E66: Can Your Hobby Be Your Job?

Show Notes

• Jemima the Asparagus Throwing Psychic
• Dog Yogurt
• DIY Miniature Houses

Questions for Reflection

Each episode we offer you a few prompts to think about how that day's conversation applies to you. Our supporters over at Buy Me a Coffee now have exclusive access to the PDF versions of all our Questions for Reflection. Join us today! 
 

1. Do you have a hobby? What is it?
2. Were you brought up with the notion that your job is something that isn't fun that you do for pay and your hobby is something you do for fun? How did that impact your life decisions?
3. Have you changed your ideas about work and hobbies? What prompted the change?
4. What hobby would you like to make your job? What's stopping you?

Transcript

Beth Demme (00:03):
Welcome to the Discovering Our Scars Podcast.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (00:05):
Where we have honest conversations about things that make us different. I'm Steph.
 
Beth Demme (00:09):
I'm Beth.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (00:10):
I've been in recovery for 14 years and I am the author of Discovering My Scars, my memoir about my mental health struggles, experiences and faith.
 
Beth Demme (00:17):
I'm a lawyer turned pastor who's all about self-awareness and emotional health because I know what it's like to have neither of those things.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (00:23):
Beth and I have been friends for years, have gone through a recovery program together. When I wanted to start a podcast, she was the only name that came to mind as cohost.
 
Beth Demme (00:31):
I didn't hesitate to say yes because I've learned a lot from honest conversations with Steph over the years.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (00:36):
We value honest conversations and we hope you do too.
 
Beth Demme (00:38):
That's why we do this and why we want you to be part of what we're discussing today. On today's show, we're going to have an honest conversation titled, "Can Your Hobby Be Your Job?"
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (00:48):
Then we'll share a slice of life and the show will close with questions for reflection where we invite you to reflect on the conversation in your own life. Beth, I think we should start by defining where this came from, this terminology. I actually talk about this in my book. There's a chapter on this specific question, I guess you could say. This was actually a question that was presented to me when I was in high school. I took this externship class where we got to work with someone a couple hours a day in a profession that we wanted to be in. I worked for a production company. I remember specifically one day the owner of the company, which was a company of three people, by the way. It's Tallahassee. He sat me down and he said, so what do you want to do? What do you want to do with your life?
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (01:36):
I was like, well, I want to make videos. I love making videos. He's like, awesome, great. He said, that's what you want to do for your job. What's your hobby? I was like, oh, well, making videos is my hobby. I love making videos. He said, no, your hobby can't be your job. He's like, what's your hobby? I was like, I don't know. I love making videos. Well, if you're going to get paid for it, that can't be your hobby. For a very, very long time this question swirled in my head like, what's my hobby? I must have a hobby. I can't get paid to do video if I don't have a hobby, like this was the thing that my brain couldn't comprehend is job, hobby. Two separate things, can't be the same. I must have a separate one. In my mind, I was like, well, what's a hobby? Okay, hobby is like building model airplanes or collecting coins or-
 
Beth Demme (02:31):
Building trains.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (02:32):
Building trains, stuff that I was like, I don't want to do. Literally, I remember thinking through all the things that I've seen at hobby stores and was like, "I don't want to commit time to those things. I like making videos." Why do I need a hobby? It wasn't until I was significantly older that I was like, no, I'm not going to let this guy tell me that I can't have a hobby that I'm also getting paid for. For me, my hobby, I love making videos. I do get paid to make videos in my profession, but I also make videos for fun that I don't get paid for.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (03:12):
I do think your hobby, something you love and are passionate about, you can get paid for and you could get not paid for it. It could be one and the same. I think what he was getting at but said in a really clunky way was, what do you do to decompress from your everyday work, I think is maybe what he's trying to say, which I have only recently been able to kind of understand that's probably what his point was. By the way, don't say things like this to young kids, because it's too confusing. It really sat with me like very confusing for a really long time.
 
Beth Demme (03:48):
I knew we were going to have this conversation on the podcast today so I actually had a pre-conversation about it with my husband, because for a long time he searched for a hobby. He had that same kind of feeling that he needed a hobby and so he was real intentional about trying to find something that he enjoyed. I was talking to him about, what do you think is really the heart of this difference between what's a job and what's a hobby because there are a lot of things that people do for enjoyment but that can also be monetized. For example, making videos. That would be one. Some people do it just for fun. Some people do it professionally. As he and I talked, what we kind of came to is if you do it for someone else, it's a job.
 
