| Monday, February 28, 2011

Well, gang, this idea of your ‘passion in life‘ is much more transcendental than I thought it was a few days ago. More than one of my students today has come up to me with tears in her eyes to tell me that she’s spent all weekend thinking about her true passion in life.

People who have spent twenty or more years of their lives doing something which is not their passion, And they know it. And it hurts. And they know that their passion is still their, and that it always has been.

They came up to me with a look on their faces somewhere between disgust and excitement: “Why did you have to write those articles? Now I’m totally confused, thinking about what my true passion is!“

I’ve had more than twenty conversations like that about this subject in the last week.

I’ve learnt that it’s possible to uncover your passion in about 15 minutes, if you think about and honestly answer the following questions.

And I say ‘uncover‘ because your passion is already there waiting for you to pay it some attention again. It always has been and always will be. If you’re confused, you’re not listening enough.

But before telling you how to discover yours, it would be a good idea to clear up what is NOT your passion:

What is not your passion

1. If you’ve been making a list of things which it might be and you don’t know for sure which one it is, it isn’t any of the things you have on your list;
2. The passion we’re talking about is not romantic passion;
3. We are not talking about generally being passionate about everything in life;
4. Your passion is not the skills you have learnt to survive in life up to now;
5. Your passion is not your likes and tastes: you can have lots of these and they’ll change from time to time;
6. Your passion is not the stuff that you want: it’s not the house you want, or the car, or the computer or the trip;

Passion, as Sandoval said in El Secreto de Sus Ojos, is passion.

How to discover your true passion in this life—the 7 questions

Be honest…

1. Do you always—or often—talk about it with your friends and colleagues?
2. Does it—when you talk about it—make you physically change? Does it make you smile, sit up straighter, wave your hands around, change your tone of voice?
3. Have you always thought about it—since you were young or even a child?
4. Do you already spend—or have you already spent—time and money on it? Would you like to spend even more time and money on whatever it is?
5. Do you already have friends who share an interest in your passion?
6. Do you always or frequently think about, read about and watch stuff related to this subject?
7. If you publish or collect things anywhere—articles, blog posts, photo albums, even your Facebook page—are the articles, photos or objects related to this thing?

If you answer ‘yes‘ to all seven questions, that’s your passion. If not, keep thinking…