Finding Your Passion

There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living. –Nelson Mandela

Passion is an amazing thing.  It drives us.  It brings us joy and happiness.  And without passion life is just not as colorful.  But sometimes, finding your passion can fall to the wayside.  Work, school, everyday tasks can get in the way.

Of course, we need to pay the bills and finish our degrees and do chores and laundry and everything else that keeps the world spinning.  But at the end of the day, we should all have at least one thing that makes it all worth it.  Our passion.

Now, I’m not saying that you can’t be passionate about your job or learning or your family and friends.  We can all be passionate about those things, at least most of the time.  But your true passion is the thing that gets you up in the morning, that makes working for the weekend worth it, that makes you want to tell the world about it.

For me, I love to write.  I always have.  Words have always flowed through me and I can’t wait to put pen to paper (or nowadays, fingers to the keyboard).  And I like to write about everything– stories that I make up in my head, things that happen to me during the day, things that I want to do in the future.  Hence why this blog was so important to me.  I hadn’t been writing for me in a very long time.  

I do have a lot of writing in my job, which is great.  I love my job (most days) because it combines several things I’m passionate about.  But at the end of the day, my job is still a job.  I don’t feel the same buzz that I do when I’m writing just for me.

There are other things that I’m passionate about, too.  I love to travel (although, as I mentioned, I don’t always have time for it).  I love experiencing different ways of living and trying new foods.  I also love creating things.  From crafting to fixing up old furniture, there’s joy in making something unique with your own hands.  And of course, I also love to cook and bake.  Being in the kitchen and turning raw ingredients into a delicious dish is simply amazing.  

It’s really cool when you find your passion(s).  And I believe when you have things that you love to do, you should share that with other people.  Now, it might not be on a public space like this blog (and really, it took a lot of guts for me to take the plunge to putting my writing out into the blogosphere), but you should talk about it to your friends and family.  They might not have the same passions as you, but when you talk about something you love, I guarantee it will bring joy to them to see your happiness.

What are some of your passions?  How do you share them with the world?  I’d love to hear about it in the comments below.