Beth Demme (04:31):
If you do it for yourself, it's a hobby. The reason I think that that definition works is because if you think about this podcast, we don't do this just for ourselves. We do this hoping that it's going to encourage other people to have honest conversations and so it's not a hobby. I think of hobbies as the things that I do for myself. I'm going to sit and put together a puzzle. I'm going to read a book that I want to read. I'm going to do travel research because that's what I like to do if I have free time, that's how I spend it. But that's all for myself. What do you think of that distinction?
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (05:06):
I like that. I also think that a good distinction is something that you're kind of taking a risk with. Like a hobby is something that is typically is something you keep to yourself. It's something you don't really share. I mean, you might with a core group of friends, but something it's very special to you and very dear to you. I have a friend that's a woodworker and he makes all these great things. I'm like, why don't you sell them online or sell them at craft shows? These are like special children like art pieces to him. He wants to give them to people as a special gift.
 
Beth Demme (05:43):
Not sell them.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (05:44):
Not sell them because he doesn't think people will appreciate the heart and soul. This is his hobby, this is his passion, his love. He doesn't want to sell them as just to somebody that's not going to love them like he does. But I think if he was to sell them in that kind of form, it's scary because you're putting your heart out there and you're letting other people judge it and you're letting other people put a monetary value on that. If he wants to charge $200 for a bowl or something, and they're like, I'll give you 20 bucks. That will start to crush that passion potentially. When I was growing up, this was before YouTube and before we were sharing things online, because we didn't really have cellphones, things like that. I mean, I'm ancient. I used to make videos all the time.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (06:37):
One of the things I'd make a video for my girl scout troop. It was called Girl Scout Tonight. I made a video every week for seven people. We would watch this and there would be inside jokes and they would just love it. It was this fun thing. I made it for not as a job but for their enjoyment and there was really no risk in it because they were all my close friends and things like that. But then I think about that if it was in today's time, is that something that I would have put on YouTube? Is that something that I would have tried to share with the masses? Would that have been something I'd look more like as a job that I would, you know.
 
Beth Demme (07:17):
You would for sure have at least TikToked it. I don't know if that's a real verb, but I'm using it that way. You know what I mean? I think if a teenager were to do that today, they would put some part of it on TikTok or maybe Instagram but probably TikTok.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (07:33):
I'm not in touch enough with the kids to know. I don't know what kind of kid I would have been. Honestly, I don't know. I mean, it's so hard to say with the way, like would I be sharing? I was so into video, would I have been sharing all my videos on the mass platform? I will tell you like the videos I made before YouTube when YouTube came out in like 2005, I thought about putting them online but I was like, no, I don't want to just put them out there for all people to see and judge because they were very, very personal to me. That's when I started my YouTube channel, Mother Daughter Projects. That was something that was very intentional. I looked at it as a job because I was going to be sharing with the masses. I thought it was important. I thought that people needed to see people like me and my mom doing projects around our house and seeing that it's possible and that you can do it too, and this is how it's done. I thought that was important.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (08:28):
I always looked at Mother Daughter Projects as a job even though I was passionate and I love it and it was things I needed to do around my house. But we added that element of filming and sharing it with other people because we thought it could be helpful and a good thing to put out in the world. But we do put a lot of thought into it because we know once it's out there, people can judge us. People can say whatever. That's a scary, scary thing to do. You got to develop thick skin because it can start to whittle away at that passion, that excitement that I have when people comment and say mean things. I have developed that and I don't let the haters dictate the kind of projects and things I share.
 
Beth Demme (09:10):
You were told your job can't be your hobby. But another phrase that I hear kind of in the ethos or whatever is if you find a job you love, you'll never work a day in your life, right? You need to try to figure out a way to make a job out of the things that you're passionate about. But then if you do that, the advice that you got about how your job can't be your hobby is that those are two contradictory ideas, but they both sort of sound right to me.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (09:37):
Yeah, but I think that's a really harmful cliche. Like if you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life. I think that's so incorrect. I work hard. I work a lot and I love what I do, but it's work. There is a lot of work involved. I mean, as a pastor, would you say you work? Like you put work into it and there's times when you're like, I'm tired. I'm not just bubbly excited every day about doing this. I think that that's a great starting point is to love what you do and be passionate about it. I think that's super important, but I think it's harmful to say that if you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life. That's not accurate, no. That's the whole point is you want to work and you got to push forward. You want to put that work into it even when you're not feeling it. That's important to do.
 
