Don’t Do What You Love

Should you follow your passion or follow the money?

I’ve tried both.

And I say the answer is NEITHER.

When you follow the money, you’re only half-heartedly invested in your work, which means you will likely fail at it, and do so unhappily.

When you follow your passion and “do what you love,” you radically limit your impact because you’ve defined your work by your own feelings and wants instead of the feelings and wants of your audience.

It means you’ve chosen work that makes you feel good instead of work that stretches and breaks you to the next level the way a worthy mission should.

The work devolves into a self-indulgence masquerading as a mission.

Don’t do what you love. DO WHAT YOU FEAR.

Do what brings tremendous value to the audience you’ve chosen to serve.

When we follow our fear, out of love for an audience and a mission worthy of us, we do things that may feel “not us” for the sake of others. We become someone else, someone new, even someone “alien” to us, because that is the path that will best serve our purpose.

It’s not easy. It’s not safe. And it doesn’t always “feel good.”

But it’s where the magic happens.

– Brian Ward, Third Way Man