Your interest doesn’t need to have a five-year business plan.
The word amateur comes from the Latin word amator, meaning “lover.”
Not beginner. Not unskilled. Not someone who failed at becoming a professional.
Somewhere along the way, we started treating every interest as a side hustle. But you don’t need a strategic reason to care about niche manga books, Pokémon cards, miniature painting, baking at midnight, bird photography or learning Greek mythology lore that will never appear on an exam.
The point is not always mastery. Sometimes the point is curiosity. Joy. Escape. Community. Experience.
The Internet is a place for shared obsessions
With everyone being more connected than ever, someone is definitely out there creating edits, drafting online magazines, curating playlists, or making entire communities around the same interest you have.
While online, have you ever wondered about how your obsession slowly and quietly teaches you skills?
You learn how to analyze stories, navigate trends, develop creativity and sometimes design skills.
You learn to have an opinion before social media tells you which one to have.
And if you get bored? You can always find something new. Learning and exploring has never been more accessible.
Amaze! Amaze! Amaze!
One of the internet’s biggest collective emotional moments of 2026 involved millions of people crying over a fictional rock alien named Rocky and collectively yelling “fist my bump” across social media because of Project Hail Mary.
Did you know that this entire universe exists because someone really loved orbital mechanics and space?
Before Andy Weir became a bestselling sci-fi author, he was a software engineer writing space stories online as a hobby. He posted The Martian chapter by chapter on his blog, and readers followed along, discussed theories and built a community around it. That hobby project eventually became a global bestseller, a Hollywood movie starring Matt Damon, and later led to the creation of the now well-known and loved Project Hail Mary.
That’s kind of the beauty of niche interests. It’s a labour of love.
You genuinely never know where loving something deeply might take you: professionally, creatively or socially.
The girl with the dragon tattoo
During my first week in Canada as an international student, after unpacking my suitcases and parts of my identity, I was sitting in a café. I noticed the barista’s tattoo — shadows wrapped around her arm, stretching into the wings of a black dragon across her shoulders, with the outline of a smaller dragon hidden inside it.
I recognized it instantly, even through my brain’s jet-lagged fog.
It was Fourth Wing reference; long before Michael B. Jordan pledged a powerhouse adaptation and before the internet turned it into one of fantasy’s biggest phenomena.
And suddenly, we were talking. About the book. About us. About how she had designed the tattoo herself.
It sounds small, but in a moment where I felt disconnected from everything I knew, finding connection through something I loved made me feel seen.
Finding your people
All this to say, niche interests stop being solitary.
Whether you’re into gaming, poetry, photography, K-pop, anime, books, movies, entrepreneurship or something incredibly specific, there’s probably already a space for it online or on campus.
And if there isn’t? You can start one. Now, it is easier than ever.
Through IGNITE Clubs, students can join existing clubs or even start their own communities around shared interests.
More often than not, friendships start because someone says, “Wait… you like that too?”
Feature image courtesy of Thimo Pedersen via Unsplash.
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