinity by "tackling the elements like a beast" like this fucking weirdo >>18307853
Modern technology has deconstructed pre-modern life, diminished the physical component from most labour as well as day-to-day activities, and then burdens us with voluntarily electing to reintroduce physical exertion into our lives through highly contrived and artificial activities such as jogging, or weightlifting, or w/e new bizarre fitness tactic was invented last week. At least with sports it's a social leisure activity that people enjoy together for its own sake. You can treat them as ends in themselves.
Not so with fitness.
Fitness is literally just a way to artificially supplement your life with physical activity according to some rational contrived regime that refers to nothing outside of itself. Humans need to use their bodies but most college educated, well groomed, liberal, phytoestrogen-boys who work air-conditioning jobs have no way to physically exert themselves unless they purchase commodities and engage in artificial activities according to a consistent schedule. (Even worse when they start purchasing supplements or smart watches to "track their progress"!)
Humans need to use their bodies though, for a lot of us, myself included, engaging in "fitness" is the simplest way to do this. But the immediate skills I build in doing so have no real world use. My ability to stand in front of my class and lecture on grammar has nothing to do with my ability to run ~8km. Nothing but my ability to run ~8km has anything to do with my ability to run ~8km! It's absolutely useless and has no practical application to anything else in my life. And it's still cringe!

>>18311086
>Yeah that sounds awful but also incredibly vague
Because I'm trying to keep it open for the purpose of application of specific situations pertaining to an individual. I don't think it's always "coping" because someone feels lesser. I think it's completely possible to simply be annoyed with others around you.

>>18310630
Most of the points that are made in this thread are seemingly not made about hobbies but rather about the absolute power of capital to subvert basically everything combined with a fractured society that doesn't bind people anymore to the same degree as it did before.
Points that can be addressed but remain kinda vague when the main vocal points are against "hobbies", which are basically things we like doing that aren't work but many anons just dislike it because people aren't doing it the right way or it doesn't have the right optics.
My grand-grand-father used to keep bees as a hobby. He was quite proud of them and he would certainly call himself a beekeeper, attending beekeeper gatherings all the while probably finding some sort of meaning in it without further thinking about it. Would the internet be around in these days he would probably shitpost on reddit or /out/ about bees and stuff.
By OPs logic he would be a söyboy but he wasn't. He was just a regular man who had a hobby.
The other anon you quote with "The only thing truly unique about you is the network of community you have built." has some points but how aren't hobbies not also a tool to accomplish this goal of acquiring a community network?

The most hate here seems to go against social-media and it's trends where activities get turned into virtual image instead of hobbies which makes the whole thread rather misguided.

>>18304074
Tinder profiles shouldn't be taken seriously. The main reason (normal) people bemoan those apps is that you need to be as safe and inoffensive as possible to maximise your matches. You don't want to put in anything polarising or putting yourself in too deep a niche, or the one who might get you off the app could swipe left on a whim. For example, come across as too outdoorsy and you'll limit yourself to people who want to go camping every weekend. Rather than limiting yourself to a small subset, you could give a balanced, something-for-everyone, nice-and-approachable profile and get as large a pool of matches as possible.

Similar things happen with too much personality or humor, you unintentionally carve out a niche for yourself and potentially give up the bulk of your possible matches. The metagame for Tinder/Bumble is a faultless profile that has just enough to not tip over the line into being too cookie-cutter and generic (you're an extremely normal, well-adjusted safe guy with a good job but you're also a certified sommelier).

>>18305523
>Probably by overthinking life
You overestimate the causal power of freely chosen thought patterns. You must be a very superficial person.

>>18311217
wow anon ur so deep poggers

>>18310102
they are one and the same

>>18304074
Hobbies are result of low social connection society.
Think about it. How can you meet new good people in a big city? There is no village / tribe identity. Just extremely diverse masses that have nothing in common, if u exclude hobbies and work.

>>18308050
I don't know anon, if you apply stirnerism to everything and make any sort of enjoyment or life-affirmation out to be a spook, I believe you're spooking yourself out of any genuine enjoyment at all. Cynicism is all well and good to keep a rational view of things, but there's a point where it stops benefitting your life holistically. If he has the qualia of a beneficial and life-improving experience, it's just as valid as anything else his senses perceive. His senses may be full of shit in the first place; but we can't tell over an animation harassment cesspool like this.

Anyway, reported experiences are really all that constitute art or beauty, so there's no point in dismissing anything - it's unfounded. I'm not even replying to you but in general anymore. The existence of hobbies is valuable if we term them valuable. If my best friend sees tabletop gaming as a worthwhile use of his time, and it is a surrogate activity to be sure - he can't command tanks in real life - is he to be faulted for taking the option on the table that best suits his interests? I wouldn't stretch this argument to playing Fortnite for 6000 hours but hopefully the point is across. Same as any aesthetic or moral judgment, there is a fine and indistinguishable line between the worthwhile and the bullshit.

>>18304140
Acceptance by suicide

>>18304129
Look at all the surrogatefags seething

>>18312571
is that real? damn. i always knew being big mattered a lot in fights and that there's a point where the difference between to individuals weights is so great that the smaller guy could not have a chance no matter how skilled he is, but i didnt know this even applies with fat weight. i wonder how a muscular 80-90 kg guy could fare against that fatass.

in any way if surrogate activities like "fighting in fair conditions" dont interest you and you just want to be as dangerous and secure as possible you might as well just get a gun or whatever. that essentially makes all physicality trivial.

if fat dude is reading this please dont get taken for me calling you a fatass i meant it in a friendly way

>>18305496
Tinder doesn't work for me, i think it's a bug because of my phone or something, i never got a match in a week.
Might reinstall if they fix the bug though.

>>18304074
>Videogames and God are the smallest ones.
Videogames are the largest media industry, larger that films, tv, books, and music. Larger even than any 3 of the other 4 combined.
God has had the most influence on all of humanity.
Really makes you think.
However I woldn't mind since it's just used for hookups. There's nothing wrong with hookups as long as the app is shameless about it, which it is not. It still pretends it's for dating.

>>18312650
260kg is an unusually high weight even for a total fatass, the guy must have a huge frame and quite a bit of muscle as well.

>>18304074

I think the general idea is that a hobby defines your identity because it is something you are choosing which indicates plenty of important things not least of which is the fact that of course there must be other things you aren't choosing
It is not something you have to do you want to do it and it's all based around the concept of ""free time"" that has really been drilled into everybody
Basically what this all reflects in the end is the extreme degree to which human society has been made to compartmentalize all aspects of life

>>18310321
In a way you are correct, but if I cut my dick (without becoming a tranny) and I continue to do all the things I already do, I prove you wrong.

>>18305396
Not that guy but God damn you're based and truthpilled

>>18309414
When going to churches was a thing.

>>18304982
Remove drinking and theatre and you become based.

>>18304097
Absolutely retarded.