What are you passionate about?

Here lately I find myself frustrated and tired. Between juggling a full time job, a full time class load and family, it’s hard to find a happy medium. It seems like I never have any down time. All this lack of time has got me to thinking. Yeah, I know with a lack of time how do I have time to think? It’s called multi-tasking. You should try it sometime. I highly recomend trying both. :)

What are you passionate about? I’m not talking your husband/wife, significant other. Though I hope you are passionate about them. What are your passions? What makes you get up in the morning and what keeps you up late at night? Cooking, reading, writing, crafts, singing, teaching, working, working out. Not sure where your passion lies? Then take this little journey with me.

Say that something tragic happens in your life and your lifestyle has to completely change. What are the things that you would be willing to sacrifice and what would you fight, and fight hard to keep? What do you give up?

I love to read. Reading let’s me live vicariously through another person. It opens up new ideas and helps me see how I want things to be in my own life. Since I have started school, I haven’t read a single book that wasn’t school related. Well, there has been one exception and that was the instruction manual to program my calculator at work. I wasn't too passionate about that one. Have I missed it? Yes and no. I bought a new book by my favorite author and I’m so ready to read it, but I don’t read during the week. Because I stay up all night and read the book. My point being, if I had to, I could give it up. There would be moments that I missed it and longed to get lost in the pages, but I don't see my soul withering up and dying if I gave it up.

Cooking is another story. I love to cook, I love to find new recipes and plan on making them some day. Cooking is sorta a necessity, unless you eat out all the time. But when life is crazy and we are eating out or I am cooking meals in advance, I miss it. I plan out time to cook. I’m not sure that I could give it up without a fight.

There is one thing, other than my husband that I couldn't give up. Cross stitch. That is the one thing that I would fight for tooth and nail. I would scrape and save and do whatever I needed to, to keep this. Everything that I make is a part of me. My time was spent making it, sometimes a few hours to a few months. This is not something that I could give up, and it’s the one thing that since I have started school I have managed to find time to do. Not as much as I would like, but enough to keep me happy. Enough to make me feel complete and at peace.

There are things that I miss doing, but could give up if I had too, like my gym membership. I love going, but I would scratch it if I had too. The time I spend with my husband, I wouldn’t give up. With his job and his school, he has very little time as well.

My point with this is…what are you passionate about? What could you not give up because part of you would wither and die? There is something in all of us that drives us when the going gets tough. Some call it motivation, some call it fear, some call it the desire to succeed. But isn’t it something that we are usually passionate about? I want to finish my degree so bad that I can taste it. I have dreams about the job I will have and the house that my husband and I buy when we don’t have to settle. And that taste and hunger keep me going, even when I’m frustrated and tired. It pushes me to go to the gym, when I would rather stay home and catch up on CSI. It lets me find time to cross stitch, when I should be cleaning, or sleeping, because I'm passionate about it.

So what are you passionate about? What motivates you? What gives you joy? What is worth any sacrifice great or small? Ask yourself these questions, and find out what your living for. Find your passion. Find your purpose. Find you.

Now, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll go stitch for a while.

“To have passion, to have a dream, to have a purpose in life. And there are three components to that purpose, one is to find out who you really are, to discover God, the second is to serve other human beings, because we are here to do that and the third is to express your unique talents and when you are expressing your unique talents you lose track of time.” ~Deepak Chopra

“A successful life is one that is lived through understanding and pursuing one’s own path, not chasing after the dreams of others.” ~Chin-Ning Chu