101 Essays That Will Change The Way You Think

(in a generation where 
“passion” is at a premium)
Our generation believes that passion is the answer—the solution to a
life joyously, successfully, happily lived. We were the kids who were
told, “You can be anything” and heard “You can succeed at
everything.” There are a lot of people much smarter than me who
have argued this beautifully.
It’s not about following passion; it’s about following purpose
passionately. Passion is a manner of traveling, not a means to
determine a destination. Passion is the spark that lights the fire;
purpose is the kindling that keeps it burning all night. (I’ve said this
before.) This is to say: The opposite of passion isn’t settling for a
lukewarm life, it’s marrying it to logic that will actually get you where
you want to go.
The ability to objectively look at our lives and interpret emotions
and events and decisions with a grounded frame of mind is not only
positive, it's essential to functioning. The head and heart must be
separate entities that you figure out how to merge together. Here’s
why:
01. Passion tells you that you should go after what you most want
in life, but it’s never about “what you want,” it’s about what
you want most. It’s about which of your (often conflicting)
desires you let win.
The only reason people don’t do what they claim to want
most is because there is something else they want a little bit
more. They ultimately don’t get what they want done because
they’re trying to follow their most intense desire rather than
prioritizing them.

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I’d like to have another day off but I’d also like to work on
my retirement fund and build my business some more. Right
now, I’m choosing the latter so it can facilitate the former later
on down the road. See that? Choosing which desire I let win.
When people try to build their lives solely on emotions,
they’re incapable of choosing which desire they’re going to
follow, so they choose the one that elicits the most extreme
high, which is fallible because it’s impermanent and it can
come at the cost of innumerable consequences that are
ultimately counterproductive to what they had intended in the
first place.
02. Passion bases relationships on the high; logic bases
relationships on the purpose.
The “purpose” being love (not attachment or not wanting to
be alone or money or ego, as some people unfortunately do).
We’re usually taught that love is just a “good feeling” or a
“verb.” But there are a lot of “good feelings” you can have that
are not rooted in love and things you can do out of what you
perceive to be love when you’re with someone important to
you.
It’s the commitment to ground your relationship in
something more than just a transitory feeling that will
ultimately make it work. When you believe that passion is
love—no more, no less—you’ll want to end a relationship as
soon as you’re not getting that hormonal high from your