When I was in the 3rd grade, I remember my literature teacher telling us in the class that passion is a form of sickness that could lead to mental disease.
That hit me pretty hard. I was 9, but at that time I already had a very concrete opinion about passion. It was the ultimate force that drives us to pursue what we want, and definitely not a sickness.
Well, that idea changed recently.
I followed my passion blindly for years, and after achieving some goals related to it, that took over all my actions, took away my concern from other important things, and brought me to a very messy situation, almost to the point of homelessness.
The good side of it is that being in that spot made me realize some things. That made me conclude that there are two major life standards in media today.
The first one is the obvious and perfectly normal life, that one that he finishes the college, gets his 9 to 5 job, have a family, retire after 40 years and enjoy the last decade of his life doing things that he could have done before with more health and disposition. That's perfectly ok to many people, but this formula also keeps others away from their true potential.
The second side is the reckless, bold adventurer who risked everything, kept trying, trying harder, following her passion and nothing else, never giving up, and having a hard time, until someday a big turnaround happens. Somebody finally sees her, notices her, or maybe she finds the secret treasure, the formula, and suddenly creates something. Finally, fame, fortune, pleasures, and happiness comes in just one big load.
It happens. not very often, but happens.
The problem is that when we are too passionate, we see this as our definite future, that if we just follow our passion, things will materialize, we forgot about planning, about realism, about how many people are doing the same, how resources are getting more limited and how globalization increases the competition in any existent field of work, art, science, etc.
It is ok to have passion, but it's important to don't let this passion blinds us, and as my teacher Rosa said, makes us sick. We need to practice the detached, i.e., external and realistic point of view of whatever we are doing, which will help us us achieve our goals more reasonably. This passion we have will start to be seen more as a purpose, as a way to contribute to the world. We will see ourselves as professionals.
With this mindset, we will have cold blood to know when to take actions that are scary, difficult, or painful, and we will notice that just doing things recklessly is not always the better way.
Suffering for a reason is bravery, but suffering without a reason is stupidity. It just hurts us and the people that care about us.
We will start getting things done without destroying ourselves.