The lost art of doing things for pleasure

Whatever happened to hobbies?

A dictionary definition of the word 'hobby' is: 'an activity that you do for pleasure when you are not working.

Hobbies aren’t about productivity, profit, or sharing with a growing list of followers online. I’m not saying these are things to be avoided - just that they’ve crept into spaces that used to be reserved for doing things purely for fun.

That definition feels unrelatable to many of us today, like something from another era, when people took pride in building model trains or collecting stamps, rather than building online followings, collecting dopamine hits and finding ways to monetise everything.

Finding a new hobby

I’ve just returned to the UK after eight months driving around Europe with my husband, our elderly dog, and an even older car. Now that I’m no longer spending my free time wandering new city streets, relaxing in a record number of coffee shops, or spending hours on end on Airbnb, I’ve suddenly got a bit of time to fill. I’m thinking it might be nice not to fill it with more work.

I do like my work - in fact, I’m one of those people who can say they’ve turned their hobby into a job. So, if writing can’t be classed as a hobby anymore, I guess it means I need to find a new one.

Figuring out what I’d actually like to do - that’s the question.

I know a few people who live for their hobbies and try all sorts. But if I’m being honest, most people I know don’t do much more than work and family life.

Where did hobbies go?

As a kid, I’d find the most fun thing possible and do it over and over, usually until I was interrupted by incredibly mundane things like homework or dinner. For me, it was rollerblading, running, dancing, playing guitar… I even considered myself a borderline professional tree-climber, but I think I just about managed to stay in hobby territory.

But somewhere along the way, we stopped doing things just for the sake of it. People report feeling “too busy” to take on or continue a hobby, yet we somehow find hours for scrolling and binge-watching. Johann Hari, in Stolen Focus, argues that it’s not just time that’s been stolen from us, it’s our attention span. Hobbies require attention.

Not so long ago, in some parts of society, hobbies were encouraged by families, schools, and communities, and even proudly listed on CVs (“Enjoys amateur dramatics and hillwalking”). Back in the 1990s and early 2000s, it wasn’t unusual to pop a few hobbies on your CV or cover letter just to show you were an interesting human. These days, it’s a bit trickier. Listing “watching Netflix” or “keeping up with TikTok trends” doesn’t exactly scream “hire me!” - and perhaps being ‘the perfect fit’ has become more important than being interesting.

The history of hobbies - a tale as old as time

I’ll keep this extremely brief because, as they say, I could write a book on this. 

Some of the earliest known hobbies date back centuries - numismatics, for example, the collecting and study of coins and currency, has been around since at least the 7th century.

Hunting, on the other hand, began as survival for those who couldn’t find enough berries, but eventually became a weekend pursuit involving dogs, horses, and questionable hats and morals.

For most of history, though, the freedom to ‘do something just for the sake of it’ was a privilege reserved for the wealthy. If you were working dawn to dusk in a field or a factory, you weren’t exactly popping out to your embroidery circle or pressing flowers for fun. Leisure time, and what you did with it, was very much tied to your place in society.

But here’s where it gets interesting: many of the skills people once relied on to make ends meet - pottery, weaving, blacksmithing, candle making - have now made their way back into our lives as hobbies. Entire YouTube channels are devoted to making soap and candles. Instagram has brought back crocheting. Even sourdough baking had its moment of fame during the pandemic.

In a strange way, it has come full circle: the things we had to do are now things we choose to do, (that’s if we do choose to take up a hobby) not because they’re useful, but because they’re enjoyable. 

Why hobbies matter

If I’m going to write a whole piece about hobbies, you’d better believe I checked whether they actually matter. And they really do!

But then, the next question is: Who has time for hobbies?

Well, all of us, if we choose to. (Yes, I know…easier said than done, but we choose everything we do.) And there are some mighty fine reasons to make time for hobbies.

It’s easy to dismiss them as frivolous, a luxury reserved for the time-rich. But the truth is, hobbies give so much more to our lives than they could ever take. And if you're wondering whether they truly matter, the research (and real life) says they absolutely do.

Here’s why hobbies matter:

1. They’re good for your brain
Hobbies that challenge us mentally, like learning a language, playing an instrument, or identifying different smells, stimulate neuroplasticity: the brain’s ability to grow and adapt. One study published in Psychological Science found that older adults who took up new, demanding skills showed significant improvements in memory, compared to those who stuck to more passive activities. You’re not just keeping busy; you’re literally building a better brain, which is likely to lead to a better quality of life.

