Lately, I’ve been seeing something repeatedly that scares me, shocks me, shakes me to the core as both a person and as a creative career coach. During talks with clients, and in their written responses to the question, “What are you passionate about?” I started getting answers like these:
“I like a lot of random things but I’m not passionate about anything in particular. I think.”
“Is it OK to not feel passionate? I don’t think I’m passionate about anything.”
“ ” (Michelle’s note: Yes, it’s blank!)
“I always get stuck when it comes to questions about my passion. I guess I never really understood what it means.”
“Passion is a really loaded word for me. I don’t like to use it.”
Now, as someone who spent my early adulthood (and lots of time, energy, and money!) chasing a passion to be on Broadway, and who then, when I finally came to terms with not wanting to pursue an acting career, made it my one and only mission to find a new passion and make that into a career—I was floored. Flummoxed. Flamoozled. Also, confused. I mean, people decide to work with me because they want to find a career that they love, that is aligned with their skills, interests, and values as grown-ups. Why the heck would you spend your hard-earned money on working with me and not believe that you can find a passionate career, nonetheless that passion even exists?
So, in addition to getting feedback from my clients, I took this question to the streets (in this case, “the streets” is my blog), and got amazeballs insight into many of the vampires that exist around the word “passion.”
There’s immense pressure that comes with your passion. If you decide you have a passion, then you must do it every day for the rest of your life, and you must stop doing everything else you like to do for the rest of eternity, because that’s how long you must work on your passion. Also, if you decide you have a passion and then “fail” at it, you must kill yourself because you’ll never be happy in your life. Ever. No matter what. Even if a money tree grew in your backyard and you never looked older than eighteen—even then.
