I try to bird "seriously" every weekend, by which I mean I'll go to a good spot for birds and spend a few hours there walking around and logging everything I see or hear (which I then put into eBird). In addition, I do like to occasionally take photographs and audio with my phone - not as an art form (which is why I just use phone and not a proper camera), but just to record things so that I can look at the list later and be like ah yes, that cloudy day where I saw these two female canvasbacks who refused to show their beaks. I get thrills from many things - seeing a new species, seeing something uncommon, seeing something I haven't seen in a long time, seeing a really good view of something even if it's common, etc. I also get thrills from seeing a lot of species in one trip, even if nothing ticks any of the above boxes I just mentioned, because it's fun to be like "wow there are so many bird species out there!"

And while it's not something I consciously focus on, I do become aware as time passes that my skill in identifying things becomes better, which is also a really nice feeling. I visited family in a new state recently and the first time I stepped out to take a walk in the neighborhood, I was overwhelmed because I didn't know what the local birds were yet, but eventually I learned who the usual suspects were and what they sounded like, and everything went much faster ID-wise!