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How I Choose What Hobbies to Pursue

From pole dancing, standup comedy, basketball, badminton, chess, and more… here’s what sticks and what didn’t.

Tam Pham
9 min readSep 8, 2019

I’ve tried so many hobbies in the past like pole dancing, stand up comedy, basketball, badminton, table tennis, tennis, cross country, swimming, chess, Yu-Gi-Oh, volleyball, acro yoga, bouldering, you name it. Some lasted for years and others for a few weeks.

I knew intuitively why I didn’t go deeper in some hobbies but never put it into words until now. Why did I quit basketball after devoting my life to it my entire childhood? This is what I realized about myself.

The hobby must have unlimited potential to grow

I pole danced for a year and a half. It was very fun in the beginning, as with most hobbies, but there came a point where my body’s limitations started to show. My flexibility was nowhere near where it needed to be. It hurt to simply sit straight up with my legs spread out, my weight made me lean back because my inner hip is just not built for that.

The first time I climbed a pole Aug 2017. What an achievement!

I told myself that I have a growth mindset and that I could still do it. But even after stretching every day for a year straight, my flexibility improved, but barely to the “starting point” as most of the other…

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Tam Pham
Tam Pham

Written by Tam Pham

Writer, Bachata Dancer, Chess Expert. I write about my weird, unconventional life at TamPham.co

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