The Passion Project: Part Two

Welcome back to the passion project! Today we’ll be discussing how to find your passion and what it might be. Let’s get into it!

Last week, we talked all about why you should find your passion and the benefits that can come from it. We covered the basics and today we’ll take a deeper look and start brainstorming, then you can put it into practice.

Brainstorming and discovery

I’m a big fan of setting out a clear map of what’s going on in your head. This is a totally awesome way to write everything out so that you don’t forget things and can further explore ideas. A great way to start exploring your passion is to create a list of your hobbies and interests. Many passions stem from these activities and it’s easier to figure it out when you’ve set it out in front of you.

Creating a mind-map of your interests and hobbies

1. Get a piece of paper and a bunch of colourful pens. Grab any stickers or decorations to make it look pretty (this can make the task more creative and fun).
2. What you want to do now is create a title in the middle of the page saying “finding my passion” or “what’s my passion?” or something of the likes.
3. Now we are going to explore four areas: Mind, body, soul and society. Create a section on the page for each area. Go through each section and write down all of the things that you like to do or want to do. Come up with your own ideas, too.
4. Firstly, mind. This area relates to things that you enjoy that challange, relax and improve your mind. These can be things that you find relaxing to do. It doesn’t have to be a big task, either. It can be as simple as playing Wordament or reading books wether it’s for fun or education. Here’s some ideas:

• making things eg. Jewellery, woodshop, Lego, sewing, gardening, mechanics, cooking, DIY activities, making Youtube videos or writing blog posts, making art, creating music or playing instruments.
• educating yourself eg. reading books, researching topics, studying,
• participating in activities eg. clubs like chess, gaming, debating, theatre such as singing or acting
• relaxing activities eg. listening to music, colouring, cloudwatching, birdwatching, finding shells on the beach.

5. Now we will go to body. These activities are things that you enjoy that relax, strengthen or exercise your body. Remember, if you have an interest in something but haven’t actually started doing it yet (you have an interest playing soccer but haven’t played with a team or haven’t gotten out to practicing) still write it down! You never know what could come from it.

• team sports such as swimming, cricket, AFL, soccer, football, tennis, water-polo, badminton, netball, cheerleading
• individual activities eg. surfing, bike riding, athletics, gymnastics, hiking, track.
• discipline training exercises such as karate, judo, martial arts, jujitsu
• relaxing activities like yoga or stretches
• creative activities like dancing or creating workout

6. Soul is everything to do with your inner feelings and wellbeing. Wether or not you’re a spiritual person or not, you can still discover passion through this area.

I consider soul to be things that make you happy or you feel nourish you. Although the other areas could make you happy, try to think about things that you feel put you at peace.

• Spending time with loved ones eg. friends, family, pets.
• Meditating or praying
• Mindfulness
• Social media free days
• Having time to sit and relax
• Sharing your beliefs with others
• Taking time off for yourself
• Spending time outdoors

7. Society is based on community and what you like to do to help others or create a greater benefit for something other than yourself. This can be helping others, animals or the environment. Write down things that you enjoy or want to do to help others.

• Environment: Sharing tips with others to help the environment, beach clean-up, using enviro-friendly products, reusing, reducing, recycling, not littering, researching ways to help the environment, reminding people to clean up, planting or gardening, donating or volunteering at a shelter, adopting animals, going vegitarian or vegan and reducing your meat intake, riding your bike instead or driving, even just picking up litter. Whatever you do to help the enviroment.
• Friends, family, strangers: Helping them with a problem or task and giving them advice, spending time with them, making them laugh, giving gifts, words of affirmation, physical affection, reminding them that you love them, inspiring them, joining them in activities they enjoy, doing favours for them, random acts or kindness and anything else you do that helps or inspires them.
• Community: This is anything that you do to help others in your community. This includes donating to an op-shop, donating money to organisations in need, giving money to the homeless, participating in fundraisers like fun-runs, attending protests or community groups, raising awareness for minority groups or people in need, spending your time making sure someone is okay, educating others on world issues such as racism, poverty, enviromental issues ect., supporting people of minority groups, educating yourself to better understand and help others on issues that affect them. This can be anyting along these lines.

8. Now that you’ve done that, let’s use the things on your page to figure out what kind of things you’re passionate about. Here’s some ways to figure out what it is. Remember you can have more than one!

• Try to find links between areas. For instance, if you write ‘birdwatching’ in mind, ‘volunteering at an animal shelter’ for community and ‘spending time with pets’ for soul, you may have a passion for animals and taking care of them.
• Look at what you do most, if you have a lot of sports that you do and you like to mediate, you may have a passion for physical and mental wellbeing. Just because you don’t have many things in each section, it doesn’t mean that you have no passions!
• What do you really want to do? What is stopping you from doing it? How can you achieve these things? Think about it and write down your answers.
• Sometimes our friends, family or classmates have passions or do activities that you may like to join them in or do for yourself.

Put it into practice

Now you have an idea of what it might be, put it into practice! The only way you can gain experience and strengthen your abilities is to take some time out to work on your passion!

Join a club, do it by yourself, grab a friend or even a pet. Look it up online or head to the library to research. There are heaps ways to put your passion into practice. You could even put up flyers for members of your own group!

Thanks for reading!

Thank you for reading The Passion Project, Part 2. I really hope that you enjoyed it and learnt something from it. Feel free to contact me on Instagram at @jorjas.journal and tell me about your passion! Until next time, Jorja Rose x