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

I had some more thoughts....

[myalexandria.livejournal.com]

1) Know thyself. This might seem kind of obvious -- you have to in order to know what you want to do, passion-wise -- but there are a lot of other things you need to know about yourself. The whole idea is that life is too short to be unhappy and afraid, but if you're going to work with that, you need to know what makes you unhappy. Do you need regular exposure to nature? Do you need to have a friend to introduce you around? You could make a mental list to help you figure out where you can cut corners and where you really need to invest your soon-to-be-limited resources. (All this advice assumes your passion isn't, say, computer programming or investment banking. YMMV.)

2) have a fall-back plan, but don't make it too easy to get to. I think it's helped, during my darkest days, to be aware in the back of my mind that I could always pack it all in and go home to mom and dad. I would've felt like a huge failure, but it was THERE, you know? I could joke about starving in the streets but it was never going to be a reality.

3) bathe frequently and get enough sleep. You'll feel more confident.

4) For God's sake, don't get addicted to anything. And don't let your dumbass colleagues peer-pressure you into smoking up on the job. In fact, be the kind of person who is secure enough in yourself that it is impossible to peer-pressure you into doing anything you don't really want to do. (If you are not naturally this kind of person, then act as if you thought you were, which is almost as good; the trick is to do it without appearing to be self-righteous.)

5) Understand about credit. This is another know thyself thing; I was much more conservative with my credit-card spending than I really needed to be, and I regret not blowing a little more nonexistent cash on things like travel, back in the day. But I can say that, because I'm the kind of person that would probably not ever ruin my credit, you know? It would never *occur* to me not to make at least the minimum payment every month, and it would never *occur* to me to run up a full $40,000, both of which I've seen a number of people do. I don't think I was ever over, say, $6000, even at the worst point. If you are indeed the kind of person who is likely to ruin your credit, then either cut your cards up or give them to a more responsible person who will vet your potential purchases for you. But anyway, I think a judicious amount of debt-spending is worth it -- if, say, you want to go back to school, or to move across the country or the ocean, or fund your toothpaste and groceries while you work for free for six months, or whatever. Don't do it with no plan in sight for repayment, but be willing to invest in your own future.

6) Should you find yourself in a space where things just aren't happening and you see no way forward, either shake them up in some way, or use the dead time to read Dostoevsky or lift a lot of weights or go on long walks in places where you've never been. Don't just stare at the ceiling and wish you were a more interesting person. (This is the one piece of advice I've generally been unable to follow, though I do think I'm getting a little better at it.)

7) Be very prepared to roll with the punches and to hustle a fair degree.

8) It's NEVER too late to change your life and do what you want to do. I just met this guy in his mid-sixties who lived his whole life in Buffalo. I think he sold real estate or something. Anyway, about five or six years ago he decided that what he really wanted to do was move to New York and work in wardrobe on Broadway. (He had done some wardrobe work on the side in Buffalo for tours that came through.) And he did. He lives in a tiny apartment and works like a dog and goes out to dance in gay bars, and he's happy. He's really happy.

10) Be prepared to do what's necessary to get the job done, and to take things -- and deal with them -- as they come. (In my experience, this is where most people fail; luckily it's one of the things I'm best at.)

Re: I had some more thoughts....

[resonant8.livejournal.com]

These are all terrific advice. You should write a book. (I'm not entirely joking here; you've got excellent insights.)

bathe frequently and get enough sleep. You'll feel more confident.

And exercise. I'm amazed at how fast my optimism dries up when I don't.

Should you find yourself in a space where things just aren't happening and you see no way forward, either shake them up in some way, or use the dead time to read Dostoevsky or lift a lot of weights or go on long walks in places where you've never been.

I think sometimes you just have a fallow period, a time when your task is to collect new information, or to quietly let your subconscious work on what you've already collected. In my case the difficulty is being able to tell the difference between that and just being lazy.

Re: I had some more thoughts....

[myalexandria.livejournal.com]

hee! maybe I should do a bestselling help book. Except I doubt it *would* sell, because the ones that sell all seem to be "you can follow your dreams *and* get filthy rich!"

I saw the HP movie last night and it left me with a burning desire to reread Transfigurations for the 47th time. So I'm off to do that.

Hey! You should do a HP recs post. I could use some new reading material, and I totally trust your judgment.

Re: I had some more thoughts....

[resonant8.livejournal.com]

Who knows what it takes to make a self-help book sell. I'm surprised I've never seen one called Get Rich By Writing Self-Help Books!

I'm ashamed to say I'm reading so little HP -- mostly I follow lj user=painless-j>'s recs. Two recent discoveries whom I like very much are schemingreader and busaikko.

Re: I had some more thoughts....

[isiscolo.livejournal.com]

It's NEVER too late to change your life and do what you want to do.

This is so true, and it's really amazing to me how hard it is to get out of the rut and change your life, especially if it doesn't suck. In my case, back in the mid-1990s I had a well-paying, moderately interesting, undemanding, but not particularly exciting job - as did my husband, although his was much more demanding - in a great place to live, with a really cool house. In 1999 we quit our jobs, sold our house and everything in it, bought a sailboat, and went cruising around the Caribbean for over three years. Taking that leap was psychologically hard, but I've never regretted it.

And now it's a lot easier for me to take leaps, to change my life. Right now my stumbling block is your #1 - I have only vague ideas of what I want to do. Ironically, I have the time and money to pursue my passions - but I'm just wandering around aimlessly. Saying "oh, I want to write!" doesn't help me much while staring at a blank Word screen!

Re: I had some more thoughts....

[myalexandria.livejournal.com]

...wow, do you still have the sailboat? want to invite me out? :)

That sounds *amazing*.

I think it's been very true for me, that once I took one big leap and it turned out to be ok, other potential big leaps just don't fill me with the same anxiety. I'm like, eh, you know what, it'll be fine, whatever happens.