My therapist said I need a hobby - help me to think of one that will actually help

[prufrock]

To cut a v. long and painful story short, I am having therapy after a year on AD's (now finished) afer a pretty terrible depressive episode. I now feel well enough to attack my underlying issues, which are basically obsessive negativity caused by my need to be perfect, caused by my mother (doesn't it always come down to the mother) and other aspects of my childhood. I am very self-aware - so much so that I get into terrible cycles of beating myself up because I'm beating myself up because I'm beating myself up because I'm beating myself up because I'm being negative - you get the picture. We both agree that I need to be easier on myself, but breaking the habits of 29 years is difficult.

I am incredibly results driven, and need to stop being so, as this just feeds my need to be perfect and my inability to ever actually reach the goals I set for myself. (I so hate the fact that I sound like a 'person who has had therapy') So my therapist has suggested I find a hobby that is process driven, rather than results orientated. And I can't think of anything, nada, zilch. Everything she came up with, I managed to see an end product - craft activities, cake making/decorating all produce something I can be not happy with. I already exercise, which helps, but is not exactly something I enjoy doing. I've managed to turn my gardening into a project, complete with spreadsheets so I can time my vegetable planting to produce a varied mix of produce from April thru November.

Am I a lost cause, or can somebody find me an activity to do that I cannot turn into a goal to be achieved (or not)?

Oh crumbs, that's a tough one. I was going to suggest knitting because it can be incredibly calming and therapeutic but you'd have to really concentrate not to make something (unless you just did lots of shapeless strips I suppose). Poor you, I haven't seen you around for a while but had no idea you were going through all this.

Develop an active interest in the Arts? Whether that be going to the theatre regularly, taking in some live music, going to the cinema, joining a reading club/'circle' type thing...

Glad you're feeling well enough now to start something up for yourself

Well, it does depend very much on what you enjoy doing, but you sound a bit like me in some ways (I am very over-anxious and analytical and have similar childhood issues) and I find the hobbies that help me most are creative and relaxing things like sewing (especially by hand - things like patchwork that I can do in front of the telly) - drawing, cardmaking or embroidery would be similar. I like patchwork because it's all from scratch and my own design, but very easy - plus it's great when you have finished, you have a beautiful quilt that you have made and get to keep and use. It can be sociable too - I have a few friends who do it and we meet up and get our DPs to do the cooking while we sew and chat - but of course you cando it alone too.

Hobbies aside, as often as I can I relax in a hot bath with a trashy magazine and totally switch off. It keeps me sane.

I don't suppose Sudoku would be any good? Not exactly a hobby, is it. It's so hard to think of things with no product, the closest I have come is fishing but I suppose people weigh their fish and stuff, don't they.

Yoga. Enormous emphasis on being in teh moment, ignoring the result, accepting your body for what it is ready to do.

Best of luck to you - you sound very strong

Yoga?

I should do this too Pru.

How much child free time do you have? Is voluntary work an option?

What about dog walking (yours or someone elses).

If it has to be at home in the evenings what about knitting, jigsaws, card makin, jewlery making? Pop to hobbycraft and have a look.

allotment

Are you working Prufrock? I only say that because if not you could do some voluntary work.

Ooops cross posted worriermum, I wasn't questioning your post, just suggesting the same thing!

Just read your second post, but I still think patchwork would be good because it does take bloody ages to finish a quilt (it takes me about 3 years) so it is about the process.

Or what about yoga or tai chi?

Hello my lovely. Sorry it's been tough

Hmm, it's a hard one, something that doesn't produce any results. What about visiting art galleries? I'm thinking aloud here but am trying to think of anything that involves participating and feeling something but not actually producing anything whilst being enjoyable at the same time. So you need something passive don't you? Visiting galleries, could that be a go-er?

Does it have to be something that has no goal or objective or can it simply be something where there is too much subjectivity around the quality of the output that you cannot achieve quantitative perfection?

I would say creative writing possibly?

Or collecting something - precious stones, Victorian glass or whatever floats your boat. I mean can there be such a thing as a 'perfect' collection?

What about yoga or meditation? Or dancing?

Pru, would you be happier back at work? Or definitely not? Just a thought, appreciate it may not be what you want.

Where there is so much subjectivity - not too much!

Hi Pru! Would you get competitive about something like reading? A weekly trip to the library is quite nice, browse for something and read. You would need to know and believe that hundreds of positive people like myself frequently get something from the library that doesn't suit, so I don't finish it. It is not a failure because I have discovered that it is not to my taste and I take it back and get something else.

What about art appreciation/history of art etc? I dabbled in this a few years ago and really enjoyed my quiet times in galleries and museums.

I'll keep thinking...

Message withdrawn

My sister and her dh spend many weekends 'geocaching', which is essentially an adult 'treasure hunt'. She was doubtful at first because she thought it sounded geeky and like something for 'anoraks'. But she wanted something they could do sporadically when they had time, and also something that didn't require lots of equipment. They love it, and say it is great fun.

Here is a link with more information:

www.geocaching.com/faq/

Do you want it to be something you do on your own, or would you consider/is it practical to join in a social activity? I'm thinking of singing in a choir off the top of my head, but there are lots of other things you could try too.

Oh prufrock, sorry to hear you're having a rough time of it ...

My recommendations would be:

• meditation (there are some FAB free podcasts out there which give regular meditations, so you can completely let go and let someone else guide the meditation - happy to give you the urls if interested).

• jigsaws - okay, you get an end product, but if you get a sufficiently difficult one and watch tv at the same time it can become a process and not an end result (after all, when you're done you break up the end result).

• okay, that's the end of my ideas - I shall think of some more

OK - I'm sorry but I'm going to be very difficult to please - please don't take my criticisms of your ideas personally

Child free time - 2.5 hours every day - more in September.

Voluntary activity - snort - already chair of local (managerless) pre-school. Big problems, causing huge stress, as there is no way even the superhuman I want to be could do everyting taht needs to be done and I detest delegating to other people who don't do it my way (I do delegate, an am v. v. nice about what other do, it just makes me feel v. stressed about teh fact I'm so neurotic that they can never get it right)

Arts - hmm - possibilities. Lots of museums here, I could just wander aimlessly and soak up without trying to become an expert I suppose. And dh and I have started making the local comedy gigs a regular fixture

I see WWW got in with art first and notnowbernard cleverly suggested anything in the arts. To which I agree.

Yoga has been suggested a lot for good reason. But it may be more fun to find a group of local housewives in a village hall than a set of show-off gym bunnies with a range of ever-harder classes.

... I would suggest photography, but that obviously has more end result to beat yourself up over...