Passion, Hot, Soul Changing Passion

Passion—hot, soul-changing passion. I just finished my summer, 2010 release, Shut Up and Kiss Me, and there’s quite a bit of passion in that book. A couple of scenes, one taking place on a desktop, well, let’s just say I had to crank the air conditioner down when I wrote it.

I do love that kind of passion, but that’s not exactly the type of passion I’m blogging about. Yup, there are different kinds of passion. Most of them are powerful, most of them can be mind consuming, and most of them are a heck of a lot of fun. (My characters had fun on that desk top!)


But I’m talking about the things you do in your life that you enjoy . . . besides the things you have to get naked to do. I’m talking about hobbies, interest, things that just tickle your fancy, that makes you happy from the inside out.

The kind of something that when you do it, times flies by, you find yourself putting your worries and stresses on the back burner, the kind of thing that feels so good doing it, that you often feel guilty. And one more time, I’m not talking about sex!

I think it was Deepak Chopra who said, (and I’m paraphrasing) that to do what you love, what you’re passionate about, and get paid to do it, is true happiness. I think the man was on to something. Because let me tell you, one of my biggest passions is writing. And I consider myself very lucky to do it for a living. Don’t get me wrong, writing is still a job, there are deadlines, and stresses.

Duh, people want the writing to be grammatically correct and things spelled right. Being dyslexic makes that hard, and I don’t like hard, I just want to tell my stories. I’d rather clip a stranger’s toenails than polish and proof my work. But I do it. (Polish and proof my work, I’ve yet to clip a stranger’s toenails.) I’m polishing that June book now. Ahh, but when I’m in the creating part, when I’m getting that first draft down, I’m in heaven. Hours can go by and I’ll forget to pee, or eat, and I’ll find myself writing until three in the morning.

Now, I have other passions in my life that don’t provide regular income, or keep me up so late, and I’ll be the first to admit, I don’t indulge into them near enough. Some of my other passions include: slow walks in the woods or on the beach, sampling good wine, cooking, jigsaw puzzles, photography, reading, and traveling.

While my passions are rather sane, for a nutcase like myself, I know and have met some people whose passions are rather . . . bizarre. I knew and wrote about a guy whose passion was . . . skunks. His mission was not only to save them from negative opinions of the general public, but he rescued skunks from attics, under people’s beds and from the sides of the road. He nursed, cared for, and trained orphaned skunks to act like . . . big skunks so he could release them in the wild.

I knew someone else whose passion was riding wooden rollercoasters and someone who went goo-goo over painting mailboxes. Another person I knew went nutzo over weaving baskets--baskets that only stood an inch high.

Crazy? Maybe. But amazingly, when these people talked about these things, you could feel it. “It” being their excitement, their joy, their passion.

Now, some of you might say, that your passion is your children, or your spouse, maybe your family as a whole. And don’t get me wrong, I love my family, and having just now discovered grandmotherhood, I’m ecstatic at this new role. But through my years I’ve learned that it’s not always wise to let other people be your passion. I’m not saying don’t love them, I’m not even saying don’t place them first in your life. Hey, we’re women, we were meant to care.

What I’m saying is that as women we often forget that we need to take time for ourselves, time to explore things that make us genuinely happy, things that don’t necessarily involve emotions for another person.

Have we not all seen what happens to moms when their children are their lives and these children grow up and leave home? Suddenly these women are left not knowing who they are. Then there are the wives whose passion are their husbands. Women who devoted their entire beings to their spouse, men who suddenly decided they wanted a divorce.

A woman whom I care dearly about recently told me, “I would give anything if I had a passion in my life like the one you have with your writing.”

I immediately started questioning her about the things she loved to do, things that made her happy. Sadly enough, she didn’t know what made her happy. And she isn’t the only one. It made me remember that at one time I too had walked passionless though my days and years. Before I discovered writing, before I discovered the importance of nurturing one’s soul.

So I ask you, what is your passion? Is there a way you can incorporate it into part of your career? Or is it already a part of your career?

Or, are you someone who has neglected to take the time to nurture your soul, to find that something that when you do it, your worries slip away? If you are, I hope you will try to reconnect to something that inspires you, that you will relearn how to play. You’ll recognize your passion because when doing it, time ceases to exist, and you suddenly realize that you are starving and haven’t peed in hours. It might not be healthy for your bladder, but it’s heaven for your soul.

Today, I hope you will share your passions with me. Tell me what you love, what you need to do more of, tell me your plans to rediscover what it means to have fun.