Why ‘Follow Your Passion’ is a piece of advice that bothers me.

Vance Johnson
Jul 20, 2017 · 4 min read

All over the internet today you will find videos, ebooks, articles and social media influencers telling you that the secret to true happiness and success in both life and business is to “Follow Your Passion.” There are countless numbers of people that attribute their success to that exact piece of advice and the reason that they became successful or are happier now than they have ever been is because they have followed their passions despite all odds and now are rich, famous, happy and successful. These passions have been found to be anything but the normal day job, that job that most of us have. These so called passions are found in DIY home decorating, obscure sports such as stand up paddle board racing (it’s a real thing, google it), living in a van, hiking, traveling and all sorts of other non-traditional jobs.

There are two aspects of this whole thing that I want to cover. I think that it would be unfair to discredit any of these ways to make a living that people have found and if they are truly happy then more power to them! I also think that it would be dishonest to say that I am not jealous sometimes of the guy that gets to go hiking every day and take awesome photos of himself on top of mountains, under waterfalls and in front of the best landscape scenery in the world. He does something that he loves, posts a picture of himself doing that thing on Instagram and gets enough likes and followers that big name brands will pay him (enough money to live on, click here for proof) to wear their hiking boots, hats or shirts and then pay him for photos that he posts wearing those clothes. How cool is that, seriously?! Free clothes, fame, a good living made by traveling and taking amazing photos with his iPhone. Sounds awesome to me and I am very impressed and I admire (most of) the people that are able to somehow build that lifestyle for themselves. I think that social media and the ability to reach such an audience that wasn’t available to people even 20 years ago is amazing and the publicity that the brands get with these deals is great. It is a win-win for the influencer and the brand.

The problem with this “follow your passion” philosophy is that it is very rare that your photos of you hiking or traveling will make you the income that will allow you to quit your normal job. The fact of the matter is that the probability of you gaining the following required to make your Instagram profile your main source of income is just not that high. If you take the amount of Instagram users with follower counts over 1 million and compare it with the amount of users in total it is very small. The chances of you getting there are almost as likely as you playing professional sports. The difference is that more people have the opportunity to be “Instagram famous” than playing professional sports because the opportunities are pretty much endless. But the chances are still slim.

The reason I have a hard time with this is that I feel just as qualified as some of these people that make their living doing things that they love while I work a desk job making a lot less money than they do. So when I see this “follow your passion” movement all around me I get discouraged about either not having a passion to follow that I can see making me any money or not feeling ready to drop my steady income for the chance at making it on Instagram or YouTube or something like that. It is discouraging. I don’t feel like I am truly passionate about the job that I have now but it pays the bills. And the mainstream media, at least the media that I consume, makes it seem like that is much less glamorous and desirable.

Now, I am making this seem more dramatic than it is. I am very happy with my employment and sometimes do enjoy my job. I also believe that work isn’t supposed to be fun all the time. I understand hard work and I will keep working at this job because the money that it brings in helps me provide for me and my wife.

I guess the point of all of my rambling here is that after hours and hours spent thinking about a “passion” that I could follow to make me money and give me the life I have always dreamed of I am coming to find out that life is what you make it. I am perfectly capable to making my dream life right now in the situation that I am in. So I’m going to do that.

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