Hobby! An activity that a person does during his/her leisure time, but the definition of a hobby cannot be limited to just an act of amusement or just a time killer; instead hobbies are necessary for the all-round development of an individual, they are also helpful in developing a particular set of skills apart from academics.
Intro to hobby
Writing is one such hobby which helps a person not only in a professional point of view but also in day-to-day life. It enhances one’s creativity, vocabulary, helps in critical thinking and much more. If one adopts writing as a hobby from a young age, it could rapidly evolve and open many career options for him/her. In addition to all of the other benefits, if a person is keen in writing, they are bound to excel in various competitions that allow an individual to strengthen his job resume if he wishes to get a job that requires the related skills.
Advantages
Apart from many pros of this hobby earlier mentioned, it has several advantages that make it quite special as well as beneficial.
Flexible Career life:
Writing hobby offers a flexible professional life. One can pursue this hobby as their passion or as their side career meaning that an individual has the freedom of choosing whether to follow their dream as a full time career where one can get professionally qualified to get a job as a young author or they can pursue writing as a side career alongside their main qualified career.
Skill development:
There are many skills that develop as a person becomes more and more familiar with writing. Writing trains a person to cope with deadlines, set goals and develop the ability to focus and continue a task even when one does not wishes to continue. Alongside this, an individual engaged in writing as his hobby would definitely develop two sets of basic yet crucial skills, Creativity and tactical thinking, meaning anyone who is keen in writing is sure to have some decent skills including these ones.
Keeping aside the above mentioned abilities… Individuals also develop communication skills as they get familiar with expressing thoughts and ideas through a medium that’s so widely known and as one thing leads to another, good communication skills can be closely linked to greater vocabulary and logical reasoning behind expression of thoughts as writing includes expression of thoughts but with a logical reasoning that shows that your ideas, suggestion or arguments are based on facts and stand on a strong ground.
Investment:
If we see the investment that one has to do in this hobby, the scenario is quite different from many other hobbies, wherein individuals with more monetary investment excel. From a perspective it may seem right but if you see the other side of the coin one may witness the injustice with those who have better skills but not enough resources to invest in their hobby but writing is quite opposite. The monetary investment required for this hobby is way less as compared to most hobbies; instead it demands efforts and time that an individual has to put in. Time and efforts are the two major things that help a person to excel in this hobby, which makes these highly interdependent.
Career options
If an individual excels in his hobby as writing, in such a way that it evolves as passion, it can open many promising opportunities for him. For instance-Many individuals opt for creative writing as their stream for graduation, this is great for a person who wants to showcase his talent as an accomplished author and that’s just one part of a bigger picture. An individual with creative writing degree can also go for journalism, Advertising copywriter, Digital copywriter, SEO Executive and many more as career options. The best part of this hobby, as I mentioned before, is the fact that it gives an individual the opportunity to showcase their talent without a formal degree related to writing, the best example to support this statement is the famous author, Arthur Conan Doyle who was a Medical Doctor but is well known through his famed fictional detective character, Sherlock Holmes.
Education
If one is keen in his hobby as writing and wants to pursue it as their career, they may go for the prescribed education depending upon the nature of his career and professional life. It is totally depended upon a person whether they want to opt for writing and related fields as their full time career or not. For writing as a full time career, a bachelor’s degree is typically required, for in a career like this skills are important as well as required. Many employers prefer candidates with degree in English, journalism, or communications. Individuals can also go for creative writing degree where students would be educated about basic elements of fiction, as well as the importance of character, scene and plot, this opens various career opportunities such as fiction writer, blogger, screenwriter and more.
Institutions:
As of today, one can find numerous fine institutions that offer courses of creative writing, journalism etc… A few examples of such institutions are-
- Khalsa College, Amritsar- Creative Writing Degree.
- Nirmal Haloi College, Barpeta- Creative Writing Degree.
- Madras Christian College, Chennai- A English.
- Presidency University, Kolkata- A English.
- Vivekananda Institute of Professional Studies- Bachelor of Journalism.
And these are few of many fine establishments. Nowadays many state-run and private universities offer courses for the above mentioned degrees so that individuals with excellent skills get education at a nominal cost.
So, after getting a heavy dose of inspiration and pumped-up with passion about something that everyone did for their entire life but never adopted as a practice that would have benefitted them by enabling them to explore and develop their own hidden selves, is it enough to start?
As anyone who reads this and thinks of the numerous benefits they may obtain, it is just not enough. When we see accomplished writers, famous journalists or in brief, personalities who have paved the road to their success in writing related fields; we just see the success but not the hardwork or the failures behind it. Thus, writing whether it’s in the form of a hobby or a skill that makes you stand out of the crowd, the only thing one needs to remember is to learn from the failures and also the successes because ultimately, the last thing that would really matter would be the will of going on irrespective of any setback that one faces, the real test of one’s endurance.
