5 + 1 Tips That Will Help You Reconnect With Your Old Passion
Boring job and oh so many regrets? Welcome
Everyone in their life has a passion. Think about how you like spending your free time. Whether it is painting, working out, cooking for your family or taking photos of kittens, I’m sure you have a special way to invest your free time.
When you talk about your passion, you could never run out of something to say, you actually enjoy the time spent doing it and you would never stop improving your skills. When you make time for them, time doesn’t matter and you recharge your energies instead of getting tired.
There is no passion to be found playing small — in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living. -Nelson Mandela
Passion leads through the purest happiness you could imagine.
But sometimes, life keeps sending messages suggesting that maybe what you love is not something useful to nurture.
That is what happened to me. Since last year, I loved drawing, dancing and creating make-up pieces. But soon, something made me remember I needed to pay my bills, I had to invest my time in something that my boss requires at work.
That’s why my true passions keep becoming something that doesn’t worth my time anymore.
They had become less than a hobby, something for those with time on their hands and no responsibilities. I hated that feeling at first, but I got used to it.
Then I started seeing someone else living my dream: great dancers attending prestigious classes and a couple of girls I know on social media became more and more skilled at doing make up and started to work with models and photographers.
I felt so sad for a while with a sense of longing for what I neglected in a corner of my time.
Over time, I became convinced that, in the end, I wouldn’t be able to outshine anyway.
Well, that’s not the point. Being passionate about something is vital for my and your well being. Even if, for some reason, you started to think that your boring 9–5 job is more important than everything else.
Passion is the driving force behind success and happiness. That’s why today we will start to regain confidence in what we used to love.
1. Take care of yourself
The first thing to do is reconnecting with yourself. Take care of your physical and mental wellbeing with a generous dose of self-care.
If you think that this has nothing to do with your hobby, you couldn’t be more wrong. You are just important as your interests, that’s why you need to focus on yourself before trying to come back to your passion. Poor self-care could undermine your attitude towards what you truly love.
How to: sleep comfortably, eat healthily, exercise enough. Breath fresh air and train your mind to think positive every single day. It might seem corny, but it is just the easiest way to start, believe me.
2. Get back to basics
Now you’re ready to start. You want to make up for a lost time but sooner you’ ll realize that the time spent not training your skills has made you rusty. You do not perform well and you are one step away from giving up again.
Stop. We’ve all been there and it’s normal to feel discouraged if you performed better a year ago than today.
First things first: humility.
Be humble, slow down and start over from scratch. Let’s go back to the basics! What made you fall in love for the first time? What is the thing you were really proud of? Try to do it again, play, break the rules, engage like a newbie and allow yourself to make mistakes.
How to: watching tutorials for beginners or redo some of your first works could be useful. Do you want to get back at cooking? Try to do your first cake. Did you like makeup as I do? Try and see if you rock at winged eyeliner. If not, there’s plenty of time to master it again.
3. Do it daily
Here I have the perfect quote. A very famous one from Bojack Horseman, one of my favourite TV shows.
I often repeat this quote when I find myself stuck in some work, and I start to think that I am not enough.
It gets easier. Every day it gets a little easier. But you gotta do it every day, that’s the hard part.
But it does get easier.
This quote wants you to know that you can do everything you could dream of. But you have to work everyday, with perseverance. You can do everything, but the hard part comes when you have to fight with your beliefs and with all the work and duties throughout the days.
It’s the “every day” the hard part.
How to: Set an hour a day when you feel comfortable enough to break from your daily schedule for some practice. Set a project and work on it little at a time or consider engaging in a 30 days challenge. Eventually, you can find something related to your passion online. If not, make one by yourself.
4. Take a class
Engaging in the activity with people who share the same passion has many benefits. First, it forces you to show up to class, confronting your work with others and sharing your struggles with someone who can help you.
Engaging with your passion alone can be great if you are an introvert and you are more comfortable working alone, but you end up missing some more benefits. In a group that shares your passion and a tutor to suppport you, most of the time, you will be better quickly.
How to: search for classes in your nearby on the internet or on your university bulletin. Surely there would be something that suits your fancy.
5. Find a buddy or join a club
A consequence of the last point, it is crucial to share your passion with someone. Those who share similar interests can provide you with the motivation, inspiration, encouragement, support, or even the competition you need to get back into the swing of things. And plus, you gain a new friendship.
How to: as an introvert myself, I find it easier to interact at first through social media. Search on Facebook, Instagram or Reddit. Talk to your classmates or your colleagues at work and get to know them.
+1. Trust social media
I added this point separately for a reason. I have not yet had the opportunity to test it personally, as temporarily I am limiting the use of my social media. Yet, I know for a fact that it’s a great way to reach out to a lot of people and show your work, passion and improvements.
I had the chance to witness this to my boyfriend, who shared with me some excellent tips to get back on track with my motivation after my post-grad life.
He set a second Instagram profile to talk about his passion and the projects he is doing. This led him to meet many people interested in his works, models contacted him for shootings and days after days, he’s improving his skills.
So go for it, trust social media. They help you stay motivated while connecting with people who love checking up your work.
Passion is a powerful force in accomplishing anything you want to, and in experiencing work and life the fullest extent possible.
This is why we should never allow ourselves to neglect it to the point of forgetting our value.
Nothing is as important as passion. No matter what you want to do with your life, be passionate. -Jon Bon Jovi
