Yesterday, we looked at some ideas related to ‘passion’ and I gave you some real examples from my friends and students here in Murcia. I told you that today I would tell you about my dilemma with passion.

I quoted Sandoval in El Secreto de Sus Ojos: “The guy can change everything: his face, his house, his family, his girlfriend, his religion, his God, but there’s something he can’t change, Benjamin: he can’t change his passion.”

I discovered this was true in life long before I saw the film. About 10 years ago, in fact.

I spent five years travelling round Europe and living in different countries: like in the film quote, all the external stuff which is supposed to be important in life—friends, girlfriends, houses, country, language, job, culture—would change every six months or so. Spain, France, Sweden, Russia and the UK.

It was, as they say, a blast.

I also discovered, though, that there are certain things which do not change, however much all the rest of it does. Some of it was small stuff—I discovered a strong liking for running, red wine and long, deep conversations about life—as well as a subject which is very relevant to my thoughts this week about passion.

That, I thought, was me. I had started to work out who I was in this life.

Do you want a job that basically works or a life you really enjoy?

Then some life happened. Fast forward a few years, and that life has definitely seemed quite mechanical this past year, especially since the summer.

Also, I’m missing doing more languages. I need to get back into French, improve my Italian and start learning some new ones.

My professional life works, basically. I mean, some people—my clients, my students, new people who might become a student or a client—ask me for things: can you teach me some English/Spanish? Can you translate these documents for me? Can you proof read this article I’m going to publish? Can you come to our meeting and act as an interpreter for us?

A friend this week has even asked me if I can help his company start dealing with social media and blogs as a new sales and marketing channel for his company.

And what do I answer when my clients, students and friends ask me for help in this way? Well, I almost always say ‘yes’, of course! Everybody wins, basically: they learn some English or get their project completed on time, I generate a bit of income and do something which is more or less interesting and everybody normally learns some other new thing along the way as well.

I’ve even set up my blog and newsletter and forum around the idea of helping people learn more Spanish and English. I learnt to set up and run a small company based on all of these things.

I know how to translate, I know how to learn languages. I know how to teach languages. Apparently, I can write. I even learnt how to start a company, do the accounting and do some business. I’ve learnt about blogging and how social media work. I can blog and tweet and Facebook all day. But none of those things is my passion, in the sense that Vaynerchuk is on about in his book. They’re all skills. Useful, relevant skills, but skills nonetheless.

What should I be using those skills for? Which subject should be receiving the benefits of all of those skills?

But you’re doing okay for yourself, what’s the big problem…?

I shouldn’t be complaining, right? I do, after all, love helping people out and teaching them about the world. But is what I’ve been doing for the last few years—is teaching languages and translating and setting up my businesses like this—my passion?

Are they the centre of my passion, or are they just skills I’ve picked up along the way because that’s the way life has turned out so far? Are they the core or are they incidental?

Do I find myself voraciously devouring translation and language blogs every waking minute? Racing out of bed to check on the latest translation forum news? Constantly searching for the latest English-teaching techniques to help my students learn even more?

No, I don’t.

So what do I read all the time? Which subject keeps me awake until the early hours of the morning wanting to know even more, and really does make me want to get out of bed sometimes?

You might, by now, have thought that if I’m even thinking so much about this question, that’s answer enough: if I have to ask and think about it, clearly I’m not living my passion right now, right?

But what is it!?

“Spain” you might shout. “Spanish”. Why don’t you become some kind of Spain correspondent 2.0?

Sorry to disappoint, but no, it’s not Spain, although I know many of you associate me with Spain and Spanish by now.

I could see myself doing a Ustream.tv show about Spain, certainly, but it doesn’t work all the time, the concept of ‘Spain’ isn’t the umbrella under which all the rest of it fits for me.

And, as a student reminded me yesterday: “you’ve never been into stereotypical Spain: you’re not mad about learning to dance flamenco or play the guitar or something. That’s not what you talk about all the time.”

Likewise, I’ve never been into the whole ‘British expat’ scene; it didn’t start like that—I first came here to study Spanish with an ERASMUS grant to go deeper into Spanish culture—and it’s never been something I’ve gone looking for, although I’ve done some translation work for British expats and their lawyers over the years.

I don’t even know very many British or American expats here in Murcia.

No, the British expat scene is much better covered by other people.

The subject that won’t go away…

Yesterday, I told you that my friend Pedro’s big thing is politics, that some students of mine who are, respectively, a biologist, a receptionist and an accountant, get all excited about the sea and boats, Michael Jackson and esoteric philosophies.

But what is my passionate subject? Which subject do people who know me identify with me if I ask?

What is that subject that didn’t go away during five years of constant change? Which subject is it that hasn’t disappeared another seven years later? Which is the subject that, now I think about it, even stretches back into my late teenage years and through the years I was considering a career as a professional soldier?

For me, that subject is: current affairs. And probably more specifically, geopolitics and global developments which are affecting us all. So global current affairs. Global politics, history, life, law, economics, religion.

The big, serious and—to some people—boring stuff that’s really hard to think about. All the stuff you’re not supposed to talk about at the dinner table. How we all try and live together. The march of history, as it happens. How the great human ideas are playing out in our lifetimes in front of our noses.

That’s it. That’s my ‘subject that won’t go away’. The one I keep coming back to, year after year, time and time again. The one that distracts me from my ‘real’ job. The one I always end up talking about in my classes if my students are cunning enough to ask. The one I bore my friends with at the pub.

That’s why I can stay up all night watching what’s happening in Tunisia, Egypt and LIbya. That’s why I wrote about Bader and Waleed’s story.

That’s why I get excited about the possibilities of Al Jazeera’s live streaming iPhone app—and not, say, Angry Birds—because we can now watch all this stuff happening live most of the time and increasingly—via Twitter, Facebook, Skype and blogs—connect with whoever is participating in a particular piece of history, in real time.

And given that people are moved by ideas and that ideas often come from what we read, watch and the conversations we have with others, we all just moved closer to history, as it happens.

What does all this mean for what I’ve been doing up to now?

That is a very good question.

If all of the above is true, and if I believe Gary Vaynerchuk’s theories are worth putting into practice, quite a lot of what I’ve been doing up to now is going to change. Both in real life and online.

Much of what I’ve already done is directly relevant and can stay. Much of it is not and will change. The whole online community & business focus would change, obviously.

Would I continue to try and teach languages online? I don’t know. I don’t know if that would eventually be part of it or not.

Would I continue to translate and teach offline? For now, yes (I need to eat as well!!).

But the next step would be to just start posting and writing about what I’’m really passionate about, instead of what I’ve been trying to work with.

The whole main focus of my articles and online stuff would shift from translation and teaching languages to “geopolitics/world affairs”.

I would not only be writing stuff about big, global events but also be blogging about media, thought, religion, belief, philosophy, psychology, learning, communication, history, technology and the great conversation, as they relate to those events which are taking place in and shaping our lives.

What type of articles or content would I produce? I would have to look into that a lot, start from scratch and see what works best.

But the first thing is the passion.

Thanks for your time; if you’ve read this far, I would obviously appreciate your comments on this post.