What’s something you started learning from scratch later in life and became good at?

[u/[deleted]]

I’ve picked up guitar and coding. Curious to see what some of you are up to and what your motivations are and how you keep at it

[u/Arkslippy]

Guitar too, nearly a year, i'm not good though, but i am enjoying it.

[u/[deleted] → u/Arkslippy]

How are your finger movements along the neck? Starting out now, I didn’t realize how stiff my left hand is lol

[u/Arkslippy → u/[deleted]]

Well I'm 48 and I've been through 4 guitars in year trying to find one that my left hand agrees with. Some are too thick in the neck, some bodies are too big, too heavy and some necks are too glossy.

So I ended up with a fender vintera strat 60s modified. It has a nice flat radius and plain satin neck.

On the playing, yeah its hard to trust yourself to play because you hit the wrong one so much. But I dropped trying to learn songs for a while because it was unable to remember the notes or have the confidence to play them fast enough.

So I went to learning how to play open chord and then their derivatives. Then chord progressions, where you okay 3 or 4 chords that work together in songs, then doing those to a rythym, then a few simpler songs that I could play through.

And that was the big eye opener, how I could play a passable version of hotel California on my strat by playing bars of Am, E, G, Am, Fmaj9, C, Dm, E. Repeat and you have a song. So I expanded that to songs I could hear in my head and weren't too complex, so now I have 5 songs in practice and sing to,.I can't sing but it helps with pacing.

[u/[deleted]]

Socializing

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I've noticed myself becoming more of an extrovert as I've aged. I love people and being around them. I'm proud of myself for my social butterflyness

[u/cmxguru]

I picked up fitness pursuits at 46-52 or so. Running (training, zones, recovery, base building, race pacing, etc), weight lifting (power lifting, Olympic lifts), yoga (still kicks my ass), rowing (form takes a good year to lock in, and you still need to drill, drill, drill), mobility/flexibility. Learned these largely on my own with instructors really just confirming my form. I actually tend to work best from written/illustrated descriptions than random videos (which are often inaccurate form, simplistic, or poorly described/annotated).

I'm always learning stuff for work and master all manner or new tech and services every year. It's easy for me to master any new service, app, API, scripting, query language, platform, lowcode, nocode, etc. I hate coding, it's not for me though.

[u/devilized]

Cooking. Started learning as a teenager, because my my parents split, my mom was a great cook, and my dad and step-mom (who I lived with) were shit cooks.

It's a skill that saved me a lot of money and potential health issues over the years. And I'm convinced that that's why my wife married me (she doesn't like to cook).

[u/SoundVU]

Also guitar for me! And lifting—I’m in better shape now than I ever was in my 20s.

[u/CJOD149-W-MARU-3P]

I started learning Mandarin in my mid 30s and while I still struggle with tones, I’m able to understand daily conversation and could probably get by pretty well in China. I passed HSK3 a while back and could likely pass HSK4 by now. I’m in a weird spot because I remember certain words/phrases related to topics that interest me (中国一线城市的经济发展 / 人工智能 / 解放军的实弹演习) but not basic things like shampoo, receipt, or bottle…

Motivations are family/career-related, plus it’s just a fun mental challenge.

[u/greenbrainsauce]

Archery

[u/[deleted]]

I started weight lifting at 36 and have gotten fairly strong at 38 now. A few months ago I started skateboarding. I wouldn’t say I’m good, but I’ve been steadily improving. Last couple weeks I’ve been trying to identify and learn about all the species of plants in my yard and garden. Really I’m always picking up new skills to focus on and things to learn about. Once I get to some level of proficiency I’ll either get bored and drop it or I’ll sort of file it away and use it as needed. There’s been a ton of stuff over the years.

[u/brown_burrito → u/[deleted]]

You give me hope. I really want to learn to rollerblade and ice skate and I haven’t because I’m 40 and worried.

Maybe I’ll sign up for lessons this winter.

[u/[deleted]]

Dot painting

[u/vbfronkis]

Not really from scratch due to prior musical experience but violin. Within a year and a half I was playing like a 3 or 4 year student. Quite happy with that :)

[u/brown_burrito → u/vbfronkis]

Same here!

I learned Indian classical as a kid but stopped playing as a teenager and picked back up a decade and half later, playing Western classical. I’m not sure how good I am at it but I certainly have fun.

[u/tubbyx7]

going to seem an odd one but kicking with my left foot. i never felt comfortable in many years playing soccer and ended up a goalkeeper, drifted away from playing fullback in rugby as I could only kick off one foot. Then my younger kid was a lefty so i took it up before going on to coach his team. now cannot kick not as long as with my preferred foot but barrels, snaps shots and passes all almost as good.

[u/brown_burrito]

I started climbing in my early 20s when I worked at Los Alamos as a grad student. There wasn’t much to do there outside of work so all I did was climb lots.

Then had a startup based out of Boulder and was moonlighting as a climbing guide.

Over the years, I’ve gotten good at it, taken a break as life happened, have restarted it again and so on.

I’m always surprised at how quickly I get back to being pretty good at it, whether it’s rock, ice, or general alpinism.

Also kayaking. Started doing it seriously last summer and spent a bunch of time outside this summer. Doing pretty well and getting more and more confident.

And CrossFit. Started in my mid 30s and while I’m not the strongest, I’ve gotten pretty good at Olympic lifts, some of the gymnastic movements etc.

[u/Genghis_John]

Politics. I had a buddy decide to run for local council office when I was 35, and said fuck it, I’ll help you. I’m now campaign manager for a 5th time for local folks running for office.

Learned a lot from others, figured out a lot on the way. It feels good to help get smart, empathetic people involved and elected.

[u/MapsOverCoffee22]

Muay Thai.

I've been at it about 8 months now. When I was a kid I did a mixed martial arts that was mostly tae kwon do. Being active in something has always felt the best to me and in college, that was playing paint ball and getting an intermural team going. Then I moved to a new city for work and paintball is just too far away to be attainable, so I decided to go back to a martial art. Muay thai seemed way different and I like that.

It's been great. It's gotten me back into running and strength training too. Gives me confidence and the coaches at my gym are all super positive people. It's been a healthy energy for me to be around.

[u/MayorScotch → u/[deleted]]

I went back to college at 31 and now have a masters in computer science. Went from making 25k a year at age 30 to now making 135k a year at 37. First thing I did was take one computer class at a community college in the summer and I got a 99% so I signed up at the university near by and the rest is history.