Beth Demme (10:30):
Even work that you love is sometimes going to feel like work.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (10:30):
Yeah, it's work. Yeah. I don't know, life is work. I don't like the cliches that we kind of toss around in society.
 
Beth Demme (10:42):
I think what the person in your externship was trying to get at is that idea. I think this is an old idea, that work is what you have to do, and then your hobby is what you want to do. It's like, okay, but you have to do your work because that's how you're going to get money. Then your hobby is going to help you decompress from all the stress of this job that you have to do but that is things that you don't actually like. There's this dichotomy. There's job and hobby. I don't think that we see work in that way anymore.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (11:11):
One of the phrases that I really don't like and I don't say to people because I don't like it is, what do you do? When people say that, what do you do?
 
Beth Demme (11:17):
Oh yeah. That question is so hard.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (11:19):
Because I will tell you, I've had a few jobs. Actually, the jobs I've had were because I was passionate about the thing. Like every job I've had that I've gone after is because it was something I was passionate and I loved, which you could consider a hobby. My first big job was working for Apple. I absolutely love Apple computers. It was something that if I had afterschool, I would go straight to my Apple computer and do work on it all day long. You could say my hobby became my job there. Anyways though, even when I worked for Apple, a traditional job in technology, it was so hard to explain people what I did. Half the time people thought I worked at an Apple stand like I sold fruits when I'd be like, I work for Apple. I had to figure out how to say it. Well, I work for the company, I would say Apple computers because I thought maybe that will help people. I teach people how to use their machines. As more iPhones get out there, people understood a little bit more, but it was just annoying to always answer.
 
Beth Demme (12:16):
I know exactly what you mean about that question. It can be a hard question to answer if you don't have a very-
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (12:22):
Traditional job.
 
Beth Demme (12:24):
That's exactly right. If you don't have a very traditional job. When I was a lawyer and I would tell people I was a lawyer, everybody understood that. Boom, we got it.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (12:29):
Easy, yeah.
 
Beth Demme (12:29):
We understand what you do, or maybe we think we understand what you do because there's been a TV show about it or something. Right. At the heart of that question is that we want to define each other by what we do. If all you're doing are hobbies, I just don't... I mean, right? That's kind of the feeling that it creates is, if every answer that I have about what do you do, if everything is like, well, I put together puzzles and I read books, then I don't sound like a valuable part of society.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (12:59):
Yeah. People would almost act like it was like a hobby or not like a real job. It was always frustrating. There was a part of me that always wished it was something easy to say that my job was.
 
Beth Demme (13:10):
I'm a firefighter.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (13:11):
Yes.
 
Beth Demme (13:11):
Right? Oh, okay. I know what that is.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (13:13):
Yes. I always felt like I had to defend. Even after I worked for Apple, I worked at a church. I even felt like I had to defend that and explain that. It just was too hard. Every job I've had I feel like it's just too hard to explain what I do. When I started being an online content creator, it took me forever to explain like every time. At the beginning when people would ask me, I would try to explain what I did. Then people would always ask me how I make money, which I felt like was a little offensive because-
 
Beth Demme (13:46):
And personal.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (13:47):
Because if you told me you're a lawyer and my first question, I'd be like, how do you make money?
 
Beth Demme (13:51):
First, you have to create a litigation budget for your client.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (13:55):
That's what I should say. I should go into some long, drawn out thing. Also, because it's not an easy answer to, I don't think any... Is there any job that's probably is an easy answer of how you make money? I don't know.
 
Beth Demme (14:09):
Well, I think sometimes you have a job and your salary is just determined by someone else. If you're a teacher in a public school, the public school system is setting your salary. You're getting paid based on that.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (14:20):
Because my salary is based on many factors. It's hard to explain in a little chunk nugget that some random person I've just met wants to know. It's hard to really explain that. I've been doing this five years and I am now, and I don't interact with people anymore with COVID, which is kind of cool. I kind of feel more comfortable with my elevator pitch of what I do. I just say I'm an online content creator. What do you do? Then they're like...
 
