Do you have a passion?

seamus wrote: »

Indeed, I've heard the opposite said by a lot of people - if you make a living out something you love, you may end up hating it..

So true.



<---My passion is animals and nature (go figure ) and my job is animal related, but totally different than what I thought I'd end doing as a kid. I have actually made a conscious choice not to go too far down the road of any area I'm involved in (job, rescue work, research, etc) as I have seen too many people "burn out" and literally HATE what they are doing.Far too many.

I've been accused of "not being ambitious enough", "sitting on the fence", "not passionate enough","not a real animal lover"...blah, blah, blah, from the very people who seem to be genuinely miserable about what they are doing in relation to animals.

I still love my job (13 years later), I love and hate the volunteer work i've gotten into (hate it because of the bad stuff you see).

I definitely need to up my game with keeping up to date on current knowledge and research (seriously lazy with that), but anyone who knows me, knows this area is my passion.

The only things that make me tick are childhood ones. Art, more realistically graphic design. I love the theory of it because I believe it is the perfect mixture of natural laws / structure and the infinite variance of the human mind.

Football. Played it all my life growing up until hit with mental illness which I haven't recovered from which has seen me almost completely living the life of a recluse. I will never forget the joys of running around a pitch and playing a great pass.

Comedy. In my limited social life it's always been my 'thing' to make people laugh. I wouldn't be known for it as much now, again, mental illness, but with people I'm comfortable with it's all I'm interested in - havin' an ould laugh. I have a memory as a kid from senior infants where one of the girls in the class was crying and even at that age I was called on as the class clown and did a funny news report (well was probably funny for a 4 year old).

Acting. Did it once when young and I still think it's the single moment of my life that I enjoyed myself completely doing it. I managed to portray Will Smith in the sixth class play. Now that I think of it I wrote most of the play as well. Good times!

And finally, the outdoors. Having this yearning for faux-freedom because of my isolation so camping and hiking would be cool but I haven't done either yet.

seamus wrote: »

Indeed, I've heard the opposite said by a lot of people - if you make a living out something you love, you may end up hating it.

A graphic designer for example, will eventually find themselves creating by-the-book stuff for conservative clients which neither challenges or interests them. By the time they get home they no have energy/enthusiasm for working on hobby pieces.

I guess there's probably an in-betweeny bit - when you start out, you're free and you do what you want. Then you get a job and you have to do what other people want you to do. But if you push past that or you get really lucky, you make a name for yourself and once again you get to do what you want, except this time people will pay you for it.
Many people probably get to the second part but then get bored and disillusioned and never get back to doing the good stuff.

Bill Watterson made a speech in 1990 to a graduating class, and recently another artist turned it into a Wattersonesque comic:
http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/18yg0u592h8qgjpg/ku-xlarge.jpg
(lyk if u cryd xx)

irish bloke wrote: »

A passion for beautiful women and fine wine. Sure that's what it's all about at the end of the day

And tell us irishbloke I suppose the closest you have got so far is a laptop and a bottle of buckfast.

GonzalezT1000 wrote: »

In order to gain a skill in any discipline it requires going through a period of frustration, those who persevere despite the frustration have often yield great dividends. If you look at the accounts of masters of disciplines throughout the ages they all got there through hard work and discipline. "Natural Talent" if such a thing exists is a much smaller factor than people think.

Einstein, Leonardo, Van Goeth, John Coltrane, Cesar Rodriguez, Darwin etc... There was nothing inherently special about any of them, they merely accessed a creativity and genius that is inside us all potentially. The hard part is putting thousands of hours of practice in learning your craft, once that groundwork is put in, then something special happens and you get access to the genius inside you.

Exactly my sentiments, well yours...