Are you interesting in starting up a new hobby? Maybe your life is feeling a little empty right now, or perhaps you have a lot of spare time. Remember, the idle mind is dementia’s biggest ally. If you want to ward off your brain aging, you need to stay active even during your downtime. Of course, I’m not suggesting that you try the same old boring hobbies that everyone partakes in at some point or another. Instead, let’s have a good at a few different things you’ve never tried and really should.

Pottery Making

Who hasn’t wanted to give this fun hobby ago? Get your turntable, purchase some clay and start molding it into pottery. This is nowhere as easy as it looks in the movies. It’s definitely not something that I would describe as sexy, but it can be fun and very rewarding. Particularly, when the final product is a beautiful, curved pot, made from your own hands. Just make sure you have put down plenty of newspaper because it does tend to go everywhere. Better yet, complete this hobby in the garden, the garage or just join a class.

Collecting

If you’re not in the mood for something messy, how about a hobby that will prime those eBay auctioning skills. If you love shopping on eBay and finding great deals, you might want to think about starting a collection. The benefit of this is that once your collection is complete, it can result in a large cash payout. Particularly, if you build up what you collected to an impressive level. Or, you complete a rare set of items. There are plenty of weird and wonderful things that you can collect. Some are more valuable than others with a touch more charm. For instance, have you ever wanted to be rich, holding trillions of dollars in your hand? Well, you can if you buy a Zimbabwe 100 trillion banknote. Inflation levels caused prices to skyrocket in Zimbabwe to the point where 100 trillion dollars could have bought you one loaf of bread. These notes are obsolete now, but they still hold value for collectors.

Start A Blog

Of course, you can always follow in my footsteps and start blogging. Blogging can be fun because it lets you be creative and share your thoughts. Blogging can also be quite therapeutic. Particularly, when it feels as though no one else is listening to you in life. You can write about whatever you like on your blog and no matter what the topic, you will find an audience. They’ll relate to your writing, your issues and you’ll be part of the community. For this reason, the hobby can be incredibly rewarding.

Photo Jogging

Now this is something that’s completely different and a great deal of fun. If you want to try this, you’ll need a camera or phone and a pair of running shoes. Got that? Okay, now all you need is to head out for a jog with your camera. When you see things that are interesting or different, take a snap. That could be a deer running through the forest or a couple sharing an intimate moment. Not all your pictures will be winners, but after a month you should have enough great snaps to fill an entire scrapbook.

Hand Fishing

A bit more adventurous this one but considerably more exhilarating than your typical arts and crafts. You can try fishing with your hands like they did in days of old. Or, you know, caveman times? In fact, even then I’m pretty sure they used spears so I’m not sure when we fished with our hands. The point is you can try it again right now. Fish are notoriously difficult to catch by hand. It takes a lot of skill and concentration. It’s considerably more effort than just throwing a line out into the water. Noodling is a particularly fun version of this where you try to land a catfish by sticking your arm down its throat. Not exactly what I’d call safe but certainly unique. Catfish, incidentally make a delicious seafood meal if you know how to cook them just right.

Sky Diving

Ending on a high note, literally, let’s think about skydiving. Skydiving might be a tad expensive for some and terrifying for others. That said, it’s no more dangerous than knitting. If knitting involved threading a stitch, falling through the air at breakneck speed, of course. Yes, Skydiving is dangerous, but it’s also tremendous fun. There’s nothing quite like it, and even if it doesn’t become a full hobby, you should try it at least once.