Keep your passion alive

” Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.”

Oprah Winfrey

Do you know what your Passion is?

Yeah,yeah, I like to bake, I like to cook, I like to read, I enjoy writing and a whole host of other things. But Am I passionate about any of these? I’d have to say a resounding no. If you are like me, then you should be asking yourself these questions:

What could I do for years without getting paid?
What would I spend my time doing everyday if I didn’t have to worry about money?
What topic could I read an abundance of material about without ever getting?

One of the reasons I’m writing this blog today, is that I’m also feeling that I have lost that passion that needs to reignited. What I wanted to do years ago, is totally different from what i would love to accomplish in a year time. In my search for inspiration, I came across these two stories about Brandon Stanton and Jim Koch. I think their stories will motivate anyone to find or to reignite their passion.

Brandon Stanton

Stanton arrived in New York from Chicago in 2010. A self-taught photographer who had just wound up his short-lived bond trading career, he had the goal of photographing 10,000 people on New York City streets. His photoblog was basically ignored for the first year, but then it took off. Now his book Humans of New York is massive and Stanton has parlayed his success into two book deals.

Jim Koch

A Harvard Business School graduate and consultant with Boston Consulting Company, Koch copied the Australian beer recipe that had been in his family for generations and used it to launch Samuel Adams (Boston Beer Company). With Budweiser, Coors, and Miller now owned by foreign companies, Boston Beer Company is now the largest American brewery.

Are you getting the gist from these two stories? Both Stanton and Koch took something that they were passionate about and use it to become mega success stories. When there is passion, it’s usually backed by enthusiasm and pride. With pride and spunk comes resilience and all that good stuff that it takes to keep going, even when there are hurdles. The point is, the gist is, the moral is, haha, find your passion and write your own success story.