2. They reduce stress and boost wellbeing
A study in Nature Medicine, involving 93,000 people across multiple countries, found that those who regularly engaged in hobbies had better overall health, higher life satisfaction, and fewer symptoms of depression.

Another study in the MDPI Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health found that hobbies can counteract the mental toll of long working hours. It’s not just a nice break - it’s protective.

3. They give your mind somewhere else to go
Creative hobbies offer what psychologists call cognitive distraction. That’s a good thing. When we’re engaged in something hands-on like knitting, painting, woodworking or perfume making, we get relief from rumination. A mental holiday, without the airport queues.

4. They help you enter a flow state
That blissful sense of being so absorbed in something that you forget to check your phone? That’s flow. It’s been linked to reduced anxiety, higher creativity, and deeper satisfaction.

As Cal Newport explains in his book Deep Work, modern life gives us fewer and fewer chances to concentrate deeply. Certain hobbies let us practise focus. and enjoy it.

5. They strengthen your sense of self
There’s often a confidence and newfound self-worth that comes from getting better at something, especially when you do it purely for your own pleasure. No boss, no pressure. Just you, improving at something because you want to.

6. They reconnect us to culture and tradition
Hobbies often come with a backstory. Pottery, dance, music, calligraphy, weaving - many creative pastimes originate from cultural or historical roots. A new hobby can be a way to connect with your own heritage or respectfully explore someone else’s.

7. They make life more interesting (and social)
Having hobbies makes you a more interesting person to talk to. It also gives you more places to meet people. You might even find yourself talking to a stranger without mentioning the weather.

8. They bring you joy
Let’s not forget the obvious: some hobbies are just plain fun. They spark curiosity, feed enthusiasm, or let you make something with your hands. You finish, look at what you made, and think - well, that was a good way to spend an hour or three.

And when you’re doing something for no other reason than the fun of it, it gives you the freedom to choose anything, even extreme ironing, for instance. Yes, it’s a thing.

The decline of hobbies: why are we doing less for fun?

If hobbies are so good for us, mentally, physically, emotionally, and even socially, why aren’t more of us doing them?

Are we too busy, distracted, or even self-conscious to do things just for the joy of it?

Well, it’s complicated. But here are some very 21st-century reasons why “fun for fun’s sake” seems to have fallen out of fashion.

1. The allure of the screen

We don’t have to ‘work’ for pleasure. The temptation of effortless, endless consumption is often irresistible. In the UK, the average adult spends a staggering chunk of their day staring at screens - whether it’s work, social media, or TV, it’s almost always something that doesn’t require us to lift a finger creatively.

Our entertainment has become frighteningly convenient, ultra-optimised, and designed to keep us hooked. In the past, you had to watch whatever was showing, and usually what whoever got the remote first decided. Now, every person in a household can sink their teeth into their own curated stream of Netflix, YouTube, TikTok or podcasts.

Why spend three hours at a watercolour painting class when Netflix is whispering, “Come on, watch me, you deserve it,” asking nothing in return but that we sit back and relax?

And while there’s nothing wrong with relaxing in front of a screen every now and then, it means there’s far less chance we’ll reach for a paintbrush or a puzzle. We don’t get bored enough to go looking for new ways to play.

2. We’ve replaced doing with watching others do

We live vicariously now. With so much access to the lives of those we follow online, we can feel deeply involved in someone else’s hobby without ever picking it up ourselves. We learn the terminology. We follow their progress. We might even convince ourselves we could do it if we wanted to - and that we will soon, but we never quite get around to starting.

It’s oddly satisfying to be close to other people’s creativity. But watching isn’t the same as doing, and we miss out on most of the real benefits when we don’t take part ourselves.

3. We equate productivity with worth

We’ve absorbed the idea that everything we actually do, or put any effort into, should lead to something - a side hustle, a new income stream or at least a well-lit Instagram post. 

It’s not enough to bake a cake so you can eat a cake. Now it needs to be frosted for Instagram, and then come the comments, of “wow that looks so good, I bet you could sell them”. 