Beth Demme (14:46):
I work for the Department of Revenue, right? Because we live in a state capital and so a lot of the jobs here are state jobs, which is another example of a job where the salary is just pre-determined and it's not going to fluctuate.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (15:00):
I should ask people that when they ask me how I make money, how do you make money?
 
Beth Demme (15:06):
The job again, it's like the thing that you do to get paid, it's sort of inherent in that question or implied in that question. Then a separate question would be, and what do you do for fun?
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (15:16):
But it's also implying that your job can't be fun and that you have to have these two separate things.
 
Beth Demme (15:24):
That's why I don't like the show The Office. This is my whole thing about the show The Office.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (15:28):
Why? What?
 
Beth Demme (15:29):
Because they don't have like, I mean, sometimes it's funny, I guess. I don't know. I could never get into it.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (15:35):
You've never seen the show so you really can't have an opinion.
 
Beth Demme (15:37):
I've watched a couple of episodes, but it's like the majority of their day is spent in this place that's like-
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (15:44):
Yeah. What's your problem?
 
Beth Demme (15:45):
It seems to be like draining their souls.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (15:48):
Well, and I think a lot of people have jobs that drain their souls.
 
Beth Demme (15:51):
That means this is a valid question.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (15:54):
I think getting back to like the question that I was asked as a teenager, I think now that I understand it, it's what do you do to kind of decompress from your every day? We mentioned that at the beginning. I will tell you, I'm someone that's like very practical and I don't like, you know like adult coloring books?
 
Beth Demme (16:15):
Right.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (16:17):
That seems crazy to me.
 
Beth Demme (16:18):
Oh, it's so relaxing.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (16:19):
It seems crazy to me to sit there and produce something that doesn't result in anything. I'm something that's very much like I want to produce something that results in something. It's like puzzles are tough for me because it doesn't really result in anything.
 
Beth Demme (16:35):
But then it's great because you've created something and you don't have to keep it.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (16:38):
Yes. I can see that.
 
Beth Demme (16:39):
That's beneficial, like I don't have to find a place to put this. I can just be done with it.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (16:43):
Yes. I can see that, but it's hard for me to justify things that don't really produce something. That was why for a long time was hard for me to figure out what's my hobby when I don't really produce anything. Ultimately, I finally decided my hobby is Lego. That's my hobby because it's not something, I don't make income from Lego.
 
Beth Demme (17:07):
Unless you sell a set.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (17:09):
Oh yeah, I've sold sets before. My sole purpose of having my Lego collection is not for money. I feel good and fine buying Lego sets that have no purpose other than they're fun and I enjoy building them. Then I put them together and display them in my room and get joy out of looking at them. I consider Lego my hobby, it's something that I can do to decompress after doing what I do on a typical day. I don't build sets every day. That's something where I'm like, that's something I can put my money into. That is what I ultimately came to like, that's my hobby. I will not make it a career and have no desire to make it a career or a job in any sense. We have done some videos within the Lego room, but not building Lego sets specifically.
 
Beth Demme (18:03):
I also know that sometimes you go hiking. Do you like to go walk in the woods with the dogs? Is that not a hobby?
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (18:10):
I mean, I guess. I guess you could say hiking is a hobby. It's something I enjoy doing. I've put some money into it. I bought hiking shoes.
 
Beth Demme (18:18):
It helps you decompress.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (18:20):
Yes.
 
Beth Demme (18:21):
You do it for yourself, not for other people.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (18:23):
Yeah. I guess that's a hobby as well.
 
Beth Demme (18:26):
My primary way of just relaxing at the end of the day is that I watch TV. Can that be a hobby? It doesn't feel to me like that can be a hobby. It feels like watching TV is something that you can do but it's not a hobby.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (18:36):
Okay. Is playing video games a hobby?
 
Beth Demme (18:38):
Yes, because playing to me seems different than watching.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (18:42):
But I think playing video games, because this is my observation, a lot of men and boys enjoy video games. Girls like them too. Women like them too. I'm not saying that's not true, but in my sphere, the ladies in my sphere, not super into the video games. They play them because the men in their lives really like them. That's who I am. My brother would only talk to me when we are playing video games so I would play video games. Do I love them? No. Would I buy console? No. Do I play them when I'm not around him? No. My whole point would be men play video games a lot the way that women watch TV shows a lot, to escape their current reality is my opinion. I would completely say playing video games is a hobby.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (19:32):
Women do TV the same way. I would completely say TV is a hobby. I don't think that that's a bad hobby to have. I watch TV. Hey, I love me some good TV. I'll share some of my favorite things recently in the slice of life. But I would say that's a hobby. I would say anything in life, hobby, job, whatever, we got to be careful. We don't want to overdo anything. I wouldn't want to buy every Lego set. That would not be a good choice for me. We need to keep everything in check. I don't think watching TV all day long is a great, healthy thing to do. Again, we're talking about healthy boundaries within all these things, and video games, same thing.
 
