In some bedrooms, you might find things like posters plastered on the walls, figures on shelves, or maybe a completed book series perfectly shelved. All of those things might have a special meaning to the person they belong to, like an interest or an obsession.
According to the Cambridge dictionary, an obsession is an interest in a thing you think about often; “an extreme interest in someone or something, that you think about all the time
.” Obsessions also have to start somewhere, whether it is because people stumble upon a video that introduced them to it, or a person who showed you.
For junior Emily Hill, she was introduced to a mix of both when discovering the K-pop group BTS around 2019.
“I had a friend in middle school. She introduced me. She made me watch BTS music videos,” Hill said.
Although this was her first time being introduced to a K-pop group, this was not Hill’s first time with the genre, as she watched an anime with K-pop music in it.
“I also discovered [it] on my own because there was also this anime, it’s called ‘Tower of God,’ their song for their show was Stray Kids,” Hill said.
Hill was also intrigued by the choreography that goes into K-pop, as well as the fact that she was into collecting things.
“[The] choreography and, I’m a big collector. So all those factors go into me being really involved in it,” Hill said.
K-pop has also given Hill some amazing memories and experiences.
“I went to see J-Hope in LA. That [was] so cool, [and] I’m around a whole bunch of people that share the same interest as me,” Hill said.
Similar to Hill, junior Bret Shaver was also introduced to his passion through someone. Shaver was introduced to jazz after his band teacher told him he should join the jazz band.
“I got offered by Mr. Nelson, my middle school band teacher, to join the jazz band,” Shaver said.
Shaver also further deepened his love for jazz after he started listening to it.
“I never really started listening to it until I was a freshman or sophomore, and then that just helped me love it even more,” Shaver said.
Jazz has also allowed him to build more connections, with Shaver being a part of multiple jazz groups. Including his own, called the scenic jazz trio.
“I’m a member of multiple bands outside of school, and the one that I formed, the Scenic Jazz Trio, is mostly jazz,” said Shaver.
The community within it is one of the reasons Shaver enjoys jazz so much.
“The jazz community in Oregon, especially with high schoolers, is relatively small, but it’s also really tight-knit. So if you’re into jazz in Oregon, then you know all the other people,” Shaver said.
Unlike Shaver, junior Beckett Dinger was introduced by a video. Dinger started metal detecting, collecting radioactive glass, after his mom would show him videos on social media of radioactive glass hunting, and metal detecting.
“They both probably started just from Instagram videos. My mom would show me, and so I got interested in them,” Dinger said.
For Dinger, the best part of both of them is the feeling he gets while looking.
“You never know what you’re going to get. It’s just like the thrill of the hunt,” Dinger said.
According to the article “The Benefits of Harnessing Obsession” by Psychology Today, obsessions are not always a bad thing and can help people reach their goals in life and allow them to truly be themselves. “A productive obsession is nothing else but a passionately-held idea that serves your meaning-making efforts.” Stated in the article.
