Passion & Work

I just read this and I bet that it exactly defines how many of us feel about our life, career and passion. I know I’m not alone in this.

Debbie Millman talked about how she feels after years and years of working in a safe path instead of following her passion to do what she likes. Very inspirational and worth reading. I keep reading it over and over again, I’m almost setting it as a mantra.

I showed to my friend and she said “it’s amazing but real life is different.”
She’s right, somehow though! Most of us have a false conception of dreams and imagination. We build an picture of the life we wish to live, yet we do not go the extra mile and think of the path that will lead to that. So dream on if you think that way.

You love to do something, but you got all these responsibilities and expectations that it’s just almost impossible to do what you love. I still think you lack some sort of dedication towards that thing you. How? You owe yourself a lot if you have a dream and you’re not dedicating your life to it, at least a little tiny bit of your life, I’m talking about four hours a day, one hour! Anything.
It’s your talent that’s going to waste and sinking if you don’t out it to use.

What does it take? 
dedication
practice
self-learning
patience

 ( Look Both Ways: Illustrated Essays on the Intersection of Life and Design i)
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/05/15/debbie-millman-look-both-ways-fail-safe/

“For most of my life, I followed a safe path. I remember in vivid detail, the moment I began the journey. August 1983, the….I lingered at the intersection peering deep into my future, contemplating the choice between secure and the uncertain, between the creative and the logical, the known and the unknown.

I dreamt of being an artist and a writer, but in as much I knew what I wanted, I felt compelled to consider what was reasonable in order to safeguard my economic future. Even though I wanted what my best friend once referred to as “the whole wide world,” I thought it was prudent to compromise. I told myself it was more sensible to aspire for success, that was realistically feasible, perhaps even failure-proof. It never once occurred to me that I could have it all.all all”

“I’m not profoundly unhappy with what has transpired in the years leading up to today; most days I consider myself lucky that I have fun, secure job and a good paycheck. But I know deep in my heart that I settled. I chose financial and creative stability over artistic freedom, and I can’t help but wonder what life would be like if I has made a different decision on that balmy night back in the west village.

I’ve come to a realization over the years: I am not the only person who has made this choice. I discovered these common, self-imposed restrictions are insidious, though they start out simple enough. We begin by worrying we aren’t good enough, smart enough or talented enough to get what we want, then we voluntarily live in this paralyzing mental framework, rather than confront our own role in this paralysis. Just the possibility of failing turns into a dutiful self-fulfilling prophecy. We began to believe that there personal restrictions are in fact, the fixed limitations of the world. We go on to live our lives, all the while wondering what we can change and how we can change it, and we calculate and recalculate when we will be ready to do all the things we want to do. And we dream. If only. If only. One day. Some day.”

“every once in a while- often we encounter someone more courageous, someone who chose to strive for that which (to us) seemed unrealistically unattainable, even elusive. And we marvel. We swoon. We gape. Often, we are in awe. I think we look at these people as lucky, when in fact; luck has nothing to do with it. It is really all about the strength of our imagination; it is about how they constructed the possibilities for their life. In short, unlike me, they didn’t determine what was impossible before it was even possible.

John Maedo once explained, “The computer will do anything within its abilities, but it will do nothing unless commanded to do so.” I think people are the same- we like to operate within our abilities, but whereas the computer has a fixed code, our abilities are limited only but our perceptions. Two decades since determining our code, and after 15 years of working in the world of branding, I am now in the process of rewriting the possibilities of what comes next. I don’t know exactly what I will become; it is not something I can describe scientifically or artistically. Perhaps it is a “code in progress”.

The grand scheme of a life, maybe (just maybe) is not about knowing or not knowing, choosing or not choosing. Perhaps what is truly known can’t be described or articulated by creativity and logic. Science or art- but perhaps it can be described by the most authentic and meaningful combination of the two poetry. As Robert frost wrote a poem “begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, homesickness, lovesickness. It is never a thought to begin with.”

Start with a big, fat lump of throat, start with a profound sense of wrong, a deep homesickness, or a crazy love sickness, and run with it. If you imagine less, less will be what you undoubtedly deserve. Do what you love, and don’t stop until you get what you love. Work as hard as you can, imagine immensities, don’t compromise, and don’t waste time, start now. Not 20 years from now, not two weeks from now. Now.”