Passion
"Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.
"I don't much care where..." said Alice.
"Then it doesn't much matter which way you go," said the Cat.
My thoughts of late have turned to "What next?". I've reached a midway point in a number of goals, and have realized that those goals largely don't suit me anymore. Yet I've years before their completion. So at this transition point, where I've purposefully taken a break from the madness, I ask myself, "What next?"
The problem being that the way I've answered that question in the past is through saying "not being here," with respect to whatever bad situation I have found myself in. Granted, it was and is better than past bad situations, but the need to move beyond, to something better, has been the only thing that motivates me into action. I've succeeded in not being where I was before, but I have not succeeded in getting to a place I like.
The switch in thinking that is necessary is to define what I want. Unfortunately, defining what I want for myself was a practice browbeaten out of me as a kid. Conditional love does that to a person. I learned that if I want what my mother wants, I'll receive love and support from my mother. If I want something other than what my mother wants, I'll receive punishment and enforced isolation as a reward. If I act on something other than what my mother wants, I'll be branded as a liar and thief, an entirely bad person whom needs to be corrected in the harshest manner possible.
At first, I latched on to what Mother wanted, and forgot what it is to want. I then began knowing what I didn't want, and I took action to get away from Mother's ill-thought out life plan for me. I steadily gained strained relations with the family until now, as I am practically the devil in the eyes of my mother and brothers. To them, I am the embodiment of everything that has gone wrong in their lives, whether I had anything to do with those experiences or not. Thankfully my father has looked upon my choices with an open mind, and respected my free will to make choices for myself, rather than enforcing the status quo.
Knowing what you don't want is certainly a positive step in the right direction. It eliminates one possible path from a destination. But I tire now of exploring paths and finding out through experience things I don't want. I need now to decide what I do want -- and barrel down that path at the expense of all the possibilities of the "best" path. Because what it really comes down to is that I've long been searching for the "best" path without realizing that the best path is individualized to the path I most want at the moment of decision.
So what to I want? Right now, I want to find what I am passionate about. What I truly want. And while that is a subjective, individualized thing, I can find support to aid me in the hunt. I can surround myself with people whom are passionate about what they do. I could approach this by looking into activist groups, but then I run the risk of finding an emotional-based cause that propels people into action, which may or may not be passion. Besides, I'd rather go somewhere I am at least vaguely familiar. I'm looking into solo businesses and bazaars.
How do I make the leap between passionate people and bazaars? Well, first it traces back to a few good experiences as a kid. I loved bazaars then, as I do now. Particularly craft shows where the crafters aren't particularly good marketeers, but do know every stitch, knick, flaw and method of their product. They're more likely to want to talk shop than sell a product. They recognize that while publicly showing their craft or skill for cash is needed to sustain it and perhaps themselves, the cash is not why they attend the shows. The reason they attend the shows is their passion for their product.
As you expand in bazaar themes, you find all kinds of different people approaching different arts in different ways. But the passion remains the common thread. Rather then promoting specific ideals, rationale, or mythology as can be the case with organizations, these people do what they do because, at least in this instance, they love to do it. That's what I'm looking for -- a place where the least common denominator is passion.
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.
"I don't much care where..." said Alice.
"Then it doesn't much matter which way you go," said the Cat.
My thoughts of late have turned to "What next?". I've reached a midway point in a number of goals, and have realized that those goals largely don't suit me anymore. Yet I've years before their completion. So at this transition point, where I've purposefully taken a break from the madness, I ask myself, "What next?"
The problem being that the way I've answered that question in the past is through saying "not being here," with respect to whatever bad situation I have found myself in. Granted, it was and is better than past bad situations, but the need to move beyond, to something better, has been the only thing that motivates me into action. I've succeeded in not being where I was before, but I have not succeeded in getting to a place I like.
The switch in thinking that is necessary is to define what I want. Unfortunately, defining what I want for myself was a practice browbeaten out of me as a kid. Conditional love does that to a person. I learned that if I want what my mother wants, I'll receive love and support from my mother. If I want something other than what my mother wants, I'll receive punishment and enforced isolation as a reward. If I act on something other than what my mother wants, I'll be branded as a liar and thief, an entirely bad person whom needs to be corrected in the harshest manner possible.
At first, I latched on to what Mother wanted, and forgot what it is to want. I then began knowing what I didn't want, and I took action to get away from Mother's ill-thought out life plan for me. I steadily gained strained relations with the family until now, as I am practically the devil in the eyes of my mother and brothers. To them, I am the embodiment of everything that has gone wrong in their lives, whether I had anything to do with those experiences or not. Thankfully my father has looked upon my choices with an open mind, and respected my free will to make choices for myself, rather than enforcing the status quo.
Knowing what you don't want is certainly a positive step in the right direction. It eliminates one possible path from a destination. But I tire now of exploring paths and finding out through experience things I don't want. I need now to decide what I do want -- and barrel down that path at the expense of all the possibilities of the "best" path. Because what it really comes down to is that I've long been searching for the "best" path without realizing that the best path is individualized to the path I most want at the moment of decision.
So what to I want? Right now, I want to find what I am passionate about. What I truly want. And while that is a subjective, individualized thing, I can find support to aid me in the hunt. I can surround myself with people whom are passionate about what they do. I could approach this by looking into activist groups, but then I run the risk of finding an emotional-based cause that propels people into action, which may or may not be passion. Besides, I'd rather go somewhere I am at least vaguely familiar. I'm looking into solo businesses and bazaars.
How do I make the leap between passionate people and bazaars? Well, first it traces back to a few good experiences as a kid. I loved bazaars then, as I do now. Particularly craft shows where the crafters aren't particularly good marketeers, but do know every stitch, knick, flaw and method of their product. They're more likely to want to talk shop than sell a product. They recognize that while publicly showing their craft or skill for cash is needed to sustain it and perhaps themselves, the cash is not why they attend the shows. The reason they attend the shows is their passion for their product.
As you expand in bazaar themes, you find all kinds of different people approaching different arts in different ways. But the passion remains the common thread. Rather then promoting specific ideals, rationale, or mythology as can be the case with organizations, these people do what they do because, at least in this instance, they love to do it. That's what I'm looking for -- a place where the least common denominator is passion.