Recovery vs Discovery

Ignoring the fact that this video is a promo for a book about quitting your boring day job to do your dream job, the author, Jonathan Acuff, raises an interesting point: "Instead of asking 'What do I want to do with my life?' you ask, 'what have I done that I loved'"

Ok, remember when I wrote about waiting for lightning to strike? Well, lately I've been trying to think about it a different way. Rather than waiting around for inspiration to give me a smack in the face, I've been trying to actively find my passion by thinking of the things I'm good at and the things that interest me.

For example: I've always loved English. I love writing and reading, and I love studying and analyzing works of literature. Some people absolutely hate that (like my mom for instance - she'd rather be doing equations), but to me there's nothing better. I took four English classes in my last year of high school and that was the year I achieved the highest marks of my high school career. So when I went to college, I immediately signed up as an English major.

I didn't last very long though. I started to panic and think, what am I going to do with an English major? Teach? I don't want to teach! Part of the problem was that I hadn't done my research and I didn't realize that with a first degree in English I could have gone on to do virtually anything at the Masters level. Anyways, I panicked and switched majors, and I've regretted it ever since.

I realize now that I have always known exactly what I wanted to do in life. I want to write. Ever since I became literate, I've been writing or thinking about writing. I write when I'm happy and I write when I'm sad and I write when I'm bored. All I've ever wanted to do was to be a writer, but when it came time to make a decision about my future, I never seriously considered it as a career. "I could never make money at that," I thought to myself, "either I would be an amazing author or a starving mediocre author." I thought that I had to be J.K. Rowling or nothing.

But four years and a first degree later, my passion for writing hasn't changed. Like Acuff says, the process of finding my passion was more about recovery than discovery.
It's really a relief to let go of dreams that are not my own, dreams that have been imposed upon me by the expectations of society, or worming their way into my head on the wings of my parents loving encouragement. I know this is the right path because as soon as I made the decision to pursue it, I felt an abrupt dissipation of anxiety and doubt.

We all know someone who has a job they hate, a job that pays the bills but makes them miserable. You might be working at a job like that right now. Is it really worth doing something you don't love just to secure a steady paycheck? Don't get me wrong; I don't particularly want to starve for my craft, but don't you find that when you love something you tend to be successful at it? There are ways to make money while following your passion. In fact, I suspect that if you’re doing something you love, you are more likely to succeed.