Surely you have heard the phrases “follow your passion” or “find your passion”, I think the phrase should rather be “build your passion”.
One is not born knowing what one is passionate about and it is very difficult to know if something will be passionate for us before doing it, even when you try it a few times. It may be that we like many things, but I speak of that which you do and where the hours go by without you realizing it, even without the need to obtain a tangible reward like money.
It isn’t about “finding” what you are passionate about, but based on trying, failing, and having discipline, you build a passion. How? One way is following these steps:
- Do many different activities so you know what you like to do and what you don’t.
- If you like something, dive in: learn more about the subject, practice it, and improve for enough time to build a passion around it.
- If once you know the subject well you see that you no longer like it, try something else.
The problem is that we believe that nothing makes us passionate because we think that doing something for a few days or a couple of weeks we will realize if that activity makes us passionate or not and when we see that the difficult or boring part arrives (which every activity has) we leave it aside without giving enough time to see if that was the way. I think more time and perseverance are needed to discover it, it is something that is built based on effort, not something that is simply found like finding a bill.
I will give some examples. Lately, I have realized that I really like writing, I even finished a book. Does writing make me passionate? It is something I am discovering. The fact of writing alone I like a lot, but there are other things around like the procedures to publish that I cannot say fascinate me, so I think I will know in the coming months. Meanwhile, I continue learning and practicing, and at least until now it is one of the things I do just for the sake of doing it and sharing it, without really thinking about a profit (as I will explain in another post, this writing thing is more a labor of love than something to live on).
Another example is programming. In this one I am passionate, I can spend hours in front of the computer doing a project (like Todogs) just because, although of course, if they pay me it is much better 😉.
Now an example of something I discovered is not my passion. I have been going to the gym for eight months, I feel better, I think I look better, and although I plan to continue doing it, I have discovered that exercise is not my passion. Some told me that at some point I would go for pleasure but until today I have not found that pleasure 😅😓. It is not something I do without suffering or thinking about a retribution (looking good and being healthy) and every day I suffer from having to go I envy those who do it for pleasure.
If you think nothing makes you passionate try many things, even if it is a cliché get out of your comfort zone and do things you don’t normally do, maybe learn about a new topic that interests you or try to sell something. Give it time to mature and if it is not that way try with something else and at least you will have increased your knowledge. In the end, everything adds up and who knows, it may be that even if it turns out not to be your passion it will be useful to you in the future.