Does anyone else have absolutely no hobbies or interests?

[twirlywindmill]

I find almost everything boring, bowling is boring and games are boring, work is boring and tv is boring.
I go and visit friends or family and I am bored.

It’s not a recent discovery, I have always been chronically bored, even on holidays.
I have tried various different activities to try and find something I enjoy but everything I do I am bored and just waiting for it to finish.
Don’t tell Dh but even sex is boring if it lasts too long.

I probably drink a bit too much but that’s only out of boredom.

Anyone else just bored all the time? I think I am so inside my head that I have no interest in the outside world, even when people talk to me I wish they wouldn’t because I’m happy daydreaming.

When I don't exercise (I can't now), I feel like this. But I'd say I'd relatively few hobbies or interests, in that some people go to cycling/sewing/jousting clubs, and I never really have done much like like, ever. But I loved the things I was doing, socialising with friends/family and I did go to exercise activities-just not sure if those things could be classes as hobbies/interests? As in it's not like people who put Duke of Edinburgh X/LAMDA whatever award on their CVs.

I’m quite similar but I’d say I’m boring rather than bored

This sounds like textbook ADHD honestly. If you could focus, you could probably become interested enough in something. I would explore this and medication that would help you focus.

Yes, and I’m medicated, but still feel exactly the same.

I can semi relate.

Things I’ve always found violently boring:

• games (board games, hide and seek, charades, pub quizzes, you name it)
• sports (playing or watching)
• certain aspects of politics (all the statistical analysis predicting outcomes of elections)
• basically anything people like to bet on
• cooking / watching cooking shows / talking about food (food itself is fine, and I eat like a normal person, I just for some reason want to scream any time anyone asks me to think or talk about it)

Things I used to love that I’ve lost the ability to concentrate on in middle age when I’ve been eaten up by complex caregiving responsibilities:

• reading
• films
• music

Things I still find interesting:

• people

Things I have found more appealing as I get older:

• being outside in nature aimlessly (not doing any particular activity)

My conclusion is that I am very low in competitive drive (I think a lot of food chat is covertly competitive - ‘look how healthy / wholesome / discerning / sophisticated I am’) and not excited by a desire to predict the unpredictable. Which makes most forms of play seem pointless to me.

I also had awful fine and gross motor skills as a child, so was never good at art or playing instruments or even non-competitive sports, so those were too frustrating to become hobbies.

I’d love to have the bandwidth to read and watch films and discover new music - but my head is full up with others’ needs. Good thing I’m still interested in people!

ETA: I am also diagnosed with ADHD, dyspraxia & dyscalculia

Do you have adhd?

Do you find it easier to stick with something if you’re doing something else at the same time? Like listen to a podcast while cooking? Do a jigsaw while watching tv?

Often people with adhd need 2 inputs at the same time to enable them to concentrate and sustain focus / enjoy another task/hobby.

Well, objectively speaking, is your life boring?

Hoenstly I'd think you are depressed, and perhaps for just so long that you never really noticed.

How did you get as far as marrying someone who you find boring? Did you lie about interests and hobbies so he'd be interested? I can't imagine a date staring at me bored constantly and thinking wow, I've found love.

Sounds like a concentration problem rather than boredom

I was like this but since being diagnosed and medicated for ADHD, I'm always doing something.

Atm, I've got Sewing Bee on, I'm cooking a new recipe, scrolling here and trying to remember to make the pin hole viewer for the eclipse! I'm focused on all of them whereas before, nothing was stimulating enough for me to enjoy.

How long have you been medicated?

Sometimes I feel like this when I am in the middle of a depression. Have you always felt like this, even as a younger person, or has it crept up on you.

How awful to live like that.
I'm in my sixties and have rarely been bored in my whole life. I've always had hobbies and interests, most of them solo, there's always something new to find out or think about, there's always something to do in my garden and I always have piles of new books to read. I can't imagine ever thinking I've got nothing to do of interest. I'm a perfectionist and have a very good concentration span so I aim to do things to a very high standard.