If you’re quite entrepreneurial-minded (guilty), that instinct is hard to shut off. But not everything needs to be monetised. Some things are allowed to be pointless, joyful, and gloriously unproductive.

As Jenny Odell puts it in How to Do Nothing, we’ve lost the ability to simply be - to enjoy experiences without needing to make them into something more.

4. We’re scared of being bad at things

This one is both sad and worrying in equal measures. Social media has made it easy to see professionals and prodigies in every field. So when we try something new - and we’re not immediately brilliant - it’s tempting to give up.

We’ve forgotten what it feels like to be a beginner and to improve slowly. To enjoy something even if we’re not exceptional at it and might never be.

5. We don’t get bored anymore

This one sounds strange, but boredom has historically been a powerful motivator for creativity. When our minds wander, we start to imagine, invent, tinker, and try new things. These days, the moment boredom creeps in, we squash it with a swipe. The second we feel a lull, we pull out our phones… ta-da: entertained for hours. But if we let ourselves get a little bored, we might just rediscover the urge to make something.

6. What’s my age again?

What age group are hobbies for?

Yes, I know the answer is any age, but when I was younger, I’m not sure it felt that way.

As a teenager, doing anything that looked like trying too hard came with a high risk of ridicule. And for many adults, it’s not until the kids are grown and life slows down that it feels socially acceptable to join a book club or a walking group.

It’s nonsense, of course. Hobbies are for everyone, at every age. But doing what your peers aren’t doing? That’s not easy for most of us.

7. Hobbies used to be social glue

Hobbies have the power to bring people together. But these days, our social time often happens online. This has opened up new opportunities, especially for those who genuinely find socialising in person difficult, which is great. Online communities have helped build connections that were never possible before, and there is huge value in that, but they are not a complete replacement for getting out and doing something. To many, it’s made real-world connections feel like a bit more effort than their worth.

A short revival: when hobbies made a comeback

Hobbies did have a moment.

During the early days of the pandemic, many of us found ourselves with something we hadn’t had in years: time. Suddenly, sourdough loaves were rising in ovens, jigsaws were selling out, and online courses in everything from embroidery to graphic design exploded in popularity.

People weren’t just filling time, they were trying new things, sometimes for the first time in years.

It was a reminder that when life slows down, the impulse to create and tinker and learn doesn’t vanish - it reappears. We just don’t usually give it the chance.

What we lose when we lose our hobbies

• Creativity: We start to think of creativity as something only professionals do, not something we all have access to.

• Satisfaction: We lose a sense of satisfaction, or outsource it to productivity or success metrics. The pride of making or doing something just for yourself disappears.

• Community: Shared interests used to be how people made friends. Ceramics classes, choirs, game nights. Without hobbies, we lose one of the easiest ways to connect with others offline.

• Resilience: Hobbies teach patience, problem-solving, and perseverance. You get better by doing, failing, and redoing. No big stakes, just the slow build of belief.

• Identity: When we stop doing things we love, we can lose sight of who we are outside of work and responsibility. Hobbies remind us of the many versions of ourselves that still exist.

• Joy: Perhaps most importantly, hobbies are a source of joy not tied to achievement. Just for the fun of it.

Let hobbies join the self-care revolution

Self-care has recently become something we feel pretty good speaking about. We’ve embraced meditation apps, cold plunges, face masks and journaling prompts - but what about making music? Speaking a new language? Or starting a new sport?

If self-care is about doing something that nourishes and supports you, hobbies deserve a seat at the table.

Perfume as a hobby

In my search for a new hobby on my return to the UK, there’s no doubt perfumery came to mind - how could it not, when all things scent-related have been taking up a generous chunk of brain space since I started writing for Sarah back in November?

Perfume making feels like an ideal hobby. It’s creative, you can do it alone or with others, it’s good for your brain, there’s a whole world of knowledge and history to explore, and it’s something you can keep getting better at - if you stick with it.

And of course, there’s the satisfaction of making something with your own hands (and nose). Whether you're scientific, artistic, or somewhere in between, perfumery gives you the space to play, experiment, and surprise yourself.

And like any good hobby, it doesn’t ask you to be perfect. It asks you to bring your own personality.

If you’re curious, Sarah, founder of 4160Tuesdays and Scenthusiasm, is a wonderful perfumery teacher, and there are a few different ways to learn with her:

• Live workshops at our Hammersmith studio in London - hands-on, experimental, and a brilliant first step into the world of artisan perfumery.

