What is Passion? – Chapter I Part III of the upcoming book ”Find Your Passion”

What is ”Passion”? Chapter I Part III of the upcoming book ”Find Your Passion”

” Ok Jim! You convinced me. I’ll give my passion a try!”, I hope you’re thinking. ”But what is it? What Is it something specific? Is it a job? An interest? A hobby? What are key its components and nature? What’s its relation to purpose?  Does it last/ Will it be the same forever? Can I have more than one passion at the same time? You might be wondering. We’ll answer all these questions in this section.

Definition

Every and each of us has our own definition for passion, our own unique perspective. That’s the beauty of human diversity. From the writer’s perspective, and in alignment with the *1 English Oxford Dictionary, passion has a twofold meaning (excluding the sexual love one). The first has to do with the ”being” of passion and the second one with the ”doing”:

1. ”Being” definition: Passion is the unique and powerful feeling of aliveness and fulfillment, evoked by the behavior expressed in any stimulus that puts you in a state of ”flow” while serving a purpose greater than yourself. In other words, the feeling you have when you do anything that a) Puts you in the ”flow”, making you lose track of time, and b) Serves a purpose greater than yourself.

1. ”Doing” definition: Passion is the behavior generated by any stimulus that puts you in a state of flow while serving a purpose greater than yourself. Here passion is the behavior which a) Comes from any stimulus, a specific activity/action, that puts you in a state of ”flow” and b) Serves a purpose greater than yourself.

On the other hand, it’s equally important here to underline what passion is not. Passion is not a:

1. Job
2. Strong interest/ interest/Hobby you love
3. Goal

It can be expressed through all the above though: You can do work you’re passionate about; have a hobby that ignites your passion more than any other and you would love to be doing 24/7; a small or strong interest on something that might trigger and lead to your passion; or it can help you achieve a big goal or dream you fiercely desire. Nevertheless, it’s none of the above. Let’s have a closer look at every one of these distinctions:

1) Passion – Job

Passion is not a job nor a career. Remember what we’ve just mentioned in the definition? It’s a feeling evoked by any stimulus that puts you in the” flow”. A job, whether it’s a dream job or not, can certainly be a stimulus for your passion. But it’s not the only one. Are all the activities and things we love to do jobs? Of course not. For example, your passion might be to help people to express themselves through music. You can get paid by teaching them how to play a specific instrument (job), but you can also help them as a volunteer or by writing a blog to educate them on the value of music for self-expression, as well as encourage them to try out playing a musical instrument (unpaid activity).

Besides the profit factor, there’s more on this. Passion is much broader as a meaning than a job because the last one is only a stimulus, a specific activity that evokes it.  Passion is broader not only because it’s a feeling as we’ve said before, but also a behavior, given its second definition. And a behavior is broader than a specific activity, a stimulus, by definition. * 2 Behavior is the way in which one acts or conducts oneself, especially towards others. The way in which one conducts oneself is a result of a repetitive series of specific actions. And it’s the common characteristics of these specific actions that form a certain behavior.  * 3 Aristotle, the famous Greek philosopher, articulated this point both elegantly and clearly:

” Furthermore, the genesis of every virtue, as well as its degeneration, have the same source and are generated by the same means – just as it is in arts: by playing the guitar become both the good and the bad guitarists; so do the builders and all the others: by building the houses in a good way they’ll become good builders, but by building them in a bad way they’ll become bad; if this was not the case, there would be no need for a teacher, and everyone would be good or bad by birth. Same applies for virtues: by doing what we do in our day-to-day affair with other people, some we become just and others unjust; moreover: by doing what we do in dangerous and dire circumstances and getting used to feeling fear or courage, others we become valiant and others coward.

Same is true for desires and rage: some become prudent and serene and others imprudent and irritable, the first ones by behaving this way under these circumstances and the others in the opposite way. In short, habits are generated by the repetition of similar actions.”

So, a behavior is not an action, activity or stimulus, but the result of repetitive actions, activities and stimuli. Therefore, a job is a specific activity that generates the passion as a behavior. Not the behavior and passion itself.

