How To Be An Indoor Kid
Everyone is handling things differently these days, but it’s pretty easy to see who is thriving out there, and who isn’t. Your friend who prefers a good book and a comfy couch? Business as usual. Your friend who’s social calendar is booked months in advance? Not so much. If quarantine has got you down, then it’s time to embrace your inner child, or more specifically your indoor child.
What’s so great about being an indoor kid?
In the old world cultural achievements were created by thousands of people at once coming together to erect wondrous buildings and public works. From the Great Pyramids to the Colossus of Rhodes, these feats were done by many, not the few.
These days things have changed. Cultural touchstones are delivered to you on a daily basis via the internet, and who do you think is making them? Throngs of people coming together? No sir, these achievements are only achieved by beautiful neurotic shut-ins who push their creations onto the internet for all to appreciate. In the age of the Corona Virus, these people are our heroes, they are our idols. We should all strive to be more like them. God help you if you don’t.
Rules of being an indoor kid
Some people in this life are naturals. Memes spout from their finger tips and YouTube content flows in their veins. Video games are their language and there isn’t a hobby they haven’t dabbled in. Here are a set of rules for the rest of us.
You are in charge of your happiness
No one is going to save you from feeling bored, unproductive, or lethargic. Pick yourself up by your bootstraps and make something of yourself, dammit.
Only boring people are bored.
It’s Monday morning and you ask your coworkers about their weekend. One tells you about how they climbed a mountain and another tells you about how they binge-watched cat videos all weekend. Which topic would you rather hear more about? My point being, be interesting, make your own fun, don’t spend all your time watching someone else have fun.
Internet friends are real friends
In the before time, hanging out with your friends exclusively on the internet may have been considered a tad anti-social. Now it’s mainstream. Whether you are sharing drinks on Zoom or playing video games together, hanging out is hanging out.
Tunnel vision is a wonderful skill
A crucial skill every indoor kid must have is tunnel vision, or myopia. The ability to work on something endlessly without thought or care for anything else is a dedication that will serve you well in this pandemic. Time will fly, you will feel driven, a real feeling of purpose will possess you until your goal is complete.
Having trouble concentrating? Create a circuit of activities that you can rotate in between, or better yet do all three at once.
Indoor Kid Tasks
Indoor kid tasks can be separated into three categories. Hobbies for fun, life skills and personal projects. Now, the lines between these three categories may often blur. I suppose it all depends on how seriously you take things.
Hobbies for fun
Hobbies for fun should give you joy. They are a great place to start if you don’t know what to do with your time. What’s that you say? All of your hobbies are done outside and your only indoor hobby is drinking while watching Netflix? No worries my friend, many online retailers will sell you a kit with everything you need to start a new hobby.
Some examples of wonderful indoor hobbies are:
Building model cars/trains/boats/planes etc.
Leatherwork
Sewing
Cooking/Baking
Painting
Drawing
Woodworking
Screen Print your own t-shirts
Tie Dye
Whittling
Legos
Video Games
Scrapbooking
Book making
Photography
Reading
Crossword Puzzles
Sudoku
Comic Books
Vinyl Record Collecting
Knitting
Macrame
Cross Stitching
Some outdoor hobbies are allowed but only if you have a secluded space where no one will see you. Learning to skateboard as a full grown adult can be rather embarrassing.
Putting
Skateboarding
Gardening
Zen Gardening
Bonsai Trees
Life Skills
Life skills are things you want to get better at that may make you feel better about yourself or will help you accomplish other goals in life. Always wanted to live abroad? Learn a language. Want to start an online business? Learn to code a website. There are many resources for you to teach yourself from YouTube to Skill Share.
Learn to play a musical instrument
Learn to code
Learn to speak another language
Learn a new piece of software
Cut your own hair
Change your oil
Fix a leaky faucet
Give yourself a manicure or a pedicure
Make a homemade scrub
Personal Projects
The single greatest feeling of accomplishment an indoor kid can feel is from the completion of a personal project. They have developed a hobby or lifeskill to the point of mastery, or close enough, and are ready to execute a plan of their own design.
Cover a song
Write a short story
Have a conversation in another language
Fix something on the car that’s been broken forever
Create a photo album
Write and illustrate your own comic book
Create a website
Start a business
Invent a new board game
Create your own wardrobe
Landscape your yard
Oh yeah, one more rule…
What is the point in doing something great if the world doesn’t know about it? Be sure to share whatever it is your are doing. Use #indoorkid to show what you’ve been up to.
Hopefully these tips will help you become the very best version of an indoor kid you can be. Now go out there and stay inside.
Seriously, stay inside until it’s safe.
