Pursuit of Passion

As you might have noticed by following this blog, I recently made a complete career switch from Information Technology to aviation. So far, I'm not flying nearly as much as I would like, but I certainly don't miss my former job, and quite frankly don't feel like I ever did that job. It's very strange.

This past Friday night, my wife rented out a restaurant and threw a party to celebrate. Have I mentioned how awesome she is? And she does stuff like this all the time - completely selfless.

After the toast, I gave a very quick encouragement to the crowd to find and pursue their passions, but I came up with some additional thoughts on that theme that I'll add here.

In my former career, I struggled with a question that I think many, if not most, of us struggle with daily. What is my purpose? How can I leave this world a better place than I found it? Here's three things that I came up with, that might work for you.

1. Find your passion
We are all passionate about something. It doesn't have to be career-oriented, such as mine. It could be your family, a sport, playing a musical instrument, your friends, it doesn't matter. It's cliche, but what did you want to be when you grew up? We all had something - I wanted to be, you guessed it, a pilot. That could be a good starting place.

2. Pursue your passion diligently
Okay, so maybe we can't all quit our jobs and become firefighters. If your passion is cars, you probably won't be able to run off to Europe and trade rubber with Michael Schumacher on the Nurburgring. But you could join a local car club. Get involved in amateur race leagues. I used to work with a guy that drove his Subaru in auto cross events on weekends. Take a photography class, do some traveling, learn to dance. There are ways to pursue your passion without necessarily quitting your day job, although if you can, you'd have my support.

3. Share your passion
This is the most important step. I'm fortunate right now in that, my job is to introduce others to the joy of flying an airplane. If you have a musical talent, join a band or play at church. Teach an art class. Join an actors guild and perform at local venues. Take your kids to the firehouse. What good is the gift of passion if we internalize it? I'm not suggesting that you take your daughter to the driving range and hit golf balls for hours on end to fund your retirement. But if others see you get excited about your passion, it will encourage them to explore and get excited about their own passions.

Get up. Find your passion. Pursue it. And share it with someone else. Heck, maybe we can leave this world just a little better than we found it.