Know when your Career is your True Passion and Life’s Calling

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Business Man with Hand Raised in Victory Answering questions about finding passions is a difficult task, because they rarely, if ever, rely on simple, linear methods. No, discovering one’s passion is a journey that leads from one’s innermost desires to those opportunities available in the real world. Figuring out the magic equation  to finding your life’s calling may be difficult at best, but knowing you’ve found it may be a step in the right direction.

When your work is your passion, time spent performing daily tasks seems to fly by. If you get so caught up in your work that you lose all sense of time and your actions seem to flow in an unrehearsed rhythm with your duties then those duties are providing a sense of fulfillment that is a necessary ingredient in defining a passion.

The old adage goes, “If you love what you do, you don’t work a day in your life.” If you are passionate about your job, you rarely view it as work. It becomes an outlet for expression; a way to shape your environment in a way that makes you feel fulfilled. If you look at your work and think that you’d do it even if you were not paid, you’ve probably found your calling.

Similarly, if you look forward to your work day you know you’ve found something special. Unfortunately, most people live life in pursuit of weekends and holidays, wishing away the eight to twelve hours per day spent toiling in a job that they hate. If you have managed to find a job that makes you happy all the time then you know you’ve found your passion.

When your work is your passion you want it to become part of your lifestyle. Your work becomes who you are and who you are is all that you have ever wanted to be. In a sense, you may find that you have become addicted to your work—that it makes you feel healthier and more capable in your life at large. When your healthy addictions are interwoven into your work life, you are doing what you love.

Keep aware of your inner life. Everyone wants answers to questions larger than themselves and looks for ways to fulfill needs that they can’t even name. When you have found a career that makes you feel as though you are pursuing those answers you know you have found what you need to be doing. When you find your life’s passion you won’t need a reason to pursue it. But when you feel as though your work gives you an excuse to seek the meaning of your life – wait for it — you know you’ve found your calling.

 

By Joshua Bjerke