Chapter Ten - Passion and Purpose

Part Two

Chapter Ten Passion and Purpose

The two most important days in your life: The day you were born and the day you find out why with passion and purpose — Dr. P. Madhurima Reddy

Dr. P. Madhurima Reddy

“Passion is the genesis of genius.” —Tony Robbins “If you can’t figure out your purpose, figure out your passion. For your passion will lead you right into your purpose.” — Bishop T.D. Jakes

Are We Passionate in Life?

How happy or satisfied are you with your life? Are you finding something missing in your life? Do you wish to find out what can make you lead a more positive, healthier, and happier life? How happy or satisfied are you with your life? Are you finding something missing in your life? Do you wish to find out what can make you lead a more positive, healthier, and happier life? Why are some people always happy, exuberant, successful, and celebrating, and why do some people appear to be dissatisfied, unhappy, unhealthy, and constantly in a state of misery? Out of billions of people that have been born on the earth, why do we find only a few thousands that have achieved greatness? Why are only 2% people actually leading meaningful, joyful, and successful lives, while the remaining 98% are just living dreary, languishing and perhaps, at the most, compromised, and complacent routine lives? We often hear statements like 'I am passionate about my work, she is living her passion, he spoke with great passion, or he loved her passionately, he is not passionate about his career, he made a passionate appeal, or I have great passion for cooking or travelling, or reading or painting or cricket or chess or dogs etc… ' So, what do you understand from such remarks?

How do we define passion? Howsoever it may be defined, simply put, passion is an extremely strong emotion, a kind of burning enthusiasm to do something, or an intense feeling for something or someone, which usually becomes a compelling force in pursuit and achievement of that objective. Passion can also indicate an extreme degree of suffering an individual is willing to undergo to achieve something he loves or desperately desires to achieve. In terms of romance and intimacy between people, passion indicates a great affinity between partners and an extreme degree of fondness, love, and constant craving for each other.

In other words, passion is an important part of our lives, and those who realise their passion and work towards their goals with passion, will inevitably find success and joy, with the result that their lives are most rewarding, accomplished and fulfilling. Extraordinary people are ordinary people who did everything with a great passion and a purpose and thus became extraordinary. When we learn their passion, we become them. The 18th Century French Philosopher and Writer Denis Diderot describes Passion as: "Penchants, inclinations, desires and aversions carried to a certain degree of intensity, combined with an indistinct sensation of pleasure or pain, occasioned or accompanied by some irregular movement of the blood and animal spirits, are what we call passions. They can be so strong as to inhibit all practice of personal freedom, a state in which the soul is in some sense rendered passive, whence the name passions. This inclination or so-called disposition of the soul, is born of the opinion we hold that a great good or a great evil is contained in an object which in and of itself arouses passion." So how do we know if we are passionate about anything or not? Most people are extremely good at doing a certain thing, such as

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playing an instrument, painting, gardening, cooking, singing, speaking, writing, reading, travelling, photography, exercising, blogging, sporting activities, or computer gaming, etc. Some people are also very good at their jobs. That is because they are passionate about them. Your passion can relate to anything when you do it with great devotion, dedication, determination, and discipline. However, most people may not be good at any of these and perhaps are only focused on their jobs or earning, which may not necessarily be from the fields of their choice. Maybe they have not even identified a passion they may have. If you enjoy your job and do it with absolute dedication, yes you definitely are passionate about it. But if you do not enjoy your work, and are constantly complaining about it, or if it disinterests you and dissatisfies you, you are undeniably not passionate about it. Did you find your passion yet? So how do we find our passion? And how do we use our passion to improve the quality of our lives? Let us, therefore, understand how to find our passion and how to use it to make us better, happier, and more satisfied with our lives.

But before venturing further on, do you know your purpose? It is important to know how the term ‘purpose’ relates to passion and how together they can decide on how progressive and successful our lives can be. Passion and purpose go hand in hand in allowing us to find the true meaning of our lives. Knowing Your Purpose What is your purpose and how do you find out what it is? Just as complex as it is to define life, purpose can be defined in myriad ways. But the crux of your purpose is figuring out what makes you happy, excited, successful, and satisfied. How you relate to people and in turn inspire them with your positivity, also can determine and strengthen your purpose. I have known many

managers and employees of corporates who come to tell me that they earn well, have strong family lives, had great villas and cars and comforts.

