If you think you haven't found your passion... | Hacker News Reader

If you think you haven't found your passion...

sivers.org

Hacker News excites me and i am sometimes a bit scared to post a comment. Now i know what to do.

Watch me dive in deeper baby!

I like this definition of passion, but I also like the comment about pg's definition of passion as curiosity.

My intuitive feeling is that both are correct, and how one subjectively experiences passion is probably related to how close to self-actualized they are. (Or perhaps a more neutral way to phrase it would be that the subjective experience differs depending on whether the person's drive to learn gets channeled into learning new hobbies, or whether it has been channeled into learning about how the world works as a whole.)

My opinion is that this definition is better than pg's. Why? Because while plenty of people are like pg in that they have their passion triggered by curiosity, I know plenty of others who have their passion triggered by other things, like feeling challenged.

I know of a few people who's passions are triggered by the pursuit of earning piles of money. Programming challenges aren't so interesting to them anymore and serve more as a means to an end.

Banking large sums of money is one of the most challenging things you can do, since you are effectively competing with everyone.

IMHO I really don't give a frak about where your passions come from. But what is important to me is that one be passionate about something. I admire people who can devote and dedicate themselves to something - and to be honest (and somewhat guilty), I look down on people who do not.

I call them floaters - people who drift through life without any purpose. They go through the motions - go out with friends, go to work, watch movies... but there's no driving force towards anything. There's nothing that they're dying to do. I've been there - and it's horrible. I have no idea how these people live with that every day.

sometimes we think about offing ourselves, but never generate any serious motivation because that too would require passion.

Hmm do you have a link to that essay where PG talks about passion?

This is probably the one he had in mind: http://paulgraham.com/love.html

Obviously everybody's different, but for me taking a look at the things that excite me moment-to-moment is only part of the answer. Once I've found something I like to tinker with, it usually takes some serious effort before I become passionate about it. Usually this means hitting some tough problems and working my way through them.

The challenge for me is that sometimes a big problem can suck the momentary excitement out of a project. Passion really starts to set in when I push myself and am able to come up with solutions.

Re: "Romeo and Juliet". Didn't they both die? That kind of "passion" is generally immature, unstable, and leads to catastrophe.

Can someone explain to me why that remark would be downvoted? I'm baffled.

It's a serious observation and I think it applies equally well to business. If you are suicidal the minute you get bad news about your business, some growing up is in order and some psychological space so you don't take it so personally might also be appropriate. Yes, feeling "alive" and letting yourself go on a roller-coaster of emotions can be a Good Thing. But having poor boundaries and no perspective usually isn't. The fact that what you think is going on at first blush is very often wrong has been addressed by countless forms of literature, not just "Romeo and Juliette" (where, if I recall correctly, one commits suicide because they THINK the other one has, only the first one was faking it). And in business it's often critical to wait and see what is really going on and get the facts before you go making irrevocable rash decisions based on your first impression of something.

I'm one of the "five or six" women here and probably don't fit in, socially, in some ways. So if someone would please explain what the issue is, I would appreciate it.

Thanks in advance.

Probably because he's saying love is not like Romeo & Juliet, which is exactly what you're saying. You've refuted a comment Sivers didn't make.

I also need to jump in as resident literatus and say that Shakespeare was saying the same thing. Romeo & Juliet is a tragedy, not a romance: Its moral is that people that think love is grand and melodramatic are dooming themselves. Shakespeare's smarter than we give him credit for.

There was no intent to "refute" any points in the article. The only intent was to make my own related observation. I had remarked at more length initially but chose to edit it down, assuming it would be understood fine in shortened form. Perhaps not.

But thank you for responding.

Derek, Have you always been this popular on HN? I'm enjoying reading your articles :)

I'm all for short-and-to-the-point articles, but I think this one was too short.

Having said that, I think the article emphasizes a powerful point. One that i keep advocation to whomever listens. You have to do what you love....

I especially liked "If you think love needs to look like “Romeo and Juliet”, you'll overlook a great relationship that grows slowly."

I tend to be impatient(hey, aren't all programmers?) in almost everything I do. And I have to learn to stop that.

What if what I like to do is read news aggegators and comment on them? Sooo not marketable.

blogging?

That CDBaby Guy has a lot of followers...theres nearly 100 comments and his post came out today!

short and to the point. "Dive in deeper" is very important.

Successful entrepreneurship is a lot about perseverance & passion is the only fuel for perseverance Ray Kroc of McDonalds a classic example of perseverance backed by passion

No passion equals low perseverance - dima chances of making it

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