5 Tips from Peter Diamandis on Finding Your Passion

“How do we know that we’ve found our passion?”

Last summer during a fireside chat with Peter Diamandis at Singularity University’s Global Solutions Program (GSP), participant Ana Cecilia Benatuil asked Peter this pressing question — it’s a question that’s top of mind for social entrepreneurs and purpose-driven professionals alike.

Unsurprisingly, it spurred an equally thought-provoking response.

But before Peter responded, he asked the room,

“How many people here honestly know what their purpose and mission in life is?”

About half of the room raised their hands.

For Peter, throughout his childhood, his passion was space. Whenever obstacles arose—as they inevitably do—he’d always go back to it for motivation and direction. Eventually, his passion evolved into focusing on moonshots and humanities biggest problems — what Singularity University calls Global Grand Challenges.

Whether you’re certain that you’ve found your passion, or feel completely in the dark, here are a few tips from Peter on ways to find (and refine) your passion.

1. If you know your passion, that’s great, but test it by also trying something new — it may reconfirm, or broaden it.

2. Explore that secret career fantasy you have in a different field.

3. Find people to share your passion with.

4. It’s okay to have more than one passion and change it over time.

5. If you don’t know your passion, try Peter’s two-question mind experiment to find it by asking yourself…

a) What did you want to do when you were a child? What was your childhood passion? Is there something real there?

b) If someone gave you a billion dollars today and told you to spend it on improving the world, what would you do with it? Search for the technology, tool, or problem you’d apply it towards.

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