” So that means that there’s the possibility for me to have more than one activities that generate my passion?”, you might wonder. Absolutely yes! In fact, there are infinite activities as ways to express your passion. These activities, or stimuli, are called your passion expressions. They are ways through which you manifest your passion as a behavior. For example, in our previous scenario, we assumed that your passion is to help people to express themselves through music. The behavior here is to help people express themselves through music. But how can you do that? How can you help them express themselves through music? These are your passion expressions. Specific activities that put you in a state of flow, and their only limit is your imagination. In this case, you can express your passion by:

1. Teaching people how to play the guitar.
2. Teaching them how to play the piano, or any other musical instrument.
3. Writing a blog, book or articles about the value of music for self-expression.
4. Simply discussing and sharing with them your own unique experience to encourage them to give it a go.
5. Starting a band to give concerts.
6. Starting a record label business.
7. Singing
8. Becoming a professional singer.
9. Becoming a voice coach.
10. Becoming a music manager.
11. Composing or becoming a music composer.
12. Teaching others how to compose/become music composers.

And the list could go on and on up to the end of this book as you can imagine. Let’s take the writer’s personal example: My passion is to empower and inspire people to find their passion at work. Currently, am manifesting this in various ways (passion expressions):

1. One-to-one career mentoring on career clarity and development.
2. One-to-one professional life coaching.
3. Designing and developing well-being and strengths-based initiatives and strategies for organizations.
4. Public speaking, online or on-site, by delivering talks on career guidance and development.
5. Volunteering as career coach and advisor at NGOs that work with schools.
6. Blogging and writing this book!
7. Advocating for the value of passion at work in every discussion!

You got the point!

2) Passion – Interest

Your interests are not your passion. Passion, as we’ve just seen, is the feeling of aliveness and fulfillment, evoked by the behavior expressed in any stimulus that puts you in a state of ”flow”, or the behavior itself. When you’re in a state of ”flow”, you create the opportunity to fully express your entire being! Such is the power of passion. On the other hand, interest is just a subtle approach to your passion – not the passion itself. For example, I have an interest in basketball and running. I do love them, and most of the times I do enjoy them. Nevertheless, I can imagine my life without them, and still be ok. It won’t be easy either, but I could deal with it by finding alternatives. Besides that, I cannot imagine myself running or playing basketball 24/7, or at least most of the time. Of course, I don’t imply here that, if you don’t want to do something 24/7, 7 days a week, 4 weeks a month, year-in year-out, you’re not passionate about it. But I do want to pinpoint here that a) this feeling of a strong desire to do something 24/7 – let’s call it hunger – married with b) the radical belief that ”I can’t imagine my life right now without it”, or that ”I would be feeling empty every single day for the rest of my life” are key attributes and evidence of passion. These key attributes do not apply to an interest, small or big.

Nevertheless, an interest can be developed further into a passion expression, or even your passion itself. For example, I have just an interest in writing. I’m curious about it, but definitely cannot declare excited nor passionate about it. I did decide to start creating online self-help videos and write this book though, because they’re great ways for me to express my passion: Empowering and inspiring people to find their passion at work. Same applies for the previous passion expressions examples we’ve mentioned. So, an interest itself cannot be your passion, but it can evolve into a passion expression, or even passion, under the right stimuli and circumstances.

”Ok Jim. Got it. So, what are interests?”, you might think. You’ll get your answer later on.

3) Passion – Goal

Although discovering and pursuing your passion are goals, passion itself is not. As a feeling and behavior, you can’t achieve it once and then brag about it. You need to work on, live and follow your passion day-in day-out, or at least be consistent. A goal is a result we desire whereas passion is the process of accomplishing the desired result. A goal is also the destination of a journey. Passion is the journey itself. Last but not least, passion is one of the most powerful fuels to reach our goals and destinations.

Passion’s Nature

So, what’s the nature of passion? Passion’s nature is defined by its core:

1. Components
2. Qualities

1. Components 

First of all, there are 6 key components which your passion consists of:

1. Values
2. Purpose
3. Vision
4. Interests
5. Favorite Strengths
6. Favorite Skills

Remember that any of them can change overtime, because you and your personal circumstances change. So does your passion. All your passion’s components have two main qualities. They’re: a) Dynamic and b) Unique; exactly as your passion. In other words, they can change anytime in the future and are personal, exclusively defined by you; your life circumstances, your mentality, your being. You’ll discover all your passion key components once we go through the ”Find Your P.A.S.S.I.O.N” method later on. For the moment, have a look at the Passion Awareness model:

1. Values

What are your core values? What do you value most in your life right now? Is it family? Love? Fun? Adventure? Justice? Equality? Environmental protection? Your values, as every component of your passion, are completely personal. That means not only that they have to do with you, which is quite obvious, but most importantly they’re defined by you. That is, they can be anything you value. Your imagination is your single limitation. For example, my top 3 values are: 1) ”Think & Play Big” 2) Mastery 3) Adventure. You’ve got the point. Therefore, remember these two takeaways:

