How can you turn an obsession into a life-giving activity that grows and develops, without any negative impacts on your life?

 

It depends on the obsession.

You can have an obsession with any of the following:

• Mindfulness
• A field of study
• A field of work
• Hobbies
• Interests
• Social Media

I will talk about the ones in bold, starting with mindfulness.

Mindfulness

If your obsession is with mindfulness, no amount is too much.

While some hobbies and interests can be illegal, criminal, or destructive, or cause you to neglect important areas of your life, mindfulness has none of those qualities.

Monks spend 5–7 hours a day in prayer ( a form of mindfulness).

Many non-ordained people, with time on their hands (such as retirees), do that as well.

If they are not praying, they are reading the scriptures.

Or going about their day, striving to bring mindfulness, prayer, and the spirit of the scriptures, into all their thoughts and actions.

In this way, a person can safely advance in their spiritual pursuits, without any negative impacts.

In fact, mindfulness has increasingly positive impacts, making you a simpler, better, wiser, and more caring person, the more you practice it.

Hobbies

The impact of a hobby can be negative or positive, depending on the stage of life you are in, and the money and time you spend on it.

I answer a lot of Quora questions.

I blog at least once a week. 

Both of these obsessions are healthy obsessions.

What is a healthy obsession to my mind?

A healthy obsession is one, which does not have any of the following negative impacts:

Make you lose money

Make you lose your job

Make you lose, or weaken your relationships

Make you do something immoral, or make you do something illegal

Clutter up your house

Make you lose your mind, or your peace of mind

When I answer Quora questions, or blog, none of the above happens.

You should be able to say that about your hobbies.

If there are no negative impacts, you should be able to list positive impacts.

Here are the positive impacts I can list for answering Quora questions and blogging:

Minoo Jha

 · 2y

What is your biggest project or goal as an artist right now? Why is it important to you, and how do you plan to achieve it?

Just to keep going with my blog. My blog helps me clarify my thoughts and ideas, develop my thoughts and ideas, and memorialize my thoughts and ideas. I have been writing on Minoo Jha Life Strategies since Dec 27, 2010. I publish a post every Sunday. My readers (family and friends) keep me going with their likes and comments. Since 2018, which is the year I discovered and joined Quora, I have an added incentive to keep writing and publishing blog content. I find I am able to repurpose my blog content to answer some questions on Quora. Repurposing my blog content helps me reach a wider audience than family and friends. Often, a way, way wider audience. Here’s an example: I published The Empty Seats at Our Table on Dec 25, 2022 on my blog. Total of Family and Friends views: 50. I then repurposed the post to answer the question below. And it already has over 700 views on Quora. Quora is a lab for me. I have put a lot of content out on Quora - both questions and answers. I have learned a lot from doing so. And I keep learning. I get bouquets and brickbats. I have content deleted and collapsed. Some of my content - questions and answers - pass like ships in the night, some generate teeny ripples, some are rippling still - what Sean Kernan calls evergreen answers. Sometimes an evergreen answer will cause ripples and ripples, only to be collapsed by Quora down the line. Quora is an extremely good test of my ability to be humble, and a test of how I react when things don’t go my way. It’s a humility test and an annoyance test. But when all is said and done, I am glad for Quora and my ability to share my thoughts and ideas with a wider audience…

If you spend a lot of time on a hobby, and it has life-giving impacts on your life, keep doing it.

If however, it has any of the negative impacts I have listed above, perhaps you should do less of it, even give it up.

Social Media

One obsessive hobby for many people in the last decade and a half, is being on social media constantly.

On the positive side, being on social media constantly, can do the following for us:

Gain us an audience

Help us stay connected with all the people we know

Help us get answers to our questions, or something we are trying to solve, or accomplish

Discover new artists and musicians and recipes and fashions and movies, and so on

Make us aware of new interests and hobbies that we can take up, new groups we can join, or new events we can go to

Make us money, if our posts are crucial to our business

On the negative side, being on social media constantly, can have the following impacts…

Give us FOMO

Make us feel that everyone else is having a better time, and enjoying more success, and favor, than we are

We can be criticized, bullied, harassed, or exposed on social media - something than can destroy our reputation, our peace of mind, and more

Also, if we gain friends and connections through social media, we can also lose friends and connections through social media. It is a double edged sword.