• The online Scenthusiasm course – a complete, self-paced introduction to perfumery. If this is a brand-new hobby for you, you can even order the materials collection to get everything you need.

• Join us on Patreon at Scenthusiasm – with monthly challenges, perfumery chats, and a friendly community of scent fanatics who are more than happy to talk about perfume making for hours.

“I have long championed the delights of the hobby. In fact I run courses that often discourage people from giving up their jobs and doing perfumery instead. 

I often wish I'd kept up writing as a career and had perfumery as something to do in my spare time. When people say, "You're following your dream!" I have to tell them that I'm really not. If I were, I'd still be playing baritone sax professionally.

Making perfume is my job now and for that reason it comes with different pressures, including stacks of admin and the constant requirement to remind people that 4160Tuesdays exists.

If one of my students makes a lovely fragrance they get encouraged by friends and family to make it into a business, but running a small business isn't for everyone. There is no off switch.

Then there's that awful term, the "side hustle". This is when you already have a job, then you double the pressure on yourself to take a second one. This is the opposite of the escape that a hobby offers you.

There is an attraction in recognition - whether it's from sales, awards or reviews - but there's a lot to be said for the secret satisfaction of just doing something for yourself.

If you want to learn how to make perfume I will happily help, and I'll also encourage you not to take it too seriously.” - Sarah McCartney – Perfumer, founder and teacher at 4160Tuesdays and Scenthusiasm.

Whether you’re looking to pick up a new hobby, rekindle an old curiosity, or simply make something that smells beautiful, I might be biased - but I think perfumery is a very good place to begin.

Stop consuming, start doing

I didn’t set out researching and writing this piece to convince you - or myself - that we all must have hobbies. I just found myself with some free time and wanted to fill it with something fun.

But now? There’s simply no argument in my mind. I’m convinced and inspired. Tonight I’m trying a new dance class, and on Wednesday I’m joining a writing group (exploring different styles, so I think I can still count it as a new hobby).

Maybe our CVs won’t be filled with long lists of hobbies any time soon. But we can choose to carve out space for things that bring us pleasure, challenge us, and remind us who we are outside of our jobs and screens.

So go on - pick up the paintbrush. The ukulele. The pipette.

Whatever it is, do it for the pleasure of doing it. That’s enough.

Sinead & Team Tuesdays

New kids on the block - our latest scents

There’s often a lot going on around here, and sometimes it’s hard to keep up with it all. That’s perfectly fine – there’s no need to. Drop in and out of the 4160Tuesdays world whenever it suits you.

However, we’d hate for you to miss one of our new scents that might just be the one ‘made for you’. So here’s a quick update on our latest releases:

No Mow May

Our latest green floral amber. Perfect for a wildflower-filled May.

In the UK, during May, everyone is encouraged to let wildflowers grow to feed new generations of wildlife. Flowers feed the insects, which feed the birds.

“It’s so beautiful - fresh, bright, summery and restful. Everything I needed on a cold and chore-filled January day.” - Lisa Hitchin

Ginger Snap

Need I say any more? Probably not, but I’m going to, because how can I not talk about this irresistible scent? This is ginger being its best self: warm, spicy, shiny and cheerful, blended with supportive tonka absolute, cinnamon leaf and smooth amber woods.

Created for Scenthusiasm’s spice month, Sarah managed to get ginger to behave – behave very well, in fact.

“This blend is so pretty!!! The Ginger with Tonka Abs is quite magical :) ” - Kareema

Figs in White Chocolate

Green tea, figs and white chocolate, with the added scent of a creamy woods accord, orris and peaches.

While experimenting with the green tea materials, Sarah came up with this, and the team decided that this was the aroma, and so it was named. 

“Figs in white chocolate, what a lovely not too sweet sort-of gourmand. This fragrance captures the ambivalence of figs, sweet fruitiness and a hint of vegetal bitterness, and cushions them in the equally delicate cloud of white chocolate.” - Sylvia Glanville-Hughes

Tempest Rose

A celebration of the best, most confident and powerful version of you, in a bottle. Sparkling aldehydes and citrus fruits, rich roses, jasmine and iris.

