[perlgeek]

> Is there anything particularly "neuro divergent" about having a hobby?

No, but how obsessive the pursuit of that hobby is, that's the question.

There are some model train enthusiasts that, over their life time, spend several millions of EUR on their hobby, so they basically work to finance their hobby.

[_Algernon_]

There are plenty of people that travel a lot. Some would say they work to be able to travel. Would you consider those people obsessive in the pursuit of traveling?

The reason why I'm asking is that my impression seems to be that there is a lot more acceptance for obsession when the obsession is considered extroverted and conforming to society's expectation.

[perlgeek]

> Would you consider those people obsessive in the pursuit of traveling?

Could be, depending on how much they give up for traveling.

> The reason why I'm asking is that my impression seems to be that there is a lot more acceptance for obsession when the obsession is considered extroverted and conforming to society's expectation.

Maybe it's also related to the accumulation of things related to the hobby.

If you see somebody's collection of model trains and their tracks, it's pretty visceral that they must have spent lots of time and money on this. Same for basically any other hobby that involves collecting this (that aren't tiny, like postage stamps).

If, on the other hand, you hear that somebody has traveled a lot, that doesn't hit home to the same degree..

Maybe another factor is that we tend to associate at least some forms of neurodivergence (autism and AD(H)D at least) with hyperfocus on a few topics, whereas travel exposes one basically automatically to many new experiences. Haven't really thought that through yet...

[bluefirebrand]

> whereas travel exposes one basically automatically to many new experiences

Tons of people just travel to "destinations" that have resorts and beaches and are very sanitized to be completely not-new at all

Once you've been to one of these resorts you've been to all of them, it really doesn't matter which country they are in

[dkdbejwi383]

Isn’t that just normal life? I know that I, and almost everyone I know, only works to finance the things we actually enjoy.

[Cthulhu_]

I'll admit I don't know many people but nobody I know has that kind of expendable income. The "worst" case spends hundreds a year on merchandise / collectibles though.

[stavros]

I don't know why you're singling out model train enthusiasts. This describes many people I know, and an extremely large range of hobbies.

[sokoloff]

The "singling out" I read as because the topic of this article that we're discussing is model trains.

If this article was about $OTHER_HOBBY, there would be a citation of someone who spent a ton of money on $OTHER_HOBBY.

[matkoniecz]

> so they basically work to finance their hobby.

and what is wrong with that?

[perlgeek]

nothing, IMHO.

[nandomrumber]

Could be worse.

Could be working to barely scrape by, going to bed early to save on heating costs, unable to afford to save a deposit to buy a house, worry how you’ll afford the next dentist or mechanics bill.

Being able to afford a hobby is a luxury.

Welcome to Australia.