Everyone has a hobby. If you don't have one, you're either very young or very sad.

It's one of the most common conversation starters for children, teens, and adults alike, and there is a wide variety of answers. Commonly, you'll hear activities like drawing or some form of sportsball. These are easily relatable and finding others that partake in your hobby comes easy. There are rarer hobbies, such as origami or shooting trap, which fit a more specific niche of people. These "tier 2" hobbies are in no way inferior by any means, but for whatever reason finding people who understand these hobbies is a smidgen more difficult.

There are hobbies rarer still, like making art out of found materials and copper wire or, my choice of poison, woodworking.

I'm no master woodworker by any standard; I'm barely even considered good as it is. Regardless, I find what I do to be very satisfying. It started very recently, in the summer of 2016. A friend of mine showed me a prop sword she wanted to make, and me being the stubbornly cocky man I am, claimed that I could make a better one out of wood. She said I couldn't, and anyone who knows me can tell you that I am extremely prone to proving people wrong (or trying to, anyway.) The very same day I went into my garage, found some old plywood lying around and, with some brief power tool tutorial from my brother, began working. From there, my obsession with turning wood into pieces of art has grown. I've made numerous prop swords, furniture addons, animal models, functional weapons, and I have plenty more projects lined up, each more complex than the last. Even now, I'm designing an egg chair, the kind that sells on the market for hundreds of dollars. In my garage, the same luxury items would be no more than 50 dollars, time, and inspiration.

Sometimes I get lost in my work, hours passing by in the blink of an eye and the time between waking up and being called for dinner seemingly miniscule. I forget to eat sometimes but feels satisfied despite so. I find comfort in the rhythmic back-and-forth motion of the jigsaw, the delicate precision and control of the dremel, the wanton destruction of the router, and the unparalleled strength of the table saw. It feels like I'm saying hello to an old friend when I bring out the time-tested sander, or a manual planer and it's primitive but effective cousin, the file. Newcomers to the arsenal are welcomed into the fold, such as the bandsaw being put to the test by making once-impossible turns and curves. I go inside to take a break smelling of sawdust and oil, sitting on the floor to avoid leaving behind a Miguel-shaped imprint on the furniture. Applying stains and paints and finishes, seeing the whole project finished with the invaluable polyurethane, is a feeling comparable to going on a date with your significant other, or being at a concert with your best friends, the best orgasm of your life, finding money in your pockets, or your friend offering to buy you food when you forgot your wallet and are desperately hungry. Yes, these things are equal in magnitude. To a degree, I feel transcendant when woodworking, turning raw material into recognizable shapes much like a god shapes the earth. Of course I'm no god; behind all my confidence are strings of expletives, cut fingers, smashed hands, and failed attempts. Still, these failures and accidents are all steps to a final product that bring joy to people, even if that person happens to only be myself.

It's rare that I find myself happy nowadays. Declining mental health and an unstable mind bring me to the lowest of lows that I've experienced in my brief time alive. I've barely held myself together by drawing strength from the people around me and leaning on them for support, but I cannot do so forever. It's come time for me to pick myself up and repay all those who've had to hold my (ridiculously heavy) weight, and perhaps the first step to that is finding what I enjoy doing most.

Bringing this all to a point, I believe we all need to have a hobby, or something we're good at. Not because we need to be better than others, or the best in our field, but for these low moments. Those nights where you can't sleep because you berate yourself, or the days that drag on into infinity. We need a hobby not to prove ourselves to others, but to prove ourselves to ourselves. To remind us that, no matter how bad we get, we are still capable of great things.

I may be absolute trash with physics, look like a toasted marshmallow with hair, and get exhausted after running for two steps, but hell, I'm proud of me. Just a little bit.

You should be proud of yourself too.

Good job.