“This is beautiful honey – you could sell stuff like this.”

I had given my mother a mug as a belated birthday present; a piece from my latest pottery class. Her first reaction mirrored my own. Here I am, investing my time, energy, and not insignificant amounts of money into hours at the wheel, shaping clay into forms that might, with luck, resemble something functional. It seemed only reasonable, then, to entertain the notion of translating these efforts into some kind of monetary compensation, a small transaction that might justify the whole endeavour.

It’s not the first time I’ve been here either. During lockdown, my obsession with knitting – driven by the desire to recreate Frisson Knits’ Isabella sweater on a tight budget – morphed into a side hustle, selling sweaters to friends, a venture that quickly became all too real and exhausting. This latest mug, too, embodies the quiet tension between creative pursuit and the relentless pull of utility.

It doesn’t have to be this way. By very definition, a hobby is done in one’s leisure time for pleasure, and my friends’ experiences affirm that I won’t die alone on this hill.

Rhyana McNab started her eponymous label in the final years of her fashion studies. It grew organically and swiftly, like all cool labels seem to, and what began as her making clothes for herself quickly evolved into filling orders for friends. Eventually, Rhyana emerged. The brand remained a very small-scale operation, where pieces were trans-seasonal and made to order, yet, as she explains to me, the newfound constraints of space and time started to place undue pressure on the pleasure she gained from her endeavours.

“I look back now and realise what I was feeling was burnout,” she tells me. “So right now I’m not halting everything, but nothing is happening in that space, and I don’t see that as a bad thing. This was a stepping stone, and it’s gotten me to where I am and showed me new skills that I can have a career in.”

I suggest that when we monetise our hobbies, we set a certain standard for ourselves, and lose the very sense of play that brings great satisfaction in the first place. “I can always come back in the future when I’ve allowed myself the time and space to rekindle that passion,” she responds. “I think that turning a hobby into something monetised can be really hard, especially when you started that hobby as something just for you.

“I don’t count it as a failure by any means. [But] when your passion becomes a chore, that's when you know it’s a problem.”

And yet, in this same space, there are people like Milka Zaleska, whose ceramic craft has evolved boundlessly beyond mine. She speaks of the fulfilment found in creating with her hands. "I was always creative, but clay allows me to transform ideas into tangible objects." Alongside selling her beautiful, curvaceous pottery, Milka juggles a full-time career in marketing and events, balancing this with the one or two days each week she dedicates to ceramics. In her, the dichotomy between creative pursuit and professional obligation seems less a tension and more a harmonious blend.

“As it is not my main source of income, any moment in the studio brings me joy,” she tells me. “And even though I am a high-energy person and I thrive in fast-paced environments, after a while I will seek solitude.

“It brings to mind a saying that there are just not enough hours in a day to finish all our tasks. I learned sometimes we have to pick and choose what we really want to focus on.” 

She tells me of the greater satisfaction she experiences with pottery than she had before, and how this joy continues to mount, in the sense that self-growth and the work that contributes to it offer a sense of fulfilment that is a challenge to find elsewhere.

Both experiences hold their own validity, not entirely dissimilar, as Frances Cook acknowledges. This bestselling author and financial journalist has chronicled her own financial journey in much of her early work. She points at the need for balance between creative endeavours and the practicalities of making a living, a testament to the multifaceted paths we navigate.

“You don’t always have to monetise a hobby,” she tells me. “But that can be one way to make a side hustle more enjoyable.

“I see a side hustle as great for sprint efforts, such as paying down debt, or saving up for a big goal that would be hard to hit otherwise. But if you have to have a side hustle at all times to survive, I think that’s a sign that something has gone seriously wrong in our society. People should be able to work a full time job, and have that pay for the basics of life.”

I think there’s a huge amount of truth to Frances’ last statement. I am so aware of the current economy we live in; those who live paycheck-to-paycheck and rely on side hustles to afford daily basic needs. If we can get a small touch of joy from this stark reality, I agree it’s not always a bad thing.

“[But] the moment that you start taking money for the work,” Frances continues, “You’re not doing it for your personal enjoyment anymore, you’re doing it for the customer’s enjoyment.

“I think the idea of having a side hustle at all times is unrealistic, and not something we should push on people. The joy of making something just because we want to, and the freedom to be bad at a hobby because we want to learn it for the enjoyment of it, those are really important too. Not to mention, the importance of community, and seeing friends and family.”

I remain curious about what this means for the future of hobbies. How do we rediscover this lost art when economic pressures demand more from us? Where are the people like me, whose side hustles turned their passions into burdens?

A side hustle, no matter what we call it, is just more hours spent working. Hobbies should offer enjoyment and reprieve, distinct from our means to an end. We shouldn’t spend precious evenings and weekends earning pennies from what should be our playtime, regardless of the satisfaction it might offer.

So despite it all, I implore you not to lose sight of what excites you most about your hobby. Embrace the tactile therapy of clay on your hands, its gritty touch simultaneously exfoliating and soothing. Allow each stitch on the needle to be a meditation, a moment of focused presence – even the dropped ones a reminder to return to the here and now. I am convinced that the inner peace cultivated when you love your hobby is worth the financial sacrifice. I can only hope that the end of side hustle culture is near.