Treat your passion like it's a skill

Passion is hard to define.

You can feel passionate about an activity, a topic or an idea.

When it comes to being passionate about an activity that can later become a job, like drawing, programming, writing, and so on, things can get a little trickier, mainly for people who only see their passion as being nothing more than... well, a passion.

Let me explain this better - let's say that our friend John loves to draw, and he wants to become an artist at some point in the future, who works for a big company. While that's what John wants, he also doesn't want to invest a lot of time into developing his drawing skills.

Sure, he loves drawing, but he only sees it as a passion, and you can't always do something you're passionate about every single day. You still need breaks from time to time. Maybe drawing once every two or three days will do the trick.

Also, watching YouTube videos about people explaining all kind of concepts like color theory or composition is boring, so maybe John will be able to learn those things while drawing once in a while.

After all, it's just a passion that may become a job. John may have to try really hard, but there's no need for that since his passion will lead him to where he needs to be.

It's kinda silly to think about passion as being this thing that you can do once in a while and that will suddenly turn you into exactly what you want to be, without actively working and trying to make progress.

That's why looking at your passion like it's a skill could be a good thing for a lot of people. If you like drawing for example, and you'd like to get better at it, then use the fact that you like that activity, come up with a schedule and make sure you draw every single day.

Watch a bunch of videos about how to get better at it, about how colors work, how composition works, what's the best way to present your artwork, and so on, and, overall, get better at what you're passionate about by treating it as being a skill you need to develop.

This will help you come up with a plan about how to improve, while also doing something you love. Being passionate about something is great, but passion alone is not what's gonna help you get good. Actively working and learning will do the trick, even though those things may be boring sometimes.