How did you discover your special interest?

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I would like to know what led to the discovery of your special interests. I have no special interests right now and my fruitless search for some new ones is causing me to feel discouraged. I think that if I hear about how some other people got their interests, it might help set me down the path to discovering my own. I guess it's kind of like that episode of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic where the Cutie Mark Crusaders go around asking other ponies how they got their cutie marks in order to give them ideas on how to get their own.

I was browsing shelves in the library and discovered some intriguing books that led to a lifelong interest. I believe you've mentioned you don't like to read, though.

Thanks for responding. I appreciate it. Yes, it is true that I don't like to read. It's because even though I'm capable of being absorbed in a book, I have a lot of trouble visualizing the characters and setting. I'm a very visual-oriented person when it comes to my special interests - all of my special interests so far have revolved around things like movies and cartoons/anime.

When I was 5 y.o., I saw a bird (an eagle) catching a snake in a book; I become surprised by the idea of a bird eating a snake (for me, the natural was the opposite), and my parents explained me that some birds (the "birds of pray") eat snakes, and I become fascinated with birds of prey; after that, these my interest was "growing": first, birds of pray; after, birds; after, animals; after, natural world; after, science (that path was from 5 to 13 y.o.)

When I was 6 or 7 y.o., I saw a movie about WWII (I suspect that it was "Objective Burma!"; at least,it was a movie about allied paratroopers fighting the Japanese). With this movie, I became fascinated with WWII and military issues; again, the interest was evolving: WWII; after, History; after, Politics/History/Economics (my main interest since 12-13 y.o.).

Chance encounters and introductions to new things by other people.

About a year ago I was at the orthodontist, and they had a table with a puzzle on it, and that got me really interested in puzzles for about 8 months. I still enjoy puzzles more than I did a long time ago, but I need to get some new puzzles.

Reading-My parents always read to me from a young age and I've always appreciated and loved reading books my whole life.

Psychology-I've always been interested in psychology, particularly about human behaviour and personalities. I've always loved doing personality quizzes and maybe that's what really got me into psychology.

Child Development-When my mum was studying to become a nurse I always read her textbooks as a child and asked her questions. I always liked watching medical shows. I used to be obsessed with the concept of child birth and aging.

Internet-Ever since we first got the Internet I always loved researching about different things and gaining knowledge.

Libraries-I love going to the library because of my passion for reading. I'm going to college to take Library and Information Tech in the fall.

Tattoos-I just like looking at the different designs and they're addicting once you start getting them. My passion for tattoos started when I was 16.

Traveling-I love learning about different countries and different cultures. I've always loved traveling ever since I was a young child.

The Sims 2-Ever since the first Sims computer game came out I've been obsessed with creating virtual families. I love creating the different people with different personality traits and decorating the houses. I like to make different scenarios.

Techno Music-I've always loved dance music ever since I was 10 years old. I've always loved the fast dance music. I think my interest first started with basic dance music geared for children such as Aqua and the Vengaboys and I also used to watch Electric Circus on Much Music. From there my tastes changed and grew as I got older.

I don't know that this will be useful to you, but I would say that I didn't so much find my latest special interest (Indonesia), as much as IT found ME.

There was a little bit of a butterfly effect going on, a series of small steps before I got to this interest. I guess it began when a Japanese poster on another site alerted me to the existence of J-Pop. I started listening, and I branched out to more Asian pop music, like Chinese, and Korean. Eventually, I ended up listening to Indonesian singers.

I should probably also mention that my mother's family are Indonesian Eurasians, so it's a familiar culture for me.

Deciphering the lyrics of these songs, my interest in Indonesian culture slowly but surely grew. I heard about a new book being published, about the victims of the Japanese practice of drafting young Indonesian girls against their will to serve as prostitutes for soldiers, during the Pacific War. I knew that my grandmother had escaped such a fate, though the danger was present when she was still living on Java in the 1940s. At the same time, I grew very fond of a coworker, whose parents had also been born in Indonesia.

That same year, I visited a 'pasar malam' for the first time. That is a cultural event in the form of an Indonesian market, selling things like clothes, jewellery, statuettes, and lots of food, while there are also bands, singers, and traditional dancers performing. I had heard about often in my youth, but had never gone. And I loved it. So later that year, I went to a second, even bigger pasar malam. The snowball was still a-rolling.

The next year, at my next job, I grew pretty close to another coworker of mine, who was from the Philippines. She would often speak about the Philippines, what life was like over there, cultural things, historical things... and I enjoyed comparing notes and naming the things that my grandmother had told me about Indonesia, which my coworker referred to as 'our neighbours'. But I found my knowledge on the subject of Indonesia was lacking, and I could sometimes not answer my coworker's questions. So, I decided to read more books about Indonesia, to enrich my knowledge. And here I am today, still doing that very thing. Last year, I also visited a LOT of pasar malams and other Indonesia-related cultural events. Just last week, I saw 4 Indonesian films at an Asian film festival, and I plan to see two more that are playing at another film festival next week.

So that's my story. I would say my interest in Indonesia has grown and developed naturally, and still is. Before that, I was frustrated about not having any special interests any more, because my love for drawing and for wildlife/nature, seemed to be dying out.

Well, my special interest is a very common casual interest: movies and filmmaking; so I'm sure there was nothing unique about how I discovered them.

I have a secondary interest in health/illness/nutrition, which started when I was very young and found and read my mom's old college medical textbooks. I call this a secondary interest, because I've never been intensely focused on it, but any time I learn about an illness or disease or medical procedure I'm not familar with, I'm compelled to research it. So, it's quite an intermittent interest.

Special interest in Theoretical Physics and Maths.
It appeared when I was 5, looking at a wonderful night summer sky. Then I discovered calculus, trigonometry and Physics between 5 and 8... At that time, my dad helped me a lot to develop those things because he was the very first to "understand".

I started reading foreign language texts one day and discovered that it felt quite similar to stimming, so I cut right back on stimming and started learning to read languages instead. Now I can read about twenty languages. In December I took it into my head to start stimmng again in the way I used to as a child (don't ask why) and now I don't enjoy my foreign language texts anything like as much and would rather spend my time stimming. I think I am undergoing what the textbooks call a regression .

My parents always used to have music on. Can't remember how or why I got into running - although, it was probably wanting something to do of an evening.

My mom forced me to take piano lessons when I was 7. Hated it for the first couple years, but as I progressed and the music became more interesting, I started to love it. Went nuts with it during my teen years, did a self study of Schumann's Carnaval and Chopin's Opus 25 Etudes the summer I turned 14 - can you say autistic obsession? Performance related injuries have sidestepped my career, but I hope to study the Taubman approach to regain my abilities. Music performance has been my only major obesession. Psychology is a distant second love.

Somehow, shortly after my mother started teaching me to read, in kindergarten or first grade, I found a book on dinosaurs. That was my first passion. They still fascinate me, especially learning the bird connection. Perhaps I should have pursued an interest in paleontology. But the ocean called, I answered...
Too long to go into it, but I switch obsessions every couple of years. Usually, I will re-visit them. Several new dinosaur books in the house, including one I purchased today.

Sincerely,
Matthew

My transit interest I had pretty much my whole life, according to my mom I got interested in trains by looking out the window whenever one would pass by.

My Hip Hop special interest, by listening to the music, I really like the socially conscious songs.

Yay, another transit fan! Like you, I couldn't tell you when my fascination with all things transportation began--it probably just came out of the fact that I was always staring out the car window whenever we went anywhere.