But they simply did not seem satisfied with their lives. Howsoever they were compensated or treated by their companies, they simply did not seem to reciprocate the value their employers gave them. Their purpose was a question to them. And sadly, they had no passion in it. But they just kept living a drab routine. The meaning and definition of purpose changes from individual to individual, but the central aspect of purpose is the one factor that motivates you to wake up in the morning each day. It directs your life, influences your decisions and behaviour, and affects your livelihood. It can also relate to how you show your responsibilities to your family and the people who matter to you. Purpose can mean many things to us. If your purpose is achieving your target for a certain period, and you did it, what next? At every stage of your life, we have a purpose. In our childhood and as we grow up, studying well and passing with good grades in school is our purpose. Getting into college, finding our profession, earning a placement, and joining a good company can be our next purpose. Falling in love and finding a romantic partner may perhaps be the next. And whether you become a family or not, your new goals and aspirations may further build up and give you a new purpose. Maybe it is to establish an entrepreneurship or buy a property or go on a holiday. So, as we keep growing and find our footing in the world, our purpose keeps changing. Purpose isn't a fixed point at which you always stay after you have reached it. It keeps changing with the way the world changes for you, based on your outlook, your priorities, your expectations, and experiences. A purpose is an objective and a goal for which you dedicate your entire time, energy and all your resources in pursuit of the same.

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Your purpose is vague, unknown or a question when you discover a void in your lives, when you feel that you have no goals, no ambitions, or no interest in anything. But eventually you will find it when your skills, abilities, talents, and natural gifts confront the void and make you realise your purpose. Then you will find that life is not meaningless or empty as you may have felt before. But in order to undergo the transformation you must be willing to leave your comfort zone and strive to understand what your true purpose is. You may be a celebrity or a socially recognised person. But what is the point if you are unhappy? There is no point in being overexposed but underdeveloped in character. It is time you look deep within yourself and begin to question what your true intention is. It is time to make changes to your life in order to reach the zone of true happiness. When you pursue your purpose with a single-mindedness, with a focus of oneness and with absolute passion, it becomes realistic and more achievable. Everything else would seem secondary. And your passion becomes the engine that drives your purpose. Thus, passion and purpose together determine the degree of our success, the quality of our lives and where we are headed to in our future.

But if you are still unsure of what your passion or purpose are, do not be confused or disturbed. Most of the people who live around you are in the same situation. But once you to begin to make changes in your own routine by subjecting yourself to a careful introspection, you inevitably will find it. First Things First Before you embark on the journey towards finding your passion and purpose, start with small changes in your life. Follow these things religiously, and with complete dedication, and you will find that nothing is a challenge in the real sense. These things will feed and develop a great passion in you and set you firmly on your

purpose. Try them regularly and as a daily routine. These are the essentials of your own discovery. • Wake up early say before 5 am. • Do a little meditation, say for about twenty minutes. • Go for a 20–30-minute walk.

• Go for a swim if you have the facility. • Reduce eating too much meat and cereals and replace them with fresh vegetables and fruits. • Avoid stuffing yourself with snacks between meals. • Always keep your stomach a little free by eating smaller meals with a sense of mindfulness.

• Drink enough water regularly, say about a glass every hour. • Gradually reduce your alcohol intake and smoking habits, as they can be injurious to your health. • Avoid becoming a lazy person, overcome laziness. • Lower your time spent of watching TV. • Avoid spending more than a few minutes on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. • Practice reading everyday for atleast half an hour. • Spend time every week with your good friends. • Do not be in the company of people who discourage you, demotivate you and criticise you for everything. • Avoid toxic people, get away as far as possible from them. • Spend time with nature, such as going for a trek, walking in the woods or a garden, sitting by a lake, etc.

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• Try to be happy and spread cheer everywhere you go. • Never be idle doing nothing. • Keep yourself busy or engaged. • Maintain a diary of your activities each day. • Review each day’s progress. • Plan your work and free time for the next day. • Get a pet and spend a little time with it. • Do a little gardening, water the plants, trim branches etc.

