Instead of Trying to Find Your Passion, Let Your Passion Find You

We all believe in many myths, one of which is that our lives have no meaning unless we do what we love. This may be true, but pursuing your passion can be equally satisfying, something we often overlook.

Note: This article is based on a blog post by Darius Foroux, in which he talks about passion.

YouTuber and great entrepreneur Casey Neistat often talks on his video blogs about how much he loves his work, and he believes in the idea: “Find a job you love, and you won't have to work a day in your life.”

Of course, he is not the only one who believes this; most artists, athletes, and entrepreneurs do too; even the late American entrepreneur Steve Jobs said: "You have to find what you love, and this is true for your work as much as it is true for your love life; your work will fill a large part of your life, and the only way to feel good is to do what you believe is great work, and the only way to do great work is to love what you do, and if you haven't found this work yet, keep looking."

I support this, and yet most people pressure themselves to find their passion. If we have no passion, we lack something, and our lives have no meaning.

We pay great attention to “passion” these days, and yes, it is essential, but it is not a magic solution that will hide all your problems. Some people may say, “I wish I found my passion,” but if you find it, what will happen?

Don't expect your life to improve tenfold when you love what you do. Life is still the same: you must wake up daily, make money, struggle, and deal with all the other things life brings.

How to find passion

I'm one of those people who didn't exactly know what they wanted to do when they grew up. I thought about doing several things, but I wasn't miserable until I started doing what I'm doing now.

I have to admit I've been stupid and made stupid decisions in the past. Still, I have been working hard at the same time, and I have gotten two college degrees, read a lot of books, traveled, started and failed some businesses, and made the most of bad situations as well. Then, one moment in 2015, I thought to myself, “Why don't I write about the things I've learned during the different stages of my life?” The Mentors and people close to me told me I should have done it a few years ago, but I didn't think about it at the time. It happened suddenly last year, like a sudden bolt of inspiration.

Don't get me wrong; waking up every day and looking to work on the things you love to do is great, but it's not the absolute key to happiness.

The importance of this information to you

For the past year, I have been researching how others can stimulate the process of “finding passion.” I have never found any study that answers this question, and no research says, “Do exactly that, and your passion will emerge.”

Great visions appear out of nowhere, and you often find your passion from an idea as well. In The Eureka Factor, authors John Kounios and Mark Beeman explain how visions arise and what scientific research says about their motivation:

"Although visions often come suddenly, we sometimes feel the presence of an idea under the threshold of consciousness and ready to emerge, and this puzzling phenomenon has a strange subjective characteristic; it seems as if an idea is about to enter your consciousness as if you are about to sneeze; cognitive psychologists call this experience "intuition,” that is, the perception of the existence of information in the unconscious mind, whether it is a new idea, a solution, or a perspective, without perceiving the information itself until it appears in the consciousness at least."

So, instead of putting pressure on yourself, you need something else that will lead to that last step and a sudden moment of inspiration. You don't know your passion because you're unaware of it, and that's all there is to it, so don't make things more complicated than they are.

Stimulate the mind to get more ideas

Here are two strategies for doing so:

1. Expose yourself to different things

Read about new things you haven't thought about before, travel, and spend time with different people. The more you open your mind, the more information you get. John and Mark explain that moments of inspiration are often a mixture of various ideas you are exposed to.

2. Manage stress and anxiety

Chronic stress and anxiety prevent your brain from thinking, focusing, and relaxing, and these are the most important things to do to get new insights. So, before you think about finding your passion, address stress and anxiety first if you suffer from them a lot.

I think these two strategies are two basic steps that most of us skip; we delve into practical things like keeping a diary by the bedside, but we need to contribute if we want information.

In conclusion

Instead of thinking about your passion, let it come to you; it is hiding somewhere inside you. Because it is afraid to reveal itself, you should trust that it will one day appear out of nowhere, and when that day comes, be happy and celebrate it, but the next day, wake up and start working.