"Chase your dreams" or "pursue your passion" are cliches that are used quite routinely. They are based on an important assumption that people already know what is their passion or that people have only one dream to chase. However, the situation is not that simple for most people. Often, it is not easy for most people to decide what is their real passion or which dream they should chase. This is the reason we see many people enrolled in courses and chasing degrees for which they have to study subjects they utterly dislike or hate just because someone told them that it would provide them a well-paying stable job. We see many people doing the job they dislike just because they think they don't have any other choice or they believe that it is too late to change. So, what is the solution to this dilemma? Is there any easy way where a person can figure out what is their real passion or which dream is worth chasing? The simple answer is, NO.
For most people, there is no easy way to find out what is our real passion or which dream we really want to chase. Some people figure out very early in their lives what they want to become and dedicate all their attention and efforts towards that pursuit. They do not care about success or failure as the journey to chase that target itself is fulfilling for them. This is great if it happens. If the journey itself is rewarding and enjoyable then who cares what is the ultimate result. Success is a bonus but not a reward in itself for them. But what if we do not know? Then, we need to take a more analytical approach. First, look carefully at your skillset, things at which you are good, things which you can learn easily and perform well. This is important to know because everybody might want to become an actor or a football or basketball player, but everybody is not good at it. If we do not have the skills to perform a task or are not willing to put enough effort into learning it then there is no point in dreaming about it. Another important thing to remember is, that just dreams or passion is not enough, it requires tremendous hard work and commitment to achieve something great no matter how passionate you are about that thing. There is no substitute for hard work.
Another thing one can do is to ask for advice. Talk with people who you think understand you and care about you. Ask them what they think might be a good profession for you, seek opinions from multiple reliable sources to get a diverse opinion, and then try to decide. Keep in mind that all this does not guarantee that you will find a cause to which you will stick for the rest of your life. Sometimes we like something but over time lose interest. We might feel that the field which we chose is not interesting anymore or we are interested in something else. If this happens, we should not hesitate to make efforts to change. It might be tough or require a significant amount of effort and involve many challenges but as I said before, such a rewarding journey might be a worthy endeavor. No matter what we decide to do, we should be able to enjoy it, and we should feel excited about it. Of course, there are going to be days where we will feel lazy, bored, and frustrated, it is a part of every profession, but in general, we should feel good about our profession. We should feel excited about going to work. We should not be dragging ourselves to work every day. We spend quite a significant portion of our lives performing in our profession, so why not have fun while working. This will not only add happiness to our personal lives but also improve our professional lives. It is true that finding our passion and sticking to it is not easy, but it is not as difficult as it sounds, just give it a try.