Connect with nature and show it your love. • Set a small daily target of something and try fulfilling it, with love and passion.

How to Live with Passion and Purpose

Ask What you Love or Like Most It is impossible for humans not to love anything; you surely must have something you like. Maybe you like watching a game of soccer. Maybe politics interest you. Maybe you like to paint or play the flute. What do you often find yourself doing? If you are not sure of even that, ask your friends and family members what you constantly talk about; they can give you an idea of what you might like, based on their observations of you. Remember the things that make you happy, things that give you joy. When you realise that something interests you keenly and something exists that you like, it is an indication that you are on the right path to finding your passion and purpose. Write down everything you love doing.

Also write down all the things you hate doing or talking about. If it is your job that disinterests you, try looking at the positive things of your job. Try to compare your present position to similar positions in other organisations, through surveys or personal enquiries. Are you better off or worse? Based on that you should either quit and find a new job or try to focus on the aspects that bring you some satisfaction in your job and thus try to enhance their scope. It could be just that you haven't seen the positive side of your job. And if your very profession sounds disinteresting, then you must list out and pursue options which interest you, in which you find better opportunity. Pradeep was a software engineer. He would slog day in and day out working for his company. Even after working for two years continuously, his job did not charm him. It stressed him out. He felt no motivation from his bosses. He was depressed and disenchanted. Not that the company treated him badly. It was just that he felt it that way. As a young teenager he had learnt the guitar and also sang well. He had won at several school and college competitions as well. But his parents had warned him time and again not to ‘waste’ time on them as his career was ‘elsewhere.’ He was compelled to pursue what he did not particularly like and was obliged to join the present company. Two years and not satisfied, he began to find something really missing in his life. He was dreary and sad.

One day he and his team had an outing at a well-known resort and there he found some live singers on a stage in the lawn, setup for his team. Some of his friends who knew he played the guitar and sang well, pushed him to perform on stage in front of a large audience which included the top management of his company. Not wanting to refuse them, he went ahead and performed for the first time in this company. His stage performance dazzled everyone, and he became an instant star. Everyone was pleased with his show. He became the talk of the

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company. When he began to be appreciated by his colleagues, his managers, and was even awarded by the management of his company, for his talent, he was quite inspired. He found a new energy in him that motivated him to work in his regular job with more cheer.

His management then made him the head of the company cultural team and gave him such assignments with music which reduced his work pressure and ignited his passion. He soon became quite famous in his company and was showered with incentives regularly. His passion always existed in him, all it needed was a spark, and it ignited at that instance on stage. If you have something positive in you, you must allow for opportunity to find you and must always be ready to recognise the signs and capitalise on them.

Identify Your Skills and Talents Everyone is good with something. It is just impossible for someone not to be skilled or interested in anything. Just find what moves you, inspires you, attracts or interests you, and you are not far from reaching happiness. Jot down everything that aligns with your likes. It can be a hobby or an activity or simply a task. What are your own values? List down all the things that you value and respect. List all the skills you have and the natural gifts you may have been born with. Some people are born with such talents like drawing, painting, singing, or dancing. Perhaps you are good with sports, or maybe you have good speaking skills. Maybe you are good trainer or good with gardening. Your passion need not always translate into a job. But if your job is based on your passion, you can do an incredible job at it. If your job and passion are different however, you can still pursue your passion with great interest, and it becomes a great motivation for you even to do your job. Talk about it, write about it, show people you are good at it, and you will find yourself becoming more and more happier.

Shortlist Your Interests

One may have several interests or hobbies. But it is impossible to be passionate about all of them. So, shortlist them by narrowing them down to just a handful, by taking into account what you love most from among all of them. You may love cricket, and trekking and painting and cooking and singing and training and reading and gaming and gardening and....but how many can you focus on? Be reasonable and pick just one or two and put your whole energies into them. You will become the best in that and be a recognised individual for that specific skill. Opportunity to capitalise is just around the corner.