Beth Demme (20:07):
Yeah. Even reading is the same thing. Sometimes I have friends who are tremendous readers. They love, love, love to read. They'll kind of look down their nose at the fact that I watch TV. It's like, guess what? I can escape into a book or I can escape into a TV show. It's still escaping.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (20:23):
Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
 
Beth Demme (20:25):
One is not superior over the other. One thing on the video games. I just want to say, I totally have a full size Ms. Pac-Man Atari game and I love it. Part of the reason it's so enjoyable to me is that it's time limited because you can only go so long before you've used up all your lives. I can play that or I play Galaga. I do get the video game thing.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (20:51):
Like an actual-
 
Beth Demme (20:53):
Like an arcade. Yeah, full-size arcade thing.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (20:56):
Okay. That's a whole different thing, Beth.
 
Beth Demme (20:57):
It's a whole different kind of video game.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (20:58):
That's a whole different thing. I totally support that. I also don't not support people who play Video games, by the way. I'm just saying that's not how I spend my time. I would totally play your Pac-Man game though. Can I play? Where is it?
 
Beth Demme (21:09):
Yes, you can come and you can play it, but you should not kid yourself that you can beat my high score on Ms. Pac-Man because-
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (21:14):
I would never assume that. I'm pretty sure I won't even be on the scoreboard, but I do want to play.
 
Beth Demme (21:20):
Yes. Video games, playing video games can be a hobby, which I guess nowadays people do it somewhat professionally too. I guess people figured out a way to turn that into a job. We've decided that watching TV can be a hobby. What about pets? Are Mac and Tosh, are they a hobby?
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (21:40):
Are your kids a hobby?
 
Beth Demme (21:42):
Nope, because it does not make me decompress.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (21:48):
What do you mean by that, Beth?
 
Beth Demme (21:49):
I mean, sometimes being a mom is a little bit stressful, people. I cannot control these other humans.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (21:56):
You know, that's interesting. I've never really thought about my dogs as a hobby. I guess you could say they're a hobby because I think about that sometimes. Like when you're looking to get a dog, there are lots of stuff to research. One of the things is like, how much a dog is going to cost you per year? I remember looking it up and it was like a couple thousand dollars for a Greyhound or like 1,050, hundred something. Because I thought about that. I was like, is this a waste of money to have a dog? Went through those things, and then I think I did kind of tell myself, well, this can be my hobby and that would be okay so I can spend money on this. They'll be my hobby.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (22:32):
When my dogs are sick and need meds, I'm like, it's fine. This is my hobby. They're sick and I got to fix them. It's fine. I guess I kind of do look at them as a hobby, even though that feels weird. I don't think of it a lot like my dogs are my hobby. But they're something that bring me joy that I enjoy playing with and spending time with and taking care of. If that's I'm passionate about, if that's how you define a hobby, then yeah. They're my hobby.
 
Beth Demme (22:57):
Yeah. I don't know though, because you have a relationship with them and you have a responsibility to them. I don't know. I don't know if Mac and Tosh can be a hobby.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (23:08):
I think it's almost a different category because like, is motherhood a job? Is it a hobby or a job? Neither seem right.
 
Beth Demme (23:16):
Neither seem right.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (23:17):
It's a calling. It's a life purpose. I wouldn't say my dogs are my life purpose, so I don't know.
 
Beth Demme (23:25):
Right.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (23:27):
I don't know. I mean, it seems too small to call it a hobby, but I think I would say pets can definitely be a hobby. It's something that you take some of your time and I'm not against it. I don't know. I really don't think it's up to us to determine. For each person, this is your hobby, this is your job. I think overall let's not tell people how to live their lives and what they should do and shouldn't do. Don't freaking should on somebody.
 
