Use Your Passions As A Life Compass!
What ideas and activities gets you excited to talk about and share with others?
The above question has always been an ever-present internal check in throughout my professional journey that I never realized in real time would be so meaningful. In fact, it's a question, I wasn't actively asking yet somehow something I was intuitively reminded of frequently. At every job I've ever held, if my peers and managers can remember anything about me it would be my love of visual arts, music and global culture. Never shy about sharing my latest music discovery or latest map location of a cool street mural even when unsolicited by the listener, sorry :-) In fact, even prior to my first jobs, I spent days at school sharing my latest art obsessions with teachers and persuading them all to purchase my art work. This led to over 50 pieces sold and features in educational journals like the 'Journal of Curriculum Theorizing' that would never have landed on my adolescent radar otherwise. This urge to create awareness of my passions and actively pursue related activities both professional and personal have led to a blending of the two that has often blurred the lines between work and play.
The blending of passion and work are often treated as independent concepts and values where one is sacrificed at the expense of the other in the absence of intentionality. Giving this dilemma that many of us face a great deal of thought, I decided to develop a tool to help keep us honest with ourselves and take a more active role in engineering our own destiny of a passion led well balanced life. The tool I would like to introduce is called a 'POT' technique which my reinterpretation of the classical 'SWOT Analysis' which is used traditionally as a planning technique to help a person or organization identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats related to competition.
My suggested approach 'POT" technique is designed for creatives and progressive professionals as it offers a framework to identify your passions, uncover and seize hidden opportunities, while avoiding the traps that stand in the way of you and your full potential.
So how does this work? It all starts with investing a little time in getting to know yourself a bit more by engaging in a journey of curiosity and honest self-exploration. I've developed a diagram below with a list of guided questions related to uncovering your passion, opportunities and threats.
The key to note here is this is only a tool and it's only going to be as effective as the time and effort committed to it by the end user, You. After identifying or simply reminding yourself of your passions, it's imperative that this information is used as a tool to inform your next career moves as well as how time is leveraged outside of your normal routine. If your career doesn't offer an opportunity to integrate your passion, then it makes sense to create space in your lifestyle to pursue paid or non-paid passion projects. These opportunities add networking, educational, and mental health value to your daily and weekly rigor. As these opportunities are discovered, received or created it's imperative that you navigate the traps identified in the exercise. One common trap is the struggle of managing financial responsibility that can sometimes lead to unmet needs if one is depending on the passion entirely in early stages of a new or underdeveloped opportunity. Part of the honest self exploration is asking yourself what you are willing to risk and sacrifice as you exchange a less exciting comfort zone for a more fulfilled long-term lifestyle aligned with your true self.
Stay inspired by voicing your passions to a family member, a mentor, colleagues, or someone who has embarked on a similar endeavor. One personal example of this mindset at work can be demonstrated in a previous role I held at my former employer. My passion for music and DJ culture had led me to connect with a wide network of music insiders, enthusiasts and DJs outside of work at events, 'record pool' sessions, casual conversations about the latest artists releases etc. I was committed to not dimming down this passion at work, although my marketing role at the time wasn't particularly music related I found ways to inject myself as a cultural insider during the traditional 'water cooler' conversations by replacing mundane small talk with culture banter unapologetically. When the company's biggest selling brand decided to make an audacious attempt to create a TV show about DJ culture - Master of the Mix- and authentically integrate the brand in its DNA, I was recruited internally to be a part of the pioneering team as one of the program architects. Some may say this was luck or synchronicity, but I would like to believe these opportunities were engineered through intentionality, a commitment to wearing my passion on my sleeve and of course divine favor.
I look forward to seeing you all embark on this journey. Actualization of your full potential is underway. Please share your testimonials with me and don't forget to pay it forward. Cheers!