A collaboration scent, Sarah teamed up with Tempest Rose of House of Burlesque to create a burlesque dancer in a bottle.

“Tempest Rose is unsurprisingly delightful and beautiful” - Eric Riviello

London Linden

A beautifully fresh white honey linden blossom fragrance balanced with lilac and elderflower.

Inspired by the lovely linden trees in London in late spring. Created using natural extracts brought back from Sarah’s last trip to Bulgaria.

“It's a heavenly summer waft, makes me want to waggle dance like a bee.” - Emily Rose Mackay

That’s it for the latest additions to the 4160Tuesdays scent wardrobe.

But there are a few more new arrivals just around the corner, so keep an eye out for part two – coming very soon.

All the best, 

Sinead & Team Tuesdays

Parfum Le Dance X 4160Tuesdays

There’s a new place to find a selection of 4160Tuesdays’ fragrances, and it’s a rather good one. Parfum Le Dance has just opened a beautiful boutique in Richmond, London, and it’s not your typical perfume shop. No overwhelming walls of designer bottles, no fluorescent-lit department store chaos - just a carefully chosen collection of scents that actually mean something.

Derya Turkan, the founder of Parfum Le Dance, started with an online store, but it seems the world of perfumery kept pulling her in. On March 15th, she took the next step and opened a physical boutique.

She describes Parfum Le Dance as the destination for the art of niche perfumery, which sounds about right. Every fragrance in the shop is there for a reason - not because of a flashy campaign, but because of the way it’s made, the way it smells, and the story it tells.

Our fragrances feel at home there. If you’re in Richmond and fancy a sniff, you’ll find:

The Sexiest Scent on the Planet. Ever (IMHO)

A soft bergamot, white woods, amber, and vanilla scent. After the first waft of lemon meringue pie-like lickability, it has very low sillage, on purpose. You have to get up close to smell it. This is a good thing.

Hammersmith Tea And Biscuits

Imagine wholemeal lemon and ginger biscuits, with toasted hazelnuts and black tea, with oat milk. That’s this. This fragrance was created to symbolise the British way of making friends and getting through a crisis.

Salt Rose

A fragrance inspired by the meeting of fresh water and salt water, where strong-spirited wild roses grow among crushed shells and driftwood.

London 1969

London 1969 is a fragrance that captures the feeling of the city in the Summer of Love. Made using only materials which were available at the time, to create a fragrance that could have existed then. A true unisex citrus.

Sonnet No 1

Fragrant flowers from Shakespeare. To rose - both absolute and essential oil - lavender, beeswax, narcissus and hay absolutes were added. The aromas of lily and violet floating on a bed of white musks. 

A Flame in Your Heart

If all you want is to smell totally gorgeous, this is the amber you need. Magnolia and rose, kumquat and cocoa, pink pepper and tonka harmonising over an inviting quartet of sultry balsams: labdanum, benzoin, styrax and cistus. Irresistible.

Warm Sands Blue Ocean

Suntan lotion, sea air, vanilla, soft woods, white flowers, musk, salt water. An escape to a warm sandy beach, somewhere you can swim in the sea and emerge to dry off in the sunshine: the Mediterranean or the Indian Ocean perhaps.

Tempest Rose

A celebration of confidence, empowerment, and pure entertainment, captured and bottled. The complete burlesque dancer: a sparkling opening act of aldehydes and citrus fruits, beguiled with rich roses, jasmine and iris, revealing musky warm skin.

If you find yourself in Richmond and like your perfume with a bit of personality, Parfum Le Dance is worth a visit.

Visit Parfum Le Dance

Visit 4160Tuesdays’ Shop

 

Want to be a perfumer? It’s more than just playing with pipettes.

In a recent video we shared on YouTube, Sarah and Arthur talked about a few things related to the early days of setting up a perfume business. Their discussion eventually led to the age-old question: What is success?

Sarah and Arthur may have had slightly different answers – and isn’t that the point? Success looks different for everyone.

In this video, they also touched on how starting your own perfume business is about much more than sitting around dreaming up wonderful scents, unfortunately. Because for creative folk, that’s the best bit. It’s what most would happily give every minute of the day to, if they could.

But that’s simply not the reality. Running a creative business is never just about the art.

This isn’t to put you off. You will have time for creating, crafting, making, and mixing. But you’ll need to fit some other tasks around it too.

