When your obsession ends

Post Reply New Topic

What feelings do you typically experience when your special interest ends? Do you try to come back to it, in hope your efforts will make you interested in it again? I recently lost my very special interest which was entering online contests. It was such a practical interest, I happened to win something relatively often or if I won something I didn't need, I exchanged it for something else with the people I knew from that board. I had loads of cosmetics and perfumes I got in this way.

The minor ones come and go, for me usually over a period of a few years, then fade away on their own as the subject is exhausted, or are replaced by new ones. The major ones may cycle in and out, but they never disappear. When a minor interest fades or is replaced, I can't say that I experience a particular emotion. If its information based, I will retain my passion for that information forever, I just won't obsessively talk about it unless some poor sap inadvertently pushes the right button. If its object or character based...well, I don't so much consider them 'gone' as 'dormant' - for the moment.

They mostly just fade away and I try other stuff until I get bored of those and so on. This cycle continues.

Eventually I get interested in past interests again. Last month I was extremely interested in North Korea and learned almost everything there was to learn about it, but this morning I just got bored of it. I'm sure I'll be reading stuff about it again at a later time.

Star Wars was my special interest from the ages of four through eighteen--and that's the year that "Phantom Menace" came out, and I am NOT a fan of the SW prequels I did not like them AT ALL. I was so obsessed with SW as a child that whenever my mom took me to a department store I would disappear and they would find me playing in the vaccuum department because I thought the vaccuums were droids.

My distaste for the prequel nonsense disillusioned me and I walked away from Star Wars for a few years. In the intervening time I became obsessed with the Mafia, and a video game called "The Elder Scrolls: Morrowind." Morrowind came out in 2002 and it replaced my Mafia interest, and I still play Morrowind many hours a week to this day. However, my Star Wars interest has also returned in the past year, I just choose to ignore anything prequel-related and focus on the original trilogy. Star Wars and Morrowind are fighting for dominance of my thoughts, and it's about an even fight right now. Though I must say I've never skipped school or work to come home and watch Star Wars, though I have done so to play Morrowind.

At 34 I became completely disillusioned with a special interest in language that had started when I was 11. Now I'm stuck working in it. It's a disappointment to go to work each day.

I was relieved, when my special interest in the UK 70s Punk movement ended, because though it was fun when it started, it just wasn't working towards the end, and I was too nostalgic about being a Mod through those three years, anyways. I gave up that special interest, and went back to just doing my own thing, and being myself, the way some WP members last saw me in 2006, and the way that all WP members, see me, today.

How come it's a disappointment? Is the job not interesting, is it boring?

When my obsession ends, I feel lost. Then I find another.

Same here. Once I've learned all I want about something, the obsession goes away and I often forget what I knew (until the memory gets triggered by something) and don't talk about it (unless some unfortunate soul brings it up!) Sometimes I feel nostalgia for minor past interests. This usually only happens with subjects like musicians, tv shows, etc. where I have forgotten some detail and couldn't remember, then I'd be sort of wistful if I don't feel an obsessive urge to go look it up and revisit the interest.

Major interests just seem to cycle through...I'll get bored but always come back to them eventually. Then there's the two major ones I don't have the chance to let go of without very bad consequences. If I became too bored with computer programming I'd be unable to do my job and would get fired; If I lost interest in my cats they would suffer from neglect because I'd get too absorbed in something else and not notice if one's sick or something, etc. So I hope I never find out with those two!

I am the same with my special interest. One of my major ones are currently switched on.

The job, teaching, just isn't a good fit for me and has less to do with the content than babysitting. The material is repetitive and not deep enough to inspire any investigative thought and honestly, I only like certain parts of the language - I don't even care about speaking it. Obviously, I'm looking for another line of work. It is mildly depressing to fall out of love with a special interest of more than 20 years. Meh, I don't care.

I don't think I ever completely loose an interest. I'm mostly over pokemon, but I still play it occasionally. Science was my first interest and I've had that all my life... the bird thing just won't go away, and now I'm stuck on mental disorders, lol.

My special interests don't end. I just tire of them. I fade away from them more so than the other way 'round. Usually it's because the old gets replaced with a new one, so I'm too busy to lament over the old.

For me, one special interest is followed immediately by another, sometimes they overlap and I take up a new one as the old one is fading. So, there is never any time that I can remember being without one.

I don't really feel anything when it ends because I don't care as I'm not interested in it anymore.
However I was once forced to give up an obsession with serial killers and because this was forced upon me, and I was still interested, I got really bored because nothing else was fun to me.

When I have a special interest it's really exciting for me to constantly be learning something new about it. When I feel like I've learned everything I can I get antsy and bored, cuz I want new information. I usually get all kinds of special interests though so, if one peters out, I go back to an old one.