I know this might sound crazy, but passion has not helped me as much as it should have at this point in my life. On the contrary, it’s made me less disciplined, less creative, and has hurt my consistency. Passion has been my drug and I have become so dependent on it, that I don’t know how to succeed without it. I’ve lived my entire life trying to be as passionate about things like powerful leaders such as Barrack Obama, Bill Gates, and especially Martin Luther King Jr. One big thing I always missed was that, although they were very passionate about what they were doing, passion was not the first thing to drive them to do what they do. Crazy, right?

A little bit of a back story with me; I started working at my job when I was 19. It was only my second job ever and I wanted to make an impression. I noticed that people were able to move up fairly quickly and my ego was stroked pretty hard, which only made me believe I could rise to the top because I thought I was smarter than everybody. So, that’s what I made my mission out to be. I started talking to people like I was smarter than I actually was. I received my first promotion about 8 months after starting as a teller. I was only in the next role for about 2 months until I got to have my own desk and help people with their basic finances. It was great. I had all the passion in the world throughout those first two roles and the first year of my third role. It was even easy. Then it suddenly happened; it got difficult. I was starting to get frustrated and wanted desperately to find a new challenge before I started to suck at my current one. The truth was that it was much more difficult to stand out in this role than in my previous ones. The leader that bought into me from day one was not there anymore and I was struggling to show how I could be good to my new leader. I started applying at jobs outside of the company to see if I could get luck elsewhere. Even though I didn’t know it, I was looking for a place to find a passion once again. My passion had dried out in the difficult times. 

I stayed in that role for three years. No longer considered, “the wonder kid” in my own head. I was spoiled and almost even entitled. I thought I was more than what my work showed for itself. I ended up applying for a role in a different line of business. No longer did I want to stick around and be considered average in something that wasn’t giving me a purpose. The job that I ultimately was offerred was a lateral move, but it would teach me something completely new, plus the schedule was sweet. Only a week passed by, and I HATED it. It was the worst role I had ever worked in and mind you, I worked with children at Chuck E Cheese 40 hours a week as a 17 year old. The job consisted of taking phone calls at all times, servicing clients. I was good at it, but I was not feeling fulfilled. I thought I was above that task by a mile (my ego was out of control). The training lasted approximately six months and the first week after training I reached out to a former boss to kindly ask what was available back in the outside world. The universe was really looking out for me, because I received a response the same day which asked if I wanted to take a leadership role I had been wanting before. So 8 months after I started that servicing role, I went back to where it all started. I jumped on that opportunity so quick. The good news was that I found the passion again. The bad news was that it only lasted for so long. 

Since that time I’ve gotten into a new role which I was very passionate about for a very long time, and now that the passion has died down, I have become more conscious about how my work begins to decline once my passion dies. I’ve seen examples of this in my relationships, in my writing, and even in my hobbies. It’s actually quite embarrassing to share, but I think that it’s something that I’ve been needing to say out loud in order to change it. I have been in denial about it for a long time. 

What I have come to realize is that sometimes, not being passionate is a good thing. Being passionate takes away from the work that needs to be done in order to make any progress. I have lived my entire life being obsessed with finding something to be passionate about with what I am doing, but sometimes, there’s just actual hard work in front of me that needs to get done in order for me to succeed. That is not to say that I will not enjoy what I am doing, but that I will be disciplined enough to know that not everything comes easy and even if I am passionate about something there may be things on the way that require a tougher grind. I’m all for it. Bring it.