What’s involved in running a perfume business?

At the start, you’ll need to wear three hats. Big sombrero-sized hats.

• The visionary hat – the person who can see the big picture and has ideas coming out their ears.
• The creator hat – ideas are all good and well, but do they work? Can they be created?
• The organiser hat – you don’t just make a few bottles of perfume and have a business. There’s a lot to be done.

You’ll need to understand ingredients and the regulations around them, work closely with suppliers and stockists, and keep your customers happy. Then there’s handling orders, packing them nicely, and making sure they’re shipped on time. Add in marketing, customer service, and all the other things that crop up, and your days will be chockablock!

Perfumery as a hobby, side hustle, or full-time career?

The question you – and anyone else having a little look around – need to ask is:

Should it be a hobby, a side hustle, or a full-time career?

Sarah and Arthur briefly (very briefly) covered some of the things involved in running a perfumery business. If you still can’t shake the idea, and you’re sure you want to spend all your working hours in the world of perfume, it can be done. Sarah’s doing it. But it takes work to build a business you can commit to full-time and still make a comfortable living.

On the other hand, if legal stuff, accounts, admin and marketing make you feel a little queasy, perhaps the best way to enjoy the beauty of scent is by keeping it as a hobby.

We should all enjoy hobbies — not everything needs to be all or nothing. Doing a thing simply for the joy of it is rather nice, and not enough of us do that lately. Why not just make perfumery the thing you do for the fun of it?

If you’re still on the fence, looking for more answers, or sure of what you want but need some guidance to get there, the Scenthusiasm community is the place for you.

Scenthusiasm is a community Sarah created on Patreon for anyone who wants to learn more about perfume-making, and at the top tier, you can learn about running a perfume business. There are different monthly themes with assignments, Zoom Q&A sessions, and regular posts on anything and everything relating to perfume. 

If you think Scenthusiasm might just be what you're looking for, you can take a look here. 

Sarah has also created a self-paced course with all the information you need to start making perfume: a recommended materials list, explainer films on using your equipment and materials, and an in-depth look at 12 popular scent styles - Scenthusiasm School. 

Take a look at the film to see where their discussion went and find out how soap can even be a sign that you’ve reached the pinnacle of success: Success? A Scenthusiasm strategy chat.

Changing into home fragrances

In the world of indie and niche perfumery, it goes without saying that scent is deeply personal; it means different things to different people at different times. What one person wears for a big night out on the town might be what someone else spritzes on for a quick drink ‘round the local. That’s the beauty of it.

And with niche perfume, things can get pretty extreme - one person’s all-time favourite, the scent they couldn’t live without, might be the very same one that someone else can’t bear to be in the same room as.

What’s the scent you change into? 

But what I’ve been thinking about lately is this: what’s the scent you change into when you get home and want to wind down for the evening?

Maybe your daytime perfume has faded, so you spray something fresh the moment you walk through the door. Or maybe you wait until after you’ve washed off the day, changed into your comfies, and then spritz it on.

Give it a try, it’s rather nice

If this all sounds a bit mad to you - if you think perfume is only for going out, or even just for special occasions, you’re not alone. Up until recently, I wouldn’t have thought of wearing fragrance just to settle down on the sofa. But with the right scent, it turns out to be a rather nice thing to do.

And if you’re one of those people who has never tried it, I should probably let you know - people have been doing this for a long time. Just like how, the second I walk through the door, I have to get out of my jeans (they’re perfectly fine for the outside world, but the moment I’m home, they feel far too formal), there are people who feel exactly the same about their perfume. They can’t properly relax until they’ve had a little spritz of their home scent.

So, do you have a home scent? Do you spray it on as soon as you walk in, or wait until you’re showered and in comfy clothes? And if you do, what’s your go-to? Or do you switch it up, depending on the season or your mood?

For anyone who’s never thought of this before but suddenly quite likes the idea, a great place to start is 4160Tuesdays’ Fairy Queen - a soft, powdery floral celebrating the queen in all of us. Or, if you want something comforting and fresh, there’s also 4160Tuesdays Freshly Laundered, which smells exactly like clean laundry dried by a summer breeze in a cottage garden.

You can find them here:
Fairy Queen
Freshly Laundered

Take care, 

Sinead & the 4160Tuesdays Team