# Your childhood hobby holds clues to who you are now

> Revisiting activities you loved as a kid can help you understand yourself better and reconnect with forgotten parts of your identity.
- Title: Your childhood hobby holds clues to who you are now · TIME
- Summary: Revisiting activities you loved as a kid can help you understand yourself better and reconnect with forgotten parts of your identity. Returning to a…
- Keywords: childhood hobbies, identity, narrative identity, self-discovery, personal growth, ballet, knitting, pinball, psychology, nostalgia, inner child, adult development
- Source: TIME — https://time.com/article/2026/09/22/revisiting-childhood-hobbies-is-a-way-to-learn-who-you-are-as-an-adult
- Author: Rainesford Stauffer
- Published: 2026-09-22T10:00:04.342+00:00
- Read time: 2 min
- Topics: childhood hobbies, identity, narrative identity, self-discovery, personal growth, ballet, knitting, pinball, psychology, nostalgia, inner child, adult development
## A dancer returns after years away
The author picked up ballet as an adult after more than a decade away from classes, starting alone in her kitchen with a tennis counter as a barre. Her muscles remembered the steps even as her knees protested.
## Childhood activities reveal your current self
Revisiting something you loved as a kid can feel like your younger self is telling you something important about who you are now. It's a chance to integrate your life around something that once mattered deeply.

> can be a very positive experience and make you feel like you're kind of integrating your life around something that was once really important to you.
## Knitting connects a woman to her grandmother
Author Kristen Martin learned to crochet from her grandmother in kindergarten. When she picked it up again as an adult, she noticed she used it the same way her grandmother did: as a calming evening ritual while her mind worked.

> I find it very relaxing as something that I can focus on, but without my full attention.
## Pinball became a competitive community
Benjamin Vigeant grew up with a pinball machine in his basement and returned to the game in his late twenties. He eventually started a pinball league in Chicago, turning a solo childhood hobby into a competitive community.

> I really enjoy competing, and now there's a bunch of people competing with me.
## Three versions of yourself meet at once
When you return to a childhood hobby, you engage your past self's memory of what it meant, your present self doing the activity now, and your future self you hope to become. All three timelines converge in that single moment.

> Returning to a hobby abandoned in childhood has the potential to engage all three of these temporal selves at once.
## Your younger self teaches you something
The author noticed her preteen self's fearlessness returning to ballet: the willingness to attempt hard steps even while stumbling. As an adult, she yearned to reclaim that freedom to try, even if it meant failing.
## Hobbies show how much you've changed
Revisiting childhood activities reveals both how you've transformed and which parts of your younger self never left. A retired person returning to piano or a parent playing basketball with their child both discover something about continuity and change.
## Key takeaway

Returning to a childhood hobby lets you see how you've changed while discovering which parts of your younger self are still alive in you today.