How to Find Your Passion and Purpose

Forbes magazine recently published an excellent article by Steven Kotler that outlines how you can to find your passion and purpose. When you chase your purpose, your neurobiology adapts to boost your efforts to transform the world.

Here’s a summary of the steps:

Step One — Make A List

Write a list of 25 things you’re curious about as specifically as possible.

Step Two — Hunt for Intersections

Look for places where your curiosities intersect. Where multiple streams overlap, your brain primed for innovative pattern recognition. Your brain releases dopamine when you recognize patterns — a highly addictive neurochemical. Dopamine helps you focus, detect more patterns, and makes you feel high on life.

Step Three — Play

Once you’ve identified the intersections, enjoy those spaces. Feed those curiosities on a daily basis with lectures, videos, articles, books, anything. Advance slowly and persistently so that your subconscious mind can process what you’re learning over time. You’ll develop expertise and intuition about the topics.

Step Four — Go Public

To get to the next stage you’ll need public recognition. You’ve developed some ideas and now it’s time to add to the discourse. This exchange will fuel your passion even more.

Step Five — Turning Passion Into Purpose

Make a new list with 15 colossal problems that you want to see solved. Write problems that have as universal a scope as possible. The bigger the problem, the bigger your opportunity for fulfillment and extraordinary contribution.

Forbes: The Passion Recipe: Four Steps To Total Fulfillment
Shots of Awe: How to Find Your Passion

Originally published at MindFullyAlive.com on June 14, 2016.