All year, I’ve tried to find a new hobby. One major problem is crushing my efforts

4 days ago 10

What do you enjoy doing in your spare time? Do you have a hobby? While it wasn’t a New Year’s resolution per se, I decided at the start of the year to launch a dedicated mission to find myself a hobby. An activity that I could do regularly, on weekends or in my spare time, one that was distinct from work, would also bring me joy, and make me sound a bit more interesting in the process.

While some people can rattle off several pastimes with which they fill their weekends, I’ve never been able to respond with a hobby that I truly enjoy.

Even a relatively cheap hobby like swimming will set you back.

But I decided this needed to change. More fuel to my fire was the proven benefits of hobbies: for a person’s mental health, including finding purpose and reducing stress.

However, nearly six months into the year and despite my efforts, I am still hobby-less. And it all comes down to one unexpected, yet critical issue: I simply can’t afford one.

My earnings, $1975.80 per week, are about average according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. But, due to the increase in living costs, which rose from 2.4 per cent in March 2024 to 3.5 per cent by March 2025, there’s virtually nothing left over by the time my bills and living expenses are covered.

And this is one of the fundamental issues with trying to find a hobby in 2025: even those you’d assume to be affordable aren’t actually all that cheap.

According to an April survey by Statista, one of the most popular hobbies among Australians is cooking and baking – an option, I thought, that would be much more affordable than more obviously expensive choices like cycling, golf, pottery classes or photography.

However, after researching introductory online cooking classes, I quickly realised that it isn’t as modest as I thought. Classes start about $100 and reach into the mid-hundreds. Even if I tried to learn for free via YouTube, equipment and ingredients quickly add up. While a basic benchtop mixer from KMart will only set you back a $79, the oh-so-Instagrammable KitchenAid model is $499, for example.

What about getting into sports? Even two tickets to the AFL will set you back around $80, and that’s before you factor in food, drinks and transport. For something like swimming you need to shell out $80 (at least) for a decent swimsuit, $25 for goggles, $20 for a swimming cap, and about $7 for pool entry every time you head out. Then, if you like it and want to go further, flippers are $40, a kickboard is $35, and a pool buoy is $25. Even walking the dog isn’t free. Have you seen the price of pet insurance these days?

Arts-related hobbies like going to the movies, theatre and comedy shows are also on the decline for similar reasons. According to August 2024 research from price comparison site Finder, more than half of Australians (53 per cent) have hit pause on engaging in these kinds of hobbies in a bid to cut costs.

“Cost-of-living pressures are definitely impacting the pastimes Australians are choosing, and how much they spend on them,” Angus Kidman, a money expert at Finder, tells me. “With disposable incomes declining, many are prioritising essential expenses, which means hobbies take a back seat.”

As journalist Tyler Austin Harper noted in The Atlantic, this kind of “hobby inflation” has seen once affordable pastimes, such as his love of clay shooting, become totally unaffordable in an already unaffordable world. “In the past decade and a half … the cost of a sporting-clays habit has more than doubled in many places, far outpacing regular inflation.”

While not being able to undertake a hobby might seem like a small thing to some people, the absence of them can have serious impacts.

“When hobbies become unaffordable, people often lose a key outlet for managing stress and feeling good. That can lead to increased frustration, low mood, or a sense of disconnection, especially if the hobby was part of their identity or support system,” clinical psychologist Dr Rebecca Ray says.

So for now at least, my 2025 hobby is … well, searching for an affordable hobby.

Shona Hendley is a freelance writer living in Victoria.

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