1. You define your core values.
2. Your values can be different from others’. If they’re, respect them.

      2. Purpose

Your purpose is a core element of your passion. It’s your calling, your destiny, your social contribution, your mission, your legacy to this world – you name it! Again, remind you it’s dynamic and unique for you. It can change and it’s your purpose – not just a purpose. Nowadays, you might hear a lot about the importance of serving a purpose at work, and in your life in general. Although serving a purpose does give you meaning in work and life, this does not mean that you don’t have a personal one. Why is this significant to consider? Because serving your purpose is even more meaningful and fulfilling for you than serving a purpose; that is someone else’s purpose. ”But if I do work that is already meaningful for me, would it be worth to search for and serve my purpose? Does it make such of a difference?”, you might wonder. Absolutely yes. Not only does it make a difference in your work and life, but it’s also a big one. For example, let’s say your employer’s purpose is ”To give everyone the power to create and share information without barriers”. Although it’s a great and quite meaningful purpose in general, your purpose is  ” To make humans multi-planetary species”, or ”To help people reach, and go above and beyond their limits”. Every and each of these purposes is great but their source and basis are different. The first is based on social networking, relationships and communication. The second on the future of humanity and human colonization at space. The last one on the maximization of human potential. You see the difference? And there’s no good or bad purpose, right or wrong. There’s just your purpose.

Without purpose, you don’t have passion. Unlike passion expressions, purpose is broader than passion as a meaning. Your purpose is your ”Why”. Why you do what you do? Your passion is your ”What”. What do you do to serve your purpose? And your passion expressions are your ”How”. How exactly do you serve this purpose? What specific activities do you do to serve it? Given this, the following scheme can help you capture better the relations among purpose, passion and passion expressions and how they interact to one another: 

3. Vision

Your vision is your life vision. What is your ideal situation in every area of your life? What do your ideal career, finances, personal relationships, free time, environment, health, personal growth and legacy look like? Feel like? Sound like? Taste and smell like? How does a life of abundance, where even your wildest dreams have come true, look like? This is your life vision, dynamic and unique as well.

4. Interests

Here’s a list of interests examples as promised:

• Things you’re curious for.
• Things you’d like to try but never tried.
• Things you used to like for a specific time period.
• Things you tried out just once, and never tried them again. Reasons can vary: criticism, circumstances, other priorities, lack of time, health, etc.
• Things that are completely unknown to you, but if you have the opportunity or right stimulus to try them out, you would be interested in exploring them further.
• Your ”secrets”: Things you do when you’re completely alone or/and when you know that nobody will be able to find them out.
• Things you care about.
• The opposite things of those you dislike/despise.
• Things you liked/loved to do when you were a child.
• Your biggest and painful experiences and challenges.

The last one is called ”post-traumatic growth”, as opposed to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). *4 It’s a positive psychological change experienced as a result of adversity and other challenges in order to rise to a higher level of functioning. These circumstances represent significant challenges to the adaptive resources of the individual, and pose significant challenges to their way of understanding the world and their place in it. Post-traumatic growth involves “life-changing” psychological shifts in thinking and relating to the world, that contribute to a personal process of change that is deeply meaningful.  You see, it takes maximum duress for us, as people, to take a step back and out of our routine and begin to question the decisions we made and the reality of everything we have believed so far. Our mind will spend no energy to reorient itself to get a new, different point of view about life. A point of view that can change our entire life for the better. The necessary personal growth someone might need usually occurs when they’re up a against a major obstacle and challenge in their life.

Is it really true? Absolutely yes. Regarding my personal experience, had been studying relentlessly for 7 years of my life to enter a field that was light years away from my passion. Two years to enter Law school and five years for my degree. Never had I experienced such an emotional struggle and void in my life. On the other hand, I was also blessed and fortunate enough for experiencing exactly this pain, emptiness and despair. Why? Because it made me learn from this mistake, made me stronger, as well as gave my life a deeper meaning and a global vision: To inspire 3 billion people in 195 countries by 2060 to find their passion at work.

Should you like to read more post-traumatic growth examples, just have a look at the life of almost every extremely successful and passionate individual at a global scale. Everyone of them has experienced some sort of post-traumatic growth due and thanks to their life adversities.

