Tell me about yourself.

[resonant]

I'm suddenly struck with the desire to know how other people do the things that matter most to them, how they find and follow their passions.

How do you decide where your heart is? How do you carve out time and energy to pursue it?

Are you on a new road or one you've been following for a long time? What have you learned that could help others? What false starts have you made, what poor judgments? What have you compromised, and what do those compromises look like to you now?

Comments

[julad.livejournal.com]

Ahaha, I think asking this will just get you more questions than answers... *g*

I stumbled upon my path a long time ago, and I don't assume it's forever, but I think it's good for a few more years yet. I knew where I wanted to go, but I didn't have a map, and sometimes I got bad directions when I asked *g*, so I've come the long way. However, I don't mind, because the journey's been valuable and I've been getting closer all the time, traveling through interesting territory (although sometimes "interesting" as in, "May you live in interesting times," *g*).

My only real regret/compromise/stupidity, I think, is with finances, which I basically ignored (read: spent!), and that has limited my options and made things take longer and be harder than they would have been otherwise.

How do you decide where your heart is? How do you carve out time and energy to pursue it?

Basically I always tell people (for some reason people keep asking me!), follow whatever you're interested in, because you don't know all the crazy jobs and occupations and things that exist out there, and you can't see it until you're nearly there. It's sort of like, once you get into the ballpark you'll find out all the different places in the ballpark you could go. I also maintain that if you're in the right ballpark, sooner or later you'll stumble onto what it is you really want (or it'll pounce on you), and at least in the meantime, wherever you currently are, it'll have some resemblance to where you want to be, and you'll be learning things that will help you when you figure out where to go. I think following your interests is the only way to collect pieces that will fall into place later, and if they don't, well, at least they're pieces you're glad to have around.

To me, to decide where your heart is, you pay attention to things you want to improve, change, solve. When you want to rip something out of somebody's hands or push them out of the way and do it yourself or make it how you think it should be, that's something you care about. Things that really shit you and that you wish you yourself could do something about, they're like lights, and the shape those lights make is a passion.

Once you're following a passion, I think, you find ways to pursue it. It's not necessarily easy to pursue, but it's apparent what you need to do, and from there you can decide how you need to do it - start with small changes; make a big change, whatever. You can make progress, both because you're getting closer to what you want and because the path itself is rewarding to travel.

The other thing I'd add is, sometimes you need somebody who knows you well enough to deconstruct all the choices you've made, pick you apart, ask you some hard questions. (Ha, like a beta for your life! *g*) Because in my experience a lot of people have locked their passion away for some reason - fear, family expectations, self-image, whatever - and it's less a matter of discovering what their passion is, and more one of admitting that their passion exists.

[resonant8.livejournal.com]

People keep asking you that for the same reason people keep wanting you to beta stories: You're good at asking the right questions and focusing on the heart of the matter. Like this:

To me, to decide where your heart is, you pay attention to things you want to improve, change, solve. When you want to rip something out of somebody's hands or push them out of the way and do it yourself or make it how you think it should be, that's something you care about.

This is excellent.

Because in my experience a lot of people have locked their passion away for some reason - fear, family expectations, self-image, whatever - and it's less a matter of discovering what their passion is, and more one of admitting that their passion exists.

Well, your passion is where if you fail it really matters, isn't it? I don't really care that I wasn't a very good journalist, after all.