Summary

The article discusses the benefits of embracing indecision as a pathway to discovering one's true interests and passions, emphasizing the importance of consistency and enjoyment in the process of finding a fulfilling hobby or career.

Abstract

The author shares their personal journey of navigating through uncertainty during their time at university, amidst a plethora of options and societal pressures to find the "best" path. They experimented with various side-hustles and hobbies, such as digital marketing and affiliate marketing, but found true satisfaction in reselling designer shoes and video editing, activities they enjoyed and were motivated to improve upon. The article suggests a method for readers to find their own interests by leveraging feelings of jealousy towards others' pursuits, trying out different activities, and applying consistent effort to see if they find joy in the process. It also cautions against chasing trends or money alone, and emphasizes the value of patience and deep exploration of interests over superficial engagement with many.

Opinions

The author believes that constant exposure to numerous options can lead to mental limbo and indecision.
They suggest that enjoying the learning process and making mistakes is crucial to finding a pursuit worth committing to.
The article posits that jealousy can be a positive indicator, guiding individuals towards potential interests they might enjoy and excel in.
Consistency is highlighted as a powerful tool for success, more important than avoiding hard work.
The author warns against solely pursuing hot topics or money, as these motivations can lead to quick demotivation if immediate results are not seen.
A high tolerance for patience is recommended, with the idea that deep, focused effort in a few areas is more likely to yield success than spreading oneself too thin across many.

Why Indecision Might Make You Happy

Actionable steps of how to use it to find your next hobby.

When I was at Uni, it was during a time where I wasn’t sure what degree i wanted to do, if I even wanted to go to Uni, crypto, side-hustles, Tik Tok and Covid all came to the fore and I was pretty unsure of what I wanted every single day.

I was in limbo mentally on more or less every single decision as I didn’t know how to make sure I was making the best decision every single day because there was so many flying about and being pushed online.

I jumped ship every day on ever decision.

e.g. I like using the ‘side-hustle’ example. During it’s height, anything could be one and during covid this was a huge thing. ‘Have you got a hobby you’re doing, did you know you can make that a side-hustle?’ I must have tried 100 things once — digital marketing, advertising, charity shop reselling, affiliate marketing, the list goes on.

I’d do a days worth of courses, put it into practice, then never touch it again.

But I got good at some things I jumped around to, but it was by complete accident that I found WHY I got better at these things and I want to remove those issues for you here.

Here’s what I found out.

My bag was reselling high ticket designer shoes and recently became video editing. I did both for years and continued to do so because yes, I did experiment with loads of jumping about, but when I found something that didn’t feel like the most boring thing in the world to continue doing, I doubled down.

None of this I knew at the time however, it’s all in retrospect but I consistently showed up again and again to learn and make mistakes.

I enjoyed selling shoes as it was finding the biggest release or hunting for under marketed hyped shoes, buying then getting the immediate feedback of making money on that decision that itched my brain in a way I was happy to be consistent.

Same with video editing, I jumped to it, realised I enjoyed learning and wanted to get better at it.

How can you apply it?

If you’re reading and nothing springs to mind that you enjoy doing right now, that’s ok, this is the best method I can give you to find something you DO want to do.

Use your friends or who you follow and add the ‘jealousy’ test. Reframing jealousy to something that is pulling you towards trying that thing. Jealous of John who can work from wherever because he’s a remote copywriter? Great! Try write a few articles on Medium or watch a few copywriting courses — try it out long enough to see how it feels

2a. Great, you enjoy learning and being able to get better at this pursuit, keep going and apply consistency, the most powerful tool — it isn’t an antidote to stuff not feeling hard as that will happen — but keep going and see how far you can push and learn when you have time.

2b. Great, you couldn’t see yourself continuing that’s not a problem, repeat step 1 or be as curious as possible, jump to something else that you’ve heard about, try it out and keep going until you can start step 2a.

Be wary of

Doing things because it’s the ‘hot topic’ right now. Examples were AI and Chat GPT a couple of months ago. 100’s of videos came out of nowhere of how you can become a X job with Chat GPT. By all means try it, but keep this in mind just because it’s top of mind right now doesn’t mean you will enjoy it.
Doing EVERYTHING for the money. Money will come but if it’s the sole reason why you start something, you can get demotivated VERY quickly when you realise it isn’t coming in as quick as the ‘gurus’ said it would.
Your patience tolerance. The best thing you can do is take as much time as you can at something then make the educated decision to flip to the next thing. There’s no point digging 100 shallow holes when you can dig 1–2 deep holes and strike gold.

Is there anything you’d add/take away?