If there is no passion in your life, then have you really lived? Find your passion, whatever it may be. Become it, and let it become you and you will find great things happen FOR you, TO you and BECAUSE of you. ~T. Alan Armstrong

If I asked you how many times have you’ve heard or reeled over the phrases, ‘find your purpose, live your passion and manifest your big crazy dreams’ in the last week, what would you say? 50? 600? If you’re any form of a human being, it’s safe to say you can multiply that by, ohhhhh, infinity.

And do you think it’s a load of wishful thinking or something you’ve been trying years to do?

Probably both.

There’s a lot of passion-finding induced panic that’s blazing a trail through the Internet, self-help circles and your purpose-panicked brain.

And whether you’re 20 or 60, leaving this Earth before you crack your purpose code and firmly plant your stake in the ground, seems inconceivable, at best.

But instead of investing in another round of therapy [or 10…okay, 23], crack open your grade-school yearbook. Yep, that gem of a book that’s collecting dust in your treasure chest — bust it wide open because there’s some brilliance lost inside.

And once you get passed the braces, bad haircuts, and awkward crushes, or in my case, all of the above, you’ll see how genius you were then.

Because if you thought like your 8-year-old self, you’d not only find your passion, but your bliss, dreams and maybe even reconnect with your 5th grade flame.

But the point is this: you were brilliant as a 6-year-old, profound as a 7-year-old and by the time you turned 8 you played level with Einstein, because you knew what you loved to do and did it — BIG.

You didn’t have to ponder your passions or drop dollars in coaching or mentorship programs to figure out your dreams. You were a living example of them both.

You did what you loved, played what you loved and read what you loved, because you were entirely in tune with the things that mattered most — the stuff that revved your little adolescent engine. You wanted to be a scientist, dancer, professional caterpillar collector, because you loved white lab coats, tutus, and gettin’ elbow deep in grass stains [much to your clean freak Mama’s dismay].

And think about how happy you were. You were really happy, weren’t you? Fricken’ ecstatic even. You weren’t anxiously debating if you should collect coins, dolls or dried-

up leaves for the next 10 years. You just did those things, because in that moment, that’s what you loved and you couldn’t imagine doing anything else.

How good would that same sense of easy inner-knowing and purpose feel now? Pretty damn good and entirely possible.

When I was a little girl, I loved animals. I grew up in a house full of ‘em thanks to my sucker of a mother who couldn’t resist my pleas for a zoo of pets. Kittens, birds, turtles, gerbils, about 9,000 over-breeding hamsters — it was like a giraffe-less Noah’s ark. So naturally, I wanted to be a vet. I dressed up my pets, played doc with my pets and wrote about them or a chimpanzee in every elementary report.

And even though I didn’t end up an animal doc, that compassionate, nurturing nature necessary for vet-hood, is very much alive and well in my life today. And when I’m in a creative slump, funk mood, or need a laugh, I play with my pup — just like I would’ve as a kid. Because I find as much peace and hilarity in animals today, as I did when I was a brazen bug-picking 8-year-old.

The lesson is this. You were really smart as a kid. You did what you inherently loved, not what you should love. [That’s the only S-word I’d like to see banned from your potty mouth].

So if you want to find your purpose, live your passion, manifest your dreams — instead of vision-boarding like a crazy-person — spend a little time in your adolescent brain and do what she/he would do.

You might eat a few boogers, but you’ll eventually fall back into your natural awesome self – especially if you ask yourself this, “What did I love about my childhood hobbies, interests and dream job? Take note. Then 3 things will happen:

1. You’ll realize that your childhood hobbies hold all the trappings for the passion, purpose or dream job you want to pursue.

2. You’ll connect the dots between your flurry of passions and see how they wrap perfectly in a hot pink life or business plan.

3. You’ll reconnect with old hobbies and they’ll stay hobbies. But they’ll ignite a creative fire and lay the inner-peace groundwork that will blaze a path toward your lovely, lofty, purpose.

Win, win!

Source: Purpose fairy