How much time do you spend with your interests?

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How much time do people spend on their special interests? Do you feel overwhelmed by them?

I've always felt, even from a young age, that I spend an extraordinary amount of time on a given interest. I could research a single interest for hours and completely lose track of time.

Though I always say that my interests are personal and very rewarding to me emotionally, I do feel overwhelmed at times. It's not a negative overwhelming experience, but overwhelmed in the sense that I sometimes avoid lots of other things in life. I usually don't like to go out with my parents, because I would rather stay home and remain involved in an interest that appeals to me. At times, they try to break me away from this, because they feel like I am way too preoccupied, much so that I rarely want to spend time with others.

And when I become involved, I sometimes go on buying sprees. I have to buy all sorts of things, usually books, related to a specific interest. And I find myself continuously researching about things on the internet. I have, on occasion, caused myself to go broke because I can get so obsessed. On two occasions, when I was younger, I even attempted to steal. That's how obsessed I had become.

- Ray M -

Well I can relate. I don't really socialize much anymore, and I seem to be heading in the direction of total recluse. There is only so much time in one's life afterall right ?
It feels overwhelming sometimes, because it is very much like I am being driven by something other than myself. I focus on my painting constantly when I am not working now.
My alternate obsession is evolution/ information theory/ psychology of religion. I bought a stack of books last summer while researching and developing some ideas I had in this area. This topic becomes almost a monomania for me in the summers it seems.

I spend approximatley 20 hours a week on the Obsession that I have with Routemasters. I've decided to go to the Flea Market, downtown Langley, this morning, just to get away from my Obsession. I was going through all the different rooms, doing just fine. Than I've spotted a Bright Red Routemaster, from Victoria BC on top of a pile of toys. I've snatched it with my hungry Fingers and I've felt Endorphins rushing through the Viens of my Body! I couldn't possibly find another one in the whole Building, right? Wrong. After I've eaten my Burger, I went back to the Main Floor to browse around. Than it happened again! I've spotted another one on a table, surrounded by Beads and other Hippie stuff saying, "Save me! Save me!" I've scooped it up, than I've turned my Head and spotted an authentic Candy Tin from Harrold's that was shaped and painted like... Suprize! A Routemaster! I've experienced that whole Endorphin Rush, all over again. Than I've decided to get away from the Flea Market, as quickly as I could, without running. I feel like a Selfish, Materialistic Snob, but it was worth it. I've gotten away from my Obsession, just to get clamped in its Mighty Vice, at the Flea Market.

I guess I do spend an inordinate amount of time on my interests. Case in point, on Friday night I spent nine hours flat making up a table of words (100 basic English words) with related words in other languages from the etymologies given in the various Webster's dictionaries as well as Samuel Johnson's 1755 dictionary. This went on non-stop from 6pm to 3am and I must say I too totally lost track of time. I ended up not having dinner till 3.30-4.00 am and being weak with hunger at the end (I still wasn't finished). The etymology of English words being one of my obsessive interests.

Another of my special interests is the local bus network (in and around Edinburgh) and I spend hours on end travelling quite aimlessly on buses, as well as travelling specific road routes (on buses). Including tonight.

AS, and finding out as much as possible about it, would be a third obsessive interest just now.

If I'm not actually doing one of these interests, it's a cert that I'm thinking about them.

I think my interests, and my absorption in them, is definitely the strongest part of my AS. For sure, it's to the complete exclusion of mainstream NT-like interests (like showbiz, entertainment, popular culture etc.)

Well at least I have some healthy obsessions, unlike some people I know.

In the last 3 days, I have probably spent fewer than 6 hours away from my computer, not counting sleep.

Though I am also writing a term paper in a subject that is one of my interests.

hey, I spend alot of time with the computers or the closers (sometimes both at same time like now) as im sitting here in front the computers I have 2 of my door closers with me right now as im typing this . I seem to never get tired of it. werever I go I always find a computer or computer parts or a closer. just saturday, I found a perfectly great mouse and keyboard for a dell in the trash near my dad's work. poor cockneyrebel, it looks like them routemasters love you alot and they find you. It seems like they know where you will be and make you notice them. how many buses do you have now? I have about 11 closers now 8 of which are storm door kind and the other 3 are the kind with an arm like seen on commercial doors. I plan to at least have 1 or 2 of each manufactere ever made.

for me the strenth of my obbsession changes alot.


Somtiem they are seperate from the rest fo the world and i go into a mode where the rest fo the world stop excisting.

jammie

Too much. In fact, I would like to do other things but if I do I start thinking in my interests and I end up doing nothing useful.

Owing to other commitments at the moment, spending as much time as I would like to on my interests has been far from possible. I've been so tired when I've come back home from work (done a lot of overtime recently) that I cannot concentrate on them for as long as I'd like which isn't upsetting me or anything but I would sometimes just like some time to myself and my interests.

With homework...All of the time.

Alot of Hours

I too spend a lot of time with my interests and become so lost in them that i loose track of everything else. I think about them all the time, working things out in my head. I by books about them, or just by books, books are one of my interests. I forget to pay attention to people and the world around me.
I'm not so much interested in facts but more in experiance. For example i read a lot of fiction books, and watch a lot of films and what i like about them is the experiance, the feelings i get from watching them or reading them. The comfort of a familiar story or charector. The beauty of perfect sentances or sequences. So for me my interests are all about experiance which makes them very hard to overcome, it feels so good when i'm writing or lost in a book or a film, or music.
And my interests certainly spill out into the rest of the world. I don't go anywhere without a book in my hand and read as i walk ( i can multitask enough for that - years of practice) i play guitar and i always end up playing friends guitars when i visit them, i just can't keep away.
I wouldn't want to give up my interests but they are often very overwhelming.