Beth Demme (23:59):
That's a good point. We shouldn't should on people.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (24:01):
You determine what your hobby is. Can your hobby be your job? Absolutely. I'm here to tell you, the things that I love that have been my hobbies and been passionate about have become my jobs and are a part of my, and I get paid to do these things. Even have jobs that I don't get paid for. The podcast, I consider the podcast a job.
 
Beth Demme (24:25):
Right.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (24:26):
I'm dedicated to it. We schedule time to plan episodes, future plan to plan and record. That is to me a job, but we aren't actually financially paid for this. We haven't really monetized it. This is something we just started because we thought it was something that we weren't hearing and we wanted to put some, our voice into the space and hopefully something good could come out of it. I definitely consider the podcasts a job, but it's not my primary source of income.
 
Beth Demme (24:59):
One thing that my husband and I always thought was kind of neat is that he went into, he has built a career. He has built a business out of...
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (25:08):
Oh, what does your husband do?
 
Beth Demme (25:11):
He, uh, he, uh. See? It's not easy. It doesn't roll off the tongue. He has a software company.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (25:16):
He's married to a lawyer. He's married to a lawyer.
 
Beth Demme (25:18):
He has a software company.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (25:19):
Oh, cool. What kind of software does he do?
 
Beth Demme (25:22):
He does custom software applications mainly for hospitality companies. But anyway, we always thought it was interesting that he went into that because his dad's hobby was working on computers. Growing up, he had access to a lot of, more so than I did because that wasn't anything that my family was into. But my dad's hobby was woodworking, and my brother, he has expanded but originally his career was that he was a framer, he built houses. It was like, we could see that our dads' hobbies kind of transitioned into jobs for some of their kids.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (26:01):
I do still think that's a thing where you get into something in your childhood that then does translate to your adulthood. Like in 10th grade I took a TV production class, fell in love with it. My parents invested in equipment for me, a really nice video camera and it just kind of took off. I started making videos. I actually started doing some paid project as well. I worked for my church and they would start paying me to do videos. Definitely, that easily translated into what I'm doing today professionally as my job. Encourage your kids' hobbies, folks. Beth, actually-
 
Beth Demme (26:38):
Today's special guest is Mac.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (26:41):
We're going to keep talking, but just so you know, if you hear whining in the background, that is Beth. She's really over this episode.
 
Beth Demme (26:46):
It's not me.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (26:47):
It's Mac. She wants to be fed because I haven't fed her in like two hours. You know. She's leaving now. Okay, good.
 
Beth Demme (26:54):
Yes.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (26:55):
Actually, Beth, here's an interesting question. What hobby would you like to make your job?
 
Beth Demme (26:59):
I don't know. Now that we've had this conversation, I kind of don't like that question because I don't think every hobby needs to be monetized.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (27:07):
Yes.
 
Beth Demme (27:08):
Right? Like it's okay to just have a hobby.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (27:10):
That's interesting actually. I think a lot of things these days we try to encourage people to monetize their hobbies. I think that is a thing where like, especially with Instagram and TikTok and everything, it's like the things you're passionate about, share it with people.
 
Beth Demme (27:26):
Then you'd be an influencer.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (27:27):
Yeah. But it is work. It's a lot of work and you can lose that passion and it can just become where you lose yourself. You really have to be ready, prepared for that step if that's something you take but anyways.
 
Beth Demme (27:43):
This conversation has also helped me because I am realizing now that I have been pushing my husband to monetize his hobby and I probably need to step back from that. He loves to research cars and buy cars and fix cars up. Well, yes, that is true. He bought a 1980, I think it's a 1985. Anyway, he bought this old Mercedes and he only paid $2,000 for it. It didn't run when he bought it and now it runs and he can drive it. It actually drives really great. He has so much fun driving it. He thoroughly enjoyed all the research that went into it. He enjoyed hunting for the car. He enjoyed having to figure out how to get this car that didn't run back to our house because it was in another city.
 
