Do we have a definition of "special interest"?

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Do we have a definition of "special interest"?
People who talk about it often say that it must be something that only gives you joy and pleasure. I often struggle with the stuff I am learning and I'm starting to wonder if I therefore have no special interests. Nothing will give me only joy and pleasure. I am not that good at anything. It's hard for me to imagine people only getting joy and pleasure out of doing something. How is this possible?

I have to say this: people avoid talking about this at all. I ask what a "special interest" is but people refuse to answer me. It's like "only joy and pleasure" is a lie. Perhaps that is how people like to talk about it, ie they think of only some aspects of the "special interest" but there are difficult aspects as well. I, myself, get frustrated when I think I should be much better at something than I am. I gues many of you never care about how good you are. You just learn something without much care if you are good or not? Maybe we just forget about the frustrations involved?

What do you enjoy doing?

If it's something that causes you frustration and you're doing it to get better at it, that's not a special interest. A special interest is inherently enjoyable and doesn't feel like work to engage with.

It's possible that you might not have any. Especially if you're depressed - one symptom of depression is the loss of capacity for enjoyment, and for autistic people that can mean not having special interests, or not finding your interests enjoyable.

It's also possible that if you have alexithymia, you might have trouble introspecting well enough to recognize what your special interests are and what you're enjoying.

I feel like "special interest" has an element of "compulsion" in it. You enjoy it----but you can't get away from it even when you don't enjoy it.

Being in the thralls of a "special interest" might make you forget to do routine things like eat your dinner or brush your teeth.

To me, a special interest is something that can take up a majority of my attention no matter what I may be doing at the time. That can cause issues in life if you do not have a measure of control over them. When I am working on a special interest, I can easily loose track of time to the point that I can sometimes forget to do important things like eating or sleeping schedules. It feels much like a kid who does not want to go to bed as they have been sucked into their favorite tv program. I learned not to go into those interests while driving, as my attention span of the road decreases too much.

Case in point, during boring departmental meetings I sometimes go into either my quantum research thoughts or my chemical engineering thoughts. While it is normal to have your mind wander when bored, this is more directed. I have been known to be so deep into those thoughts that I will completely miss important details that were said at the meeting. Knowing this, I record the meetings so that I can check later on to see if I missed something while in my mental playground.

Hm.

Special interest is basically an obsession someone enjoys.


There's a huge misunderstanding somewhere between the concept of reward systems in everyone's heads.
There's actually two of them, independent of one another -- one that develops habit and focus, and one that is motivation driven and would give pleasure.

Obsession is like an uncontrolled habit and focus. Habit is usually unconscious, focus is more or less controllable -- it can be separated.
Interests is the motivation and pleasure that comes with it. But even motivation and pleasure itself can be separated.


I'm sure there are some who can name names of neuroanatomy and biology. I don't.

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I enjoy upcycling old furniture. I really get a lot of enjoyment out of doing it. I would like to call it a hobby and I've always considered that a hobby is a special interest.

It's not something I'm obsessed with doing and it's not a compulsion either but once I start doing a project I will get completely immersed in it.

My latest 'special interest' has been laptop computers. I have forty of them, about thirty five bought within the past three years. Most are 15-20 years old, and quite a few were being offered on Ebay 'for spare parts'. I like to get them working again, connect to the internet, etc, but then I don't know what else to do with them. It's definitely a bizarre compulsion with obsessive elements. I've had similar things over the years with coins, postage stamps, car magazines, trains, video games, the stock markets and quite a few other things.

Much of this defies rational explanation and analysis - I just tend to let it happen, and it's mostly enjoyable, though it can take over one's life at the expense of other important things.

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