You sound like alcohol may also be a problem for you if you drink at work and find it helps to alleviate boredom. That's going to affect how you approach things.

This almost fits but I when I daydream it’s more mulling things over, planning things, and making sense of things so I don’t actually live in a fantasy world or dream up stories.
I sometimes go over things, conversations and think about what I should have said or done and didn’t, I also get angry with people in my head and go over what they’ve done and say all the things I am far to people pleasing to actually say out loud.

I used to daydream for hours and hours as a kid in an almost in a trance rocking to music but I phased that out when I got married and had kids so now that’s just reserved for when I’m walking and driving.

I can shut out the world and find the outside world almost an interruption.

I used to feel this kind of intense, painful boredom when I was young. And then, when I had small children, it hit me hard because you just have to spend so much time attending to them without a break. (which is charming and lovely of cours but only UP TO A POINT.)

I have found things very differnt as I come out on the older side of middle age. It is partly that I just have more tine to explore interests and , mor crucially, I give myself permission to do this. But also, I think I am getting better at just being present in a situation, without restlessly casting for ... something else.

I certainly didn't have space or energy for hobbies when I was busy parenting, so it might just be a time of life thing, op.

Have you tried all sports?

Skateboarding?

Polo?

Snowboarding?

Kite surfing?

What about travel? Is that boring to you?

I find you very interesting - your finding everything boring!!!

But you don’t have an inner world, seems to be what you’re saying? That what you prefer is zoning out, whether it’s doomscrolling or rocking to music? It’s not that you’re escaping to an imaginary world, or imagining a more interesting life, it’s that you’re not really there?

Really interested (and relieved in a way) to read that you are already medicated for adhd, OP, and it made notdifference to this part of you. I just knew there would be an MN tendency to ascribe your mindset to adhd and I find this so depressing. There are so many aspects of us that just get shunted into this one mild-to-moderate neurological variation and we are so much more than this.

Just over 3 years, only when one of my children was diagnosed but I am not so sure now 72 mg of methylphenidate and I don’t know I’ve had it.

Have you had the medication reviewed? Sounds like it might not be the right one or dosage for you.

Yes that’s very true I do zone out and I do think wine does that for me and enables me to just be.
I don’t drink a lot but I look forward to when I do because it’s the only time I’m not aware of time or boredom.

If someone asked you to imagine what a non-boring life (or even a non-boring day!) would look like for you, what would come to mind?

Sorry but are you going to work and having a few shots then coming home and being responsible for your children? How old are they?

Also, couldn’t you get a more interesting job - you only work 4 hour shifts in a pub? I’d be bored if I only worked that amount - what qualifications do you have? Would you like to earn more money?

I can understand. I've only ever "done things" because it's expected of me rather than I actually enjoy doing them.

Half the responses suggesting there's a whole exciting world just waiting to be explored prove that expectation is alive and well.

I find most things to be so predictable. I am boring but equally I find others to be mostly boring too.

The best bit of getting older as a square peg is I'm no longer trying to fit into a round hole to please others.

Just being present in what I’m doing and my mind not drifting off watching the clock.
I would love to just be fully doing what I’m doing on the outside without the constant pull back into the fog.

I’d like to be able to listen to someone and know what they said and not drift away half way through because I got bored, I even get distracted by my own thoughts and I can’t remember what I was just thinking.

When I drink wine I feel fully present in the moment and I’m not bored, time stops standing still and I feel fully focused and involved with no distractions and I enjoy whatever I’m doing, that’s the only time I’m not bored so I know it exists but my natural state is just a foggy blur, I can hear the outside but it’s all muffled and I can’t stay there long, it feels like outside my head is a a distorted radio station and I keep going out of range.
My eyes glaze over the world blanks out and I’m gone, I can snap out of it briefly but the pull is constant.

That’s not boredom though, that’s a lack of focus or attentiveness.