Beth Demme (28:25):
Then he has a couple of Jeeps. He's got one Jeep that he works on and he's driven around. He's gone several hundred miles gathering parts for it. I keep encouraging him like, okay, well now you've got that car running. You should sell it and get another one. He's like, well. I probably need to just lay off and let the man enjoy his hobby. Stop trying to monetize it.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (28:48):
Yeah. It is interesting because it's a fine line. Like you have this passion for it, but then if you then try to monetize it, it becomes a whole different thing. I do think it's important to have something that is just kind of for us, like my little building houses. That's something that's fun for me. I haven't been sharing it online. I thought about it, but I'm like, this is just my fun little thing. I haven't really talked about it, even though I've been building it since like mid December. I was like, this is just fun and relaxing. I do think if he decided to make that a job and go full time with that, that would be awesome, but then it would be probably still important to find something that he can do that is just relaxing, fun, if he was to do that all day long.
 
Beth Demme (29:33):
Right.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (29:34):
I do think it's important and but it doesn't have to be like this big thing. It doesn't have to be coin collecting. I always thought it was this big thing. I think it's important to allow ourselves something that doesn't have to be monetized and doesn't have to, can just bring joy and doesn't have to bring money. Just bring joy into our life. Like my animals, they don't bring me any money. They cost me money, but I never stress about the money of my animals because they bring so much back to me. I spend a little bit of money on these things because they bring me joy and there's nothing wrong with that. I don't have to justify it to anybody. I definitely don't have to because I'm in charge.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (30:18):
I think ultimately what we're saying though is like it's important to have passion in life and something that just drives us. Whether it's your job, whether it's your hobbies, whether it's both, a combination of both, I think that's important. I think it's taken me a while to get to that place of realizing what that balance is and why that's important.
 
Beth Demme (30:41):
It doesn't have to be this hard and fast line between the two.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (30:45):
Yeah. I think it's easier in our brains to be like this and that, that or this. But I think the lines are blurred on so many aspects of human life.
 
Beth Demme (30:54):
Sure.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (30:55):
Sometimes you're going to spend more time in your hobbies. Sometimes you're going to spend more time on your job. I think it's important just to be mindful of passions and where we place our time and the joy we get out of things.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (31:11):
Well, if you get joy and excitement listening to our podcasts like we do because we really do, we love doing this. We just wanted to remind you that we have a Buy Me a Coffee page. It's basically where we post some behind the scenes of what's going on here and put our questions for reflection, the PDFs of them. You can either buy us a coffee or a tea, which is basically like just a monetary donation, and you can also become a monthly member where you'll get all of our extra content. There'll be a link in the description for you to check out our Buy Me a Coffee page. Beth, I have two recommendations for you.
 
Beth Demme (31:57):
Okay.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (31:57):
As I've been saying, I've been building my tiny little houses. They're called like DIY mini houses, I think. Anyways, they're like made in China. I was very concerned because the description was like, these are written where I can't understand them. I will tell you, they're written awesome. They're all amazing. I five star them all day long. I'll send them to you. You can put a link in the description. They are amazing. They are made in China in their metric but very well done. I highly recommend them. If you want something that takes a lot of time but you have something in the end, if you want something like an adult coloring book but way better, get these because they're super fun.
 
Beth Demme (32:38):
All right, so do you have two? That's one.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (32:40):
No, that wasn't even one of them. My two recommendations were TV shows. It was TV shows. I've been watching some TV shows as I've been building my mini house. That was my point. That was the connection. It all comes around. One is, there is a show that was on in the like '80s, '90s called Saved by the Bell. It was a fun romp. I watched a lot of reruns. Beth watched them live because they were her. When she was in high school, they were like the same time that she was in high school.
 
Beth Demme (33:08):
Same time, that's right.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (33:09):
But they've done like a reboot. I was like, that's probably not going to be good. It is good. My opinion is it's very good. It's on Peacock. It's embarrassing to say but it's NBC's streaming service. There's like 500.
 
Beth Demme (33:23):
Everybody's got their own streaming service now.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (33:25):
But fun fact, if you have a Comcast account, if you have Comcast TV in your house, you probably get Peacock for free. Check that out to see. If not, it's like 499 a month. We're not getting paid to say this. There's literally nothing else on there that you would want to watch but the show, so sign up for a trial if you don't get it for free. The second thing is, oh, I'm not going to share the second thing. The House will be my second.
 
Beth Demme (33:49):
You're not good at this.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (33:54):
Thank you, Beth, for pointing out that I am not good podcasting. I will not be saying, what do you do? I will not be saying I'm a podcaster. Beth, do you have anything weird for me?
 
