As part of our work with students, we try to help them narrow in on their passions. Why? Because without understanding what you’re passionate about, you’ll never find yourself engaged and energized about what you do. And if you lack these things, it’s really hard to do great work. In my humble opinion, doing great work is really the only way to ever truly love what you do.
One of my favorite quotes about passion comes from Andy Stanley (pastor of North Point Community Church) who said, “a Passion allows us to experience ahead of time the emotions associated with our anticipated future.” In other words, a passion allows all of us to push through the inevitable crap that life will throw at us. Even after you find your “perfect” career, you will no doubt experience disappointments, failures, and setbacks. You’ll also find yourself doing certain tasks that don’t absolutely thrill you.
But at the end of the day, dealing with all this will still be worth it if you possess passion around what you do.
The common analogy we use for students is any professional sports team. The goal for a team is to win…not just a single game, but to win a championship. To get to that championship however, it requires a lot of stuff that is less than exciting. Drills, lifting weights, running miles and miles on end, skills development…the list goes on and on. A lot of athletes don’t jump with joy when they have to do these things leading up to game time. They just want to play. But they understand that these things are necessary to experience any sort of success at the most elite levels.
And so they push themselves through these activities –– not because they want to, but because they’re running purely on the “emotions associated with our anticipated future.” The teams that end up winning more often than not are the ones who can almost feel or taste the end goal. Their hunger for that championship fuels them the entire way. It helps them deal with the dull moments or trying situations of what is otherwise a dream career for them.
In the same way, passion does this for any other professional. Passion is the difference between doing great work and work that just has you going through the motions. It’s also the difference between sticking with something through thick and thin and hopping from one career to the next.
Passion isn’t the only ingredient that helps to define what your dream career is. But it IS the ingredient that ensures long-term sustainability in anything.
Do What You Love 