Passion and Perseverance

Many of the influential people in my life have been speaking on passion and at first I thought this word might be being overused, but I think we may not use it enough. Passion has several definitions according to Merriam-Webster, but the one that caught my eye is, the state or capacity of being acted on by external agents or forces. Like all external forces acting upon us it is what we do with it that matters.

Passion itself is not a force, but it is the opening up of our hearts and minds to allow ourselves to be moved beyond the comfortable and convenient. Passion allows the knowledge in our heads to move from empty thoughts to words and then actions that cause change. It takes the dreams and desires of our hearts and brings them alive to our consciousness so that we will be motivated to bring them to pass.

We are all acted upon by external forces on a daily basis and asked how we will respond. Will our guiding direction be changed based on our current passion? Will our waning passion for the difficult and good things that we know we should be about give way to a new ideas of mediocrity and complacency?

Passion can also be redirected into things that draw us in wrong directions. If passion is used to bring about laziness it will drive us to under-performing and looking for shortcuts. If used to recruit negativity it will sink us into depression and despondence, that will hinder the action that is necessary to succeed in life. Passion can lead us to frustration and bring about anger towards ourselves and those around us.

The great obstacle for us to overcome regarding passion is its ability to wane if not cultivated, and this is where perseverance does its work. Persevere is defined as; to persist in a state, enterprise, or undertaking in spite of counterinfluences, opposition, or discouragement. Perseverance manifests itself as doing what you need to do when you don't want to do it. Desire finds no place in perseverance, it is about the duty and obligation to do what we know is right because it written on the inside of us. This is where the two collide, perseverance and passion combine on the inside of us to move what needs to be done out into action.