Be Curious, Ask Questions, Explore, Discover, Learn When you are looking at improving yourself and be recognised in order to be happy, you must begin to explore yourself. You must learn to be curious about things, develop your self-awareness; you must ask questions out of the ordinary, and explore and discover things which you earlier did not bother about. Learning always improves you and makes you a leader. The more you are knowledgeable about things that matter and even things that don't seem to, you become a magnet to everyone. By being aware of the happenings in your own field you might even discover a better career opportunity. If you are not curious and do not attempt to explore things around, you may be closetting yourself from potential opportunity, that can help you grow further. Be with Passionate People We all admire someone or the other in our own close circles. Why do we do so? Because we like certain qualities in them that are truly inspirational. I knew about a retired airforce officer who later set up a highly successful security organisation. Even at seventy, he never lacked discipline or lost his passion. He would jog five kilometres each day and was the first to reach his office each and every day, for twenty-five years to date. He had thousands of happy

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employees spread across several states. He was knowledgeable and knew a great many things about the government, about the corporate sector, about the society, about life’s challenges, about medicine, and even about acting. His discipline was exemplary. His staff both feared him, respected him and at the same time loved him. It is simply impossible not to be inspired by such people. When you have such passionate people around you, you learn from them. If you are mentored by such great men, you are even more fortunate. Being with people with such great traits would greatly impact your own success. So be around such people. It helps you learn from them making you inculcate such qualities through which you can be a better person yourself. Keep Improving Your Skills Your passion feeds and boosts your purpose. When you are passionate about anything, you should invest your maximum time and energy in strengthening it. The more you spend time on your passion, the better you will get in it and the higher your respect in your community. So, whether it is badminton, or skating, speaking, or writing, drawing, or painting, cooking, or gardening, keep spending more and more time in that interest and you will find greater satisfaction with yourself. Try Newer Things You may often find yourself wanting to do something different from what you regularly do. Such as acquiring a new skill. Maybe you always wanted to draw, and you could not. Maybe you always wanted to learn the piano and you possibly could not. Maybe something prevented you from pursuing that interest. But do not let such interests die out. Fan them and let them be reignited. Try newer things and you will find a new chord of joy and happiness taking hold of you. A great internationally renowned motivational speaker had

come from very humble beginnings. He found that his parents did not have the money to pay for his college when the time came. He worked in the neighbourhood running errands for people for paltry amounts and worked at a book store occasionally. It was a question of survival. But he always had a great interest for reading from his childhood.

With what little money he could save, he bought used motivational books from the very store he worked at, on credit, and began reading them. Soon he was so inspired that whenever he spoke to his friends, they would listen to him with awe and respect. His ability soon earned him a good reputation and the neighbourhood counsellor was so pleased with him that he arranged for a state scholarship that earned him a place at college. From thence there was no looking back. In about ten years after college, he became one of the most successful international speakers and an established author. Had he not tried his hand in trying something new, he probably would not have become as famous as he today is. Be Strong and Determined When you pursue a passion, it is possible you may be hindered with obstacles and challenges. Maybe you could not meet the right people. But do not let any setbacks demotivate you. If people such as Steven Spielberg, Colonel Sanderson or Walt Disney left their passion because of their early setbacks, the world would have missed out something beautiful on its canvas that these great people drew. Never allow any failures demoralise you from pursuing your passion howsoever bad they may seem to be. Just be relentless, unstoppable, and limitless. The only things that stop you are the ones you make up in your mind. Purpose dictates our life and passion fuels our purpose. When you find them both in your life, and align yourselves to them, you will not only find a sense of direction to your life but

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will have drawn up the roadmap to your success and your ultimate happiness. All successful people in the world, whether they were kings, men of science, politicians, explorers, philosophers, inventors, and discoverers, all of them were led by their purpose, which in turn became successful due to the passion they put into its pursuit. Most people ignore the beautiful things that life gives them and choose to be overcome by the negative aspects of life. The world would be a much happier place if everyone found their purpose and allowed themselves to pursue it with passion. But change begins from the self, and you probably could start with your own self. Discover your purpose and your passion today and sow the seeds of harmony, happiness, satisfaction, success, and fulfilment of your life, and as you progress, you will have spread your happiness around allowing others to discover their own through you.

When you live life with passion, you see how powerful you are and what you are truly capable of. True passion with what you do decides what your purpose is, giving you a proper direction for a successful and meaningful life

— Dr. P. Madhurima Reddy

Dr. P. Madhurima Reddy