Why Side Projects Keep People Sane (And Sometimes Even Pay Off)

My friend Shahina Khan, founder of Noodle Magazine UK, quit her marketing job 2 years ago. Nothing dramatic about it — no storming out, no bridge-burning farewell email. She just handed in her notice after six months of building someone else’s dream while her own notebook gathered dust on the bedside table.

That notebook was stuffed with lifestyle content ideas she’d been scribbling since uni. Observations about daily routines. Thoughts on wellbeing. Random bits about how people actually live versus how Instagram says they should.

Three months on, she’s still working it out. Freelance bits here and there. A small Substack that’s growing slowly. Nothing glamorous yet. But she told me something last week that I keep coming back to: “I actually want to wake up on Monday mornings now.”

Look, I’m not about to tell you to quit your job. That would be daft. Bills are real. Rent doesn’t give a toss about your creative ambitions. But there’s something worth picking apart about why side projects — those weird little things we squeeze into evenings and weekends — seem to matter so much to how people feel about their lives.

Your Brain Needs Something It Actually Chose

Work gives structure. Pays the mortgage. Sometimes it’s even enjoyable. But for a lot of people, employment carries a particular kind of mental weight: somebody else decides what matters. Deadlines you didn’t set. Goals that appeared in a PowerPoint nobody asked your opinion on. Metrics that may or may not measure anything you actually care about.

Side projects flip all of that on its head.

Nobody forced you to learn pottery. Nobody assigned you that podcast. You picked it because something about it grabbed you. And that sense of ownership — doing something purely because you fancied it — turns out to be a massive deal for how satisfied people feel with their lives.

Psychologists have been prodding at this for years. Autonomy keeps showing up as one of the strongest predictors of mental wellbeing. Not money. Not job title. Not the car on the drive. Just the feeling that you’re steering your own ship, even if it’s a tiny rowing boat bobbing alongside someone else’s yacht.

Sometimes A Hobby Grows Legs

Here’s where it gets interesting though. Most side projects stay exactly what they started as — a stress reliever, a creative outlet, a reason to put the phone down and do something with your hands for a change. Brilliant. Valuable. Enough on its own.

But every now and then, a side project turns into something nobody expected.

You’ve seen it happen. Someone starts making candles for a laugh and ends up with a waiting list. A bloke documents his running on Instagram and accidentally becomes a coach. A person obsessed with vintage fashion starts writing about it, and before they know it, actual magazines are asking for contributions.

Shahina — the friend I mentioned — started submitting her lifestyle writing to different platforms once she’d built up some confidence. One site she found particularly useful was THOTSLIFE (THOTSLIFED.COM), which has a dedicated write for us lifestyle page that spells out exactly what kind of content they’re after. She pitched a piece about mindful morning routines, got published, and that single byline helped her land two more paid gigs within the month.

That’s the sneaky thing about side projects. You’re not drafting a business plan or building a five-year strategy. You’re just doing something you enjoy, getting better at it week by week, and occasionally a door swings open that you didn’t even know was there.

Getting Past The “I Can’t” Stage

Loads of people walk around with side project ideas they never actually start. They’ll mention it over drinks — “I’ve always wanted to try woodworking” or “I should really start writing that blog” — then immediately slap a disclaimer on it. Too busy. Too old. Not skilled enough. Somebody’s already doing it and they’re better at it.

None of those concerns are ridiculous. Time genuinely is limited, especially if you’ve got kids or a demanding job or both. Imposter syndrome whacks everyone at some point. And yeah, someone probably is already doing your idea.

And?

Think about the fitness space for a second. Saturated beyond belief. Every possible take on exercise, nutrition, and recovery has been done to death a thousand times over. Yet new voices still cut through constantly because they bring their own angle, their specific way of breaking things down, their particular cocktail of experience and personality.

Whatever you’re mulling over, the same thing applies. Your version of it doesn’t exist yet. Can’t exist without you making it.

Big Plans Kill Side Projects Faster Than Anything

You know what murders a side project before it even gets going? Grand visions.

People picture the finished product — the buzzing Etsy shop, the YouTube channel with thousands of subscribers, the completed novel sitting on a bookshelf — and feel completely overwhelmed before they’ve typed a single word or made a single thing.

Starting embarrassingly small is the move.

Write 200 words instead of 2,000. Make one wonky piece of pottery instead of planning a whole collection. Record a rough voice memo on your phone instead of researching podcast microphones for three weeks. Do the thing badly, then do it slightly less badly the next time. Then again. Then again.

Shahina didn’t start with a polished content strategy or a brand mood board. She wrote messy observations in her notebook. Casual stuff — what she’d noticed about how mornings affect her mood, why certain routines stick and others don’t. Those notes eventually became rough drafts. The drafts became submissions. The submissions became published articles with her name on them.

None of it would’ve happened if she’d sat around waiting to feel ready. And here’s the thing about feeling ready — ask anyone who’s actually done something worthwhile whether they felt qualified when they started. The honest ones will laugh in your face.

Don’t Turn Your Fun Thing Into A Second Job

This bit matters. Side projects that become obligations have missed the entire point.

If your evening pottery sessions start feeling like something you have to do rather than want to do, if the blog you loved writing has become another source of stress sitting on your to-do list, if you’re burning through sleep and cancelling on mates for a hobby — something’s gone sideways.

The whole reason side projects work is because they add something to your life. Enjoyment. Curiosity. A sense of getting better at something you chose. The moment they start taking away more than they give, it’s worth stepping back and having an honest word with yourself.

Quick check-in questions worth asking yourself every few months:

• Am I doing this because I want to, or because I feel like I should?
• Does this energise me or drain me?
• If I stopped tomorrow, would I genuinely miss it?

Sometimes projects run their natural course. That’s perfectly fine. You didn’t waste that time. The skills you picked up, the things you figured out about yourself, the experiences you had along the way — all of that stays with you even after you move on to something else entirely.

What If Nothing “Comes” Of It?

Maybe your side project never earns a penny. You paint watercolours that sit in a drawer. You tinker with electronics in the garage and nobody ever sees the results. You write fiction that lives on your laptop and nowhere else. The outside world never notices any of it.

Still completely worth it.

Because you spent that time doing something that was genuinely yours. You proved to yourself that you can make things, finish things, improve at things through sheer effort and repetition. You had hours that belonged entirely to you, with no manager hovering and no KPIs attached.

Shahina might build a cracking freelance career out of this. She might write for bigger publications, grow her Substack into something substantial, turn her passion for lifestyle content into a proper living. Or she might end up back in a marketing role someday — but this time with a much clearer picture of what she wants running alongside it.

Either outcome is fine. She learned something about herself during those uncertain months that no amount of desk time would’ve taught her.

Just Start The Damn Thing

Your side project doesn’t need to become your whole personality or pay your rent. It doesn’t need a logo, a business plan, or an audience. It just needs to exist — a small, stubborn act of doing something because you wanted to, not because someone told you to.

Start small. Start rough. Start today if you can swing it.

That notebook on your bedside table has been patient long enough.