By Ava Kesler
When I hear the word, "passion," the first thing that comes to mind is an activity like drawing or reading. When I hear "passionate," I imagine strong emotion. In this article I will be explaining what I have discovered about the meaning of the words, "Your Passion."
It isn't as simple as your "hobbies"
Many times I have seen people encouraging you to decide what you like to do in your free time, calling this your passions. But if that were the case, my passion would be scrolling Instagram.
Passion is actually something that should give you purpose. It should require some kind of effort from you, and should result in a sense of self-fulfillment. This could describe anything though, including doing homework... so what really makes the difference?
Passion should come from your heart
When you are really passionate about something, no one has to tell you to do it. Passions really touch on an emotional level. They're like a bigger version of seeing a hurt baby animal and feeling the need to help it.
Why is my passion even important in the first place?
Passions are enjoyable. They prod you to explore new things in life, and you will discover things about yourself along the way. Depending on the scenario and how far you want to take it, you could even develop it into something even bigger on a community or larger scale to help others, for example, like MyMindsMap.
How is my passion supposed to help me decide on a career though
Good question. I want to be a doctor but that doesn't mean I currently treat sick people. Yes there are ways to gain experience and an understanding of the field, but this wouldn't originate as a passion. Sometimes our passions will not give us a direct path to a career.
Passions and how we cultivate them can provide insight into our approach to life. What direction you take it, what message you convey, what groups you support, how you do this, the skills you use, how you organize yourself, and the goals you make are all indicative of traits you have.
This can become helpful when it comes down to deciding where your strengths and weaknesses lay, in addition to what you enjoy most from these processes.
This sounds really cool and all, but how do I find my passion?
Sadly, you will not begin an activity and suddenly realize it's your passion. Part of what makes the "your' in "your passion" is that it lasts a long time, and that you develop a relationship with it.
I always loved ballet, but only after I created a program to teach kids ballet at a local church did I really discover my passion for it. It suddenly became such a bigger project to teach these kids than it was for me to go to class everyday, and the energy that I found myself putting into teaching them and watching them grow has made me realize how strongly I really feel about ballet. Not only this, but it has taught me things about myself, such as how important structure and organization are to me, and how I want to see others around me happy. It is after this that I can call ballet my passion.
In similar ways I have discovered that I am also passionate about school and mental health. Sure, I wanted good grades and I understood the mental health lessons taught in school one week in the year. I thought both of these things were important. But after time and growth, after creating this platform to express these subjects, I realize that these are my passions. Even after time developing MyMindsMap, I am still developing these passions. Every article makes me think differently and approach the world under a new light. I say all this in the hopes of giving you something more substantial than just the how-to format of the earlier part of the article. It can be hard to follow along such abstract ideas and suggestions, so hopefully these real life examples can provide insight on what makes a passion "your passion," and why it matters.
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