Beth Demme (34:03):
All right. I have found someone who has predicted some things for the year 2021. We're still pretty early in the year. Well, it's a woman. She has predicted that there will be a new normal after the end of the coronavirus pandemic. That there will be a royal breakup. That foreign travel will become an occasional option rather than the annual norm. That extremes of weather will continue with tropical storms becoming more frequent. That a popular baby name in 2021 will be Gus.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (34:38):
Okay. That's just more like duh than predictions.
 
Beth Demme (34:41):
Well, what's special about this is how she makes her predictions.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (34:46):
Okay.
 
Beth Demme (34:47):
But I wanted to tell you the predictions first because I have the exact same reaction, duh.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (34:52):
Yeah, Gus, of course.
 
Beth Demme (34:54):
Well, maybe not Gus. Maybe I wouldn't have gotten to Gus but like a new normal after the end of a pandemic, you're kidding. She even predicted something like-
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (35:02):
The weather, oh, global warming is just a new thing? Oh wow.
 
Beth Demme (35:05):
Yeah. She predicted that the pandemic would begin to pass by June. Yeah. We're vaccinating people in January, so hopefully by June. Anyway, her method of prediction is not a crystal ball.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (35:20):
Okay.
 
Beth Demme (35:20):
It is not cards. It is not tea leaves. She throws asparagus into the air and makes her predictions based on how it lands. There she is. I'm going to put a picture in our show notes so you can see it that this is an actual thing.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (35:36):
Is this fake news? Let me see where this is from. Oh, it's from the UK. It could be fake. It's a British lady. Okay. That's okay.
 
Beth Demme (35:44):
Yes.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (35:45):
A royal breakup, that's insane.
 
Beth Demme (35:47):
She's predicted a royal breakup.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (35:48):
A royal breakup. How many royals are there? There's definitely one breaking up right now. Are you kidding me? That's like every year you can predict that and that's going to happen.
 
Beth Demme (35:58):
I should correct myself because she doesn't use the whole asparagus. She only uses the asparagus tips.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (36:03):
This is weird. Good job, Beth. It's weird.
 
Beth Demme (36:07):
It's pretty weird. I want to bring you some weird news in 2021 and so I'm bringing you Jemima the asparagus throwing psychic.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (36:15):
None of this sounds good.
 
Beth Demme (36:16):
You're welcome.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (36:17):
Wow. Well now I'm like, what should I bring?
 
Beth Demme (36:19):
I hope that for our next episode you'll bring me a scented candle because-
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (36:25):
We had to cut a lot out of this episode.
 
Beth Demme (36:28):
Stephanie's new dog, Tosh. She's got some tummy issues.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (36:32):
Okay. Dogs have gas. It's a thing. Greyhounds have it pretty bad.
 
Beth Demme (36:38):
Mac has never been this bad.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (36:41):
Because this is the thing, because I did a bunch, she did early on.
 
Beth Demme (36:47):
Not while we were recording.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (36:48):
No, because after, I had already figured it out by the time we started recording. The secret is yogurt. I give her a spoonful of yogurt every day for dinner and no gas. Mac has no gas. It's amazing. It works perfect. It's high quality yogurt. I buy it. Only could buy it a couple of places actually, but any yogurt will work. But this one I like because it's like a thicker, it's not Greek, but it's a thicker yogurt. We'll put a link in the show notes. To the dog, yogurt is great. But I was giving it to Tosh and that was helping but then she stopped eating the yogurt. She's not liking the yogurt anymore. I'm going to try to give it to her again in the future to see if she's like, oh yeah, I forgot. I love the yogurt. But that's why. I'm trying to figure out solutions because I know it's not great. It hasn't smelled great in here. I might invest in some candles. I will invest in some candles.
 
Beth Demme (37:41):
Well, she's very sweet and totally worth the odor.
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (37:46):
At the end of each episode, we end with questions for reflection. These are questions based on today's show that Beth will read and leave a little pause between and then you can answer them to yourself, or you can find a PDF on our Buy Me a Coffee page.
 
Beth Demme (37:57):
Number one, do you have a hobby? What is it? Number two, were you brought up with the notion that your job is something that isn't fun that you do for pay and your hobby is something you do for fun? How did that impact your life decisions? Number three, have you changed your ideas about work and hobbies? What prompted the change? Number four, what hobby would you like to make your job? What's stopping you?
 
Stephanie Kostopoulos (38:27):
This has been the Discovering Our Scars Podcast. Thank you for joining us.