Passion is something you do
“Passion” for me, has always been an ephemeral experience. I wake up one day and have an idea, “I want to do this thing or be this person”, and for the next 24 hours it’s all I can think about.
Consider my most recent love-affair with future-casting. Last week it was a starting a “standing-desk consultancy” (I kid you not) and the week before that it to be a iOS developer (possibly one who finally makes a decent pressure cooker app for the iPhone).
Of course, tomorrow I’ll start thinking about all the ways it might not work. All the reasons it’ll probably be a boring, stupid, or regretful endeavor. With time, it loses it’s luster, and so I’ll easily stick with it only until I discover a new thing to captures my attention (likely within a week).
Maybe that’s why I’ve never discovered a “lifelong passion.” Maybe that’s why writing is my primary avocation, because it allows me to jump from one idea to the next at light-speed (maybe I’m wired that way). And maybe (most likely) I’m simply making “finding my passion” (an otherwise simple choice) far too complicated because I’m confusing it for a noun, when in fact it’s a verb.
Because maybe, quite possibly, passion isn’t something that strikes you like lightning. It’s simply something you stick with long enough to develop an enthusiasm for.
When you think about that way, it makes a lot of sense. Because the whole idea that somehow something is going to hit you out of nowhere—like an instrument being handed to a musician—and somehow endow you with a calling, is utterly ridiculous.
People don’t “find their passion” as much they persist in something long enough that the intrinsic rewards (and financial incentives) make it something they want to continue pursuing.
Combine that with a cohort of similar-minded people, a culture that appreciates their ability, and the eagerness get better at what you’re already good at, and it’s no surprise that eventually choosing to do this thing as a life-long gig becomes an obvious choice.
Which is to say that passion isn’t something external, it’s merely something you do.
You can become passionate about a boring job, an entreprenurial vision, or simply a hobby. What’s important (what makes it a passion) isn’t how you feel at the onset, it’s sticking to it long enough that it becomes something you care about. Something you want to get better at, and something you want to do more of.
Waiting to “find it” is wasting time that could be better spent doing it.