Tony Robbins, one of the greatest life and business strategists in the world, was raised in a family environment of violence and abuse. Mike Tyson, one of the greatest boxers of all times, lived throughout in and around areas with a high rate of crime, such as in Brownsville, Brooklyn, New York. By the age of 13, he had been arrested 38 times, and lost his mother at the age of 16. Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, was ousted out of his own business by John Sculley and Apple’s board. This left him feeling betrayed and depressed but he did not let that get to him for too long, as later on he returned to Apple as CEO. Jim Carrey, one of the greatest comedic talents alive today, was just a boy when his father lost his job. With no steady income, his family eventually lost their home, and was living out of a van. Carrey also quit high school at the age of 15 to take a job as a janitor to help support his family. Nelson Mandela, one of the greatest peacemakers, political leaders and philanthropists of all times, lost his father at the age of 12. As if his father’s loss was not painful enough, he spent in total 27 years in prison, ending up dismantling the apartheid regime and introducing multiracial democracy as the first President of South Africa.

       5. Favorite Strengths

What are your natural talents? What comes naturally to you and you’re good at? What are your aptitudes and temperament? All these consist your strengths. Out of these, which are your very favorite ones? These that you enjoy or love using most? Most of the times, if not always, your passion does include one or more of your favorite strengths and talents.

     6. Favorite Skills

What are your hard and soft skills? Generally, what are the things you’ve done in the past for a specific time period, regardless of what they are? Your skills are every knowledge you’ve acquired throughout your life by frequent implementation. In other words, your ”hands-on” learning and experience. Out of your current skill set, which skills you love or enjoy utilizing most? These are your favorite skills. On the one hand, they can be great indications of your passion as passion expressions. On the other hand, they can demonstrate no indication for what you’re passionate about, given that your passion and passion expression might be completely different from your current skill set. For example, one of my passion expressions is career mentoring through public speaking. I can assure you that public speaking was definitely not a skill of mine when I discovered my passion. Nevertheless, developed it while following my passion to be able to express and serve it better.

Feel free to connect with me on Facebook and LinkedIn, as well as check my upcoming book ”Find Your Passion”, by visiting my personal site JimPanos360.com

*1 See definitions 1.1: ”A state or outburst of strong emotion”  & 1.4: ”A thing arousing great enthusiasm” https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/passion

*2 See English Oxford Dictionary https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/behaviour 1103b8 – 1103b20

*3 Nicomachean Ethics, 1103b8 – 1103b20: ἐκ τῶν αὐτῶν καὶ διὰ τῶν αὐτῶν καὶ γίνεται πᾶσα ἀρετὴ καὶ φθείρεται, ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ τέχνη· ἐκ γὰρ τοῦ κιθαρίζειν καὶ οἱ ἀγαθοὶ καὶ κακοὶ γίνονται κιθαρισταί. ἀνάλογον (10) δὲ καὶ οἰκοδόμοι καὶ οἱ λοιποὶ πάντες· ἐκ μὲν γὰρ τοῦ εὖ οἰκοδομεῖν ἀγαθοὶ οἰκοδόμοι ἔσονται, ἐκ δὲ τοῦ κακῶς κακοί. εἰ γὰρ μὴ οὕτως εἶχεν, οὐδὲν ἂν ἔδει τοῦ διδάξοντος, ἀλλὰ πάντες ἂν ἐγίνοντο ἀγαθοὶ ἢ κακοί. οὕτω δὴ καὶ ἐπὶ τῶν ἀρετῶν ἔχει· πράττοντες γὰρ τὰ ἐν τοῖς συναλλάγμασι (15) τοῖς πρὸς τοὺς ἀνθρώπους γινόμεθα οἳ μὲν δίκαιοι οἳ δὲ ἄδικοι, πράττοντες δὲ τὰ ἐν τοῖς δεινοῖς καὶ ἐθιζόμενοι φοβεῖσθαι ἢ θαρρεῖν οἳ μὲν ἀνδρεῖοι οἳ δὲ δειλοί. ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ τὰ περὶ τὰς ἐπιθυμίας ἔχει καὶ τὰ περὶ τὰς ὀργάς· οἳ μὲν γὰρ σώφρονες καὶ πρᾶοι γίνονται, οἳ δ’ ἀκόλαστοι καὶ ὀργίλοι (20), οἳ μὲν ἐκ τοῦ οὑτωσὶ ἐν αὐτοῖς ἀναστρέφεσθαι, οἳ δὲ ἐκ τοῦ οὑτωσί. καὶ ἑνὶ δὴ λόγῳ ἐκ τῶν ὁμοίων ἐνεργειῶν αἱ ἕξεις γίνονται.

* 4 See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posttraumatic_growth