Jeff and friends pose for Gizmodo
An Examined Life
A good friend of mine is in the process of re-engineering his life. He’s having to do it from a combat zone, which brings with it some expected complications like heat, angry camel spiders, grumpy field grade officers and random bouts of poorly targeted high explosives.
Where his companions are more interested in filling their scarce free time with dog eared paperbacks, XBox 360s, and card games, Jeff is taking the time to rediscover something about himself. He’s trying to figure out where his Passion is.
Well that’s stupid – everyone knows what they’re passionate about.
Really? Now before you go and say something about how you’re passionate about “your wife” or “your family” or “Sam Adams Chocolate Bock” – you need to understand the kind of passion we’re talking about. We routinely tell people we’re passionate about art, or cinema, or NASCAR. But how many of us make our living doing the things we’re passionate about?
Real people don’t do that – we work for a living – passion is for hobbies.
That’s the answer I hear from almost everyone I talk to. As Americans we’ve all been raised to put away the childish things we love very early on and to get serious about making a living. We do it because it’s what our mothers and fathers have always done, we do it because we know it’s what’s expected of us. We do it because we grow up wanting STUFF and STUFF costs MONEY.
