Sometimes the only thing that matters is if you want to learn and do something like playing a violin, dulcimer, etc. You don't need to be good you just have to have fun.

I am not really a Vonnegut fan, but this story inspired me years ago. It is so true that some things are worth doing because they are inherently interesting and fun. It doesn’t matter whether I am ever able to play like my idols (or willing to play in public at all).  I can and should do them because I want to do them. 

I have far more hobbies than most people. And some of them I do very well. People have asked me why I don’t turn them into a business (glass beads and carving tools).  The answer is because the doing is the purpose. When I make someone else’s beads or blades, I lose the joy of making them. 

One of my favorite Vonnegut stories. In recent years it has inspired me to do what gives me and others joy, and to hold my tendency toward perfectionism in check. It's the joy that really matters!

Along those lines: "Success is getting what you want, happiness is wanting what you get."  I don't remember where I picked that up. 

This concept puts me in mind a bit of past blog posts i made long ago, like these two:

https://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2010/08/why-is-it-taking-so-long-for-me-to.html

https://dulcimer-noter-drone.blogspot.com/2011/01/down-with-tyrant-carrot-or-dont-punch.html

This!  💯   I have never excelled in anything, but have learned to love time spent playing music, gardening, catching some pretty cool pictures, etc etc!  I have found much true happiness in these things even though I am not at the top.  Well, I AM  at the top of what matters to me 🎶 😊

I just love that. I was raised playing sports; competing; excelling; career, etc. I reached a point where I got tired of it and just wanted to enjoy doing what I loved to do, one of which was music (since 1973). Now retired, it's a nice place to be in life, with my husband, family, and doggos. 

Regardless of the veracity of the story, there is wisdom therein.

I read that Kurt Vonnegut said this. Not sure how accurate that is, but i love the message!:

“When I was 15, I spent a month working on an archeological dig. I was talking to one of the archeologists one day during our lunch break and he asked those kinds of ‘getting to know you’ questions you ask young people: Do you play sports? What’s your favorite subject? And I told him, no I don’t play any sports. I do theater, I’m in choir, I play the violin and piano, I used to take art classes.

“And he went wow. That’s amazing! And I said, ‘Oh no, but I’m not any good at any of them.’

“And he said something then that I will never forget and which absolutely blew my mind because no one had ever said anything like it to me before: ‘I don’t think being good at things is the point of doing them. I think you’ve got all these wonderful experiences with different skills, and that all teaches you things and makes you an interesting person, no matter how well you do them.’

“And that honestly changed my life. Because I went from a failure, someone who hadn’t been talented enough at anything to excel, to someone who did things because I enjoyed them. I had been raised in such an achievement-oriented environment, so inundated with the myth of Talent, that I thought it was only worth doing things if you could ‘win’ at them.”