The Mindset That Will Help You Find Your Passion
Over time I’ve learned that the key to finding your passion is your own mindset. Those who are successful in building a career they love have the right beliefs, expectations, and attitude.
Rather than asking “How do I find my passion?”, we should be asking “What beliefs, expectations, and attitudes would lead me to finding my passion?”
If you don’t have the right mindset you’re going to feel frustrated, anxious, and possibly depressed when things don’t go your way. You’ll feel that any stray from the path is a complete waste of time and that you’re just not meant to find your passion.
With the proper mindset, when things go as expected, you won’t be phased. Concepts like “failure” or “wrong” won’t even apply since each experience is part of the process.
Patience
If you are expecting to find your passion next month, go find a different article. I’m not saying it’s impossible, hell, for all I know you might find it tomorrow. What I’m saying is expecting to happen soon can lead to frustration and ultimately quitting. If you expect to find your passion soon, and you make the slightest mistake, you’ll feel so far behind that you’ll just give up. You’re going to think “I don’t have time for mistakes!” But you do, all you have is time to make mistakes.
Also, if you don’t have patience, you’re going to have anxiety. If you are requiring that everything be fixed RIGHT NOW, it’ll only make you feel rushed. Bob Proctor said that “Patience is not the ability to wait, but the ability to have a good attitude while waiting.” Proctor was right. Patience has nothing to do with waiting and everything to do with attitude.
Age
Another topic related to patience is age. I often hear things like “I want to do this thing, but it’ll take two years, and I’ll be 32 by the time I finish!”
I’ll tell you a secret: You’re going to turn 32 (or 46, or 64) no matter what you do. And if you don’t take any risks until then, you’ll be in the exact same in three years, but older.
At some point you’ll wonder, “Am I making the right decision?” I wasted years doing this.
The reality is that you can’t know if you made the right decision until you make it. What you can know are the possible costs and benefits to each decision. You can weigh the worst case scenarios against the best possible outcomes. This way if you realize the decision wasn’t the best one, you will have a plan about what to do next.
Don’t try to predict your entire future
Often times people ask “Is this what I want to do for the rest of my life?” I’ve written before about terrible questions, and this is the worst of them all.
Whenever I asked myself this question it only caused anxiety. The question is too big and too vague. A better question to ask is “What am I most interested in during this phase of life?”
There are tons of examples of people who did things that weren’t what they were going to do for the rest of their life. Tim Ferriss got his degree in Asian Studies, then worked in sales, started a supplement company, moved to Buenos Aires to learn tango, wrote a book, on and on. If at any point he asked, “Is this what I want to do for the rest of my life?” the answer would have obviously been no. Early in his career he didn’t stick to the same thing for more than a couple years.
People who build a career that they love pursue what they are most interested in during that current phase of life. In this way, they take advantage of their current interests and are able to enjoy the work much more.
You don’t need to figure out the next thirty years. Life is serendipitous. Making a plan for the rest of your life would rob the joy and surprise from it.
Address your next one to three years, then assess your situation every few months as you go along.
Be kind to yourself
Forgive yourself for not knowing what you didn’t know when you didn’t know it.
At 18 you didn’t know that what you studied in college wasn’t what you really wanted. At the age of 20, you didn’t have the wisdom to know that your parents weren’t in the best position to give you advice. You didn’t know that the job you just took was going to suck.
For most people, scolding and talking down to themselves is the only method of motivation they have in their arsenal. But it’s a terrible strategy. It will sap you of the energy you need for the journey. You have to believe that compassion and understanding can get you not only just as far, but much further.
There are tons of benefits to being nicer to yourself, but one major one is you’ll be less afraid to try things. When you’re kind to yourself at each failure, the possibility of failure is much less daunting.
When you make a mistake, assess what led to the mistake being made, and how you might prevent it in the future. It’s best to do this by journaling with an actually pen and paper.
In the end, you have to realize that the main thing stopping you is your own mind. How you deal with uncertainty, mistakes, and going into uncharted territory will ultimately determine if you find the work you love.
This article was originally published on findfulfillingwork.org
