How To Find Your Passion

I cannot say it enough! We live in such a wonderful time – the digital/information age.

There are so many resources at our fingertips to learn and grow and create the life we have only dreamed about.

In an earlier post, I spoke about my childhood days with the Encyclopedia set that my mom bought, and being fascinated by the fact that I could go look up (almost) anything and learn about it. Well, for me, the internet is more than an extension of this and I love that I can learn as much as I want about any topic.

We always have a list of things we want to try, see or experience. Then there is the burning question of what should we be doing with our lives? What is our life purpose or what are our passions?

Is there a difference between your life’s purpose and your passion?

For some of us, it may very well be that our life’s purpose and our passion are one and the same, for others they may be different. I believe that discovering our passion, working on developing and finding ways to grow that passion can help us with our life’s purpose.

Let me explain.

For example, your life purpose may be to be a mother to your six children, to guide and support them towards fulfilling their duties on this planet. However, your passion may be cooking or baking. Through working with your passion, you can open your own catering business and bring in an income, to contribute to providing for your children’s future and setting them on the right path.

This is where passion and purpose work hand-in-hand.

I also believe that your life purpose will be fulfilled once you follow the path of your heart. What do I mean by this? If you go in a direction that does not feel good to you on an inner level – you have anxiety, or feelings of dread about something that you are about to do – you are not on the path of your heart. Yes, there may be times in life that we have fears about changing direction or trying new things, but what I speak about is more of the ‘bad feeling’ that we Trinidadians talk about.

A deep ‘knowing’ that it is not right for you.

So many of us are waking up every day just doing what ‘the man’ says we should do instead of doing our part in the world to awaken our passions and creativity and contribute positively to mankind.

How exactly do we find what our passions are?

Here are five ways that you can start discovering your own passions right now.

Journaling/ Self-Discovery

Start by finding a quiet place where you can sit by yourself and in a notebook or journal start writing. Write words pertaining to things that bring you joy. Write foods you love, music genres you listen to all the time, people you admire, things you enjoy pinning on your Pinterest boards, YouTube videos you love watching. Just pour all of you onto the page in no particular order. Even if you end up being repetitive, this is good, allow it to flow. The words and thoughts that keep popping up may be the ones that need the most attention.

Words may come to you like this:

Ella Fitzgerald songs
Old Wicker Furniture

Cooing Babies
Walking in the Rain
Vegetarian Pizza

Messy Hairstyles
Having tea with Aunty Pam
Recipes from around the world

Strategic Video Games
Camping and Hiking
Talking to Animals

Makeup Application

It may seem pretty random, but get it all out.

Next, examine what you have written and from this exercise, list the top twenty things that you want to experience in your life. From the above list it may be:

Furniture Restoration
Cooking Recipes from Around the World
Testing Strategic Video Games

Going Camping and Hiking with Family
Starting Your Own Line of Exotic Teas or Hosting Tea Parties
Becoming a Makeup Artist

Etcetera.

Further, list next to each experience, ways that you can make the experience manifest. For example, you may love watching makeup tutorials on Youtube.

You admire the creativity and artistry that goes into each and every look and you realize that you would like to try your hand at makeup application on other women. But you have no experience with shadows, contouring, highlighting etc. Your only real exposure to makeup is a lip-gloss you have had since high school and the mascara that your Aunty Pam gave you last Christmas.

You can then list ways to learn how to do makeup:

Watching more tutorials geared towards doing makeup on other people and best practices for having a successful makeup artistry business

Finding and doing reputable courses online
Going to beauty school
Becoming an apprentice to an experienced makeup artist in your local area

After doing this with all twenty items on your list, pick the top five that not only appeal to you greatly but are also doable in terms of cost-effectiveness and the time you have available to do it. Is it something that you can schedule after your usual workday? Or something that you can do online for a few hours after the children have gone to bed?

Focus on one at a time and make a plan.

Once that is decided, the next step is to START!

Just do what you need to do to accomplish what you need to accomplish!

I believe in investing in yourself. This is a process that you need to get your hands into to know what you like and what works for you. Don’t allow people to discourage and make you feel that you do not know what you are doing because you are trying out different things.

What did you like to do as a child?

There is such innocence in the life of a child. As children we view the world with wonder, look up at the stars and dream…well, at least that is what I did!

Memories of what we wanted to become as children or what activities interested us at that time (before society and circumstances moulded and conditioned us), can lead us to a path towards our passion.

I for example, always knew that I wanted to write a book or start a magazine…something along those lines. I enjoyed creative writing in school and I loved to read. In my first job, I took the initiative to write a report for my boss and she appreciated it. I actually used to look forward to going to my job just to write up the reports.

So, do some self-reflection. What did the child version of you like to do or always wanted to do? Once this is still in your heart to experience, then do what you must! Seek out how to get it done and do it!

Who do you admire for what they do?

Do you have a role model or someone that you look up to? An example may be Julia Child for sharing her cooking talent with the world or Iyanla Vanzant for rising through adversity to become one of the greatest inspirational speakers. Maybe it is your mother, grandmother or a teacher that you have encountered along your journey.

These people may also hold clues to what inspires you and brings gladness to your heart. Inspect the lives of your top inspirational women (and men) and find out what it is about them that resonates with you. Something in what they do or how they live their lives may be calling out to you to explore in your own life.

Create your perfect day

I love visualization. I first learned visualization techniques from authors like Shakti Gawain, Deepak Chopra and José Silva.

I believe that we spend so much time in ‘busyness’ that we do not sit in quiet and plan how we would like things to be.

Create your perfect day. Find a quiet place and sit in a chair with your back straight and your feet flat on the ground. Place your hands on your thighs. Close your eyes, take a deep breath, hold it for a count of five and exhale slowly. Do this about four times. Every time you exhale, allow all the stress and tension to drain away from your body. Feel your body becoming more and more relaxed with each breath.

Allow yourself to experience the silence and relaxation for about two minutes.

Next, visualize waking up from your bed, preparing for your day and then doing the things that would bring you joy throughout and satisfaction at the end of that day.

Include as much bright details and sensory input as possible. If baking fine artisan bread in your own bakery is part of your ideal day, allow yourself to smell the aroma of bread baking and wafting through the shop. Maybe even see customers coming off the street following the amazing smell of your delicious bread.

Allow the visualization to flow. Sometimes our subconscious mind will throw in things that we are not aware of that we want, and need, to be a part of our experience. Pay attention to the feelings, emotions and ideas that surface.

Ask someone close to you

I always believe that we do not need validation outside of ourselves to accomplish anything that we want to in life, but in this case, it is good to have a conversation with someone close to us – someone who knows us personally.

It could be a parent, sibling, spouse or even a best friend, ask them what they think you are good at. The answers may surprise you and it may be that you are overlooking or underestimating a talent that you have.

You may be great at offering advice and guidance, more so than the average person, and therefore you could look into becoming a life coach or a motivational speaker. You might be fantastic at telling stories or have a great sense of humour and you may be an excellent stand-up comedian.

So take the opportunity to get some feedback about your talents.

There is no better time than the present to start on your path to greatness, to discover who you really are and contribute your talents to the world!

As always, stay motivated!