Clearly, social media is one of those activities, we should approach mindfully.

So it all comes back to mindfulness.

If you are mindful, you will be able to recognize whether an activity has positive impacts or negative impacts.

You are less likely to go overboard, and not realize that , until it is too late.

Your obsessions with things, will not make you a hoarder.

Your obsession with making more money, will not make you lose money.

Your obsession with ideas, will not make you lose friends.

Your obsession with winning, will not make you make a fool of yourself.

I will end with the wisdom that has worked for me.

Which is to stay on the safe side, in the choices you make, and how much time, money, and energy you spend on those choices.

Minoo Jha

 · 3y

How many blog posts do you write per week?

One a week - published every Sunday. Here’s a recent one… Stay On The Safe Path Stay on the safe path The safe path is where there is ambition without greed __ Stay on the safe path The safe path is where there is eating and drinking without excess __ Stay on the safe path The safe path is where there is work and there is rest __ Stay on the safe path The safe path is where there is concern without paranoia __ Stay on the safe path The safe path is where there is passion without obsession __ Stay on the safe path The safe path is where there is optimism without over confidence __ Stay on the safe path The safe path is where there is tradition with tolerance __ Stay on the safe path The safe path is where there is trust with verification __ Stay on the safe path __ Stay on the safe path, my friend, Stay on the safe path!

Yes, stay on the safe side, my friend.

Stay on the safe side.

May you be mindful, all through 2026, so you live well and thrive.

Here's why I recommend you create a motivation list for 2026, and not just a resolution list...

You have shopping lists, to do lists, wish lists, bucket lists, resolution lists.

Since a new year is already two months under way, I recommend you create a motivation list, as well.

A motivation list to underpin all the activities and goals you have planned for this year...

...Serious important activities and goals, such as getting a new certification that will benefit your career, kicking a habit that isn't serving you well, or taking steps to improve your most significant relationships...

And light, fun activities and goals, such as watching all the Oscar nominated movies.

Your motivations, simply stated, are your reasons for choosing your activities and goals.

Example 1: one of your plans for this year might be to continue to bake bread (something you started during the pandemic).

Your reason might be that it makes home more homey, or it reminds you of your childhood, and the bread your mother used to make, or it has become a cherished activity that you and someone you love do together.

Example 2: one of your plans for this year, may be to continue to be part of a group you are involved with - whether a choir group, a book club group, a hula group, a Toastmasters group, a Bible Study group, a volunteer group, and so on.

Your reason might be that you enjoy participating in shared activities, and it costs little or nothing to participate.

Example 3: one of your plans for this year, may be to continue to cook, craft, write, garden, read, take on exercise challenges, .......(fill in the blanks, with any of the things you have been doing, and plan to continue to do this year).

Your reason for continuing might be that it's relaxing, or it gives you an outlet for your creativity, or the challenges invigorate you, and give you something to focus on.

There are at least 3 advantages to listing your reasons for your plans, activities, and goals:

1. It will make you feel surer that you are doing the right thing for the right reasons.

2. It will help you do the things you want to do, and more importantly, it will help you do the things you don't want to do, but should.

3. Finally, it will help you keep going, even when problems and challenges get in the way. For instance, if your goal for this year, is to walk for 30 minutes, at least 3 days a week, listing your reasons (for example, to keep your blood sugar down), will help you stick to your schedule, even when things such as the weather, or aches and pains get in the way. If you have more than one reason to do anything, list all the reasons. 

Yes, it's good to have plans, activities, and goals, but also reasons to support them, and keep at them.

You are choosing to live a certain way. Why?

You are choosing to spend your time doing certain things. Why?

You are choosing to spend your money on certain things. Why?

Without reasons, you risk jumping from one thing to another, spending on one thing and another, and when December 31st rolls round, you might have a profound sense of another year wasted, plus lots of extra clutter, and less than satisfying memories.

This needn't be the case.

So don't delay.

Get out that pen and paper.

List all your plans, activities, and goals for this year.

And then, as I suggested, write your reason for each one of those plans, activities, and goals.

Wishing you the very best for 2026.

May you live well and thrive.