So, currently I am going through a trying time. I feel like I’m facing up to a problem I’ve not really wanted to face up to before. I have no idea how to solve it (well, that’s not true, I have snippets of ideas, and vague ideas, and general principles and stuff like that, I’m not totally without weapons to fight — just nothing specific).

It’s a good time though, I’m seeing this positively. I guess you can call this the “quarter life crisis”. (This is assuming I live to the age of 100. Which, actually, I do.) Mid life crises are when you ask yourself, “what have I done with my life?” Quarter life crises are when you’re old enough to understand the urgency of that question (I’m 5 years away from 30!) but still young enough to make an impact on my future. I have two questions, then. What have I done with my youth? And, What am I going to do with my life?

So that’s the background. Part of this is decision making, and this is why I wanted to just decide about some things that interest me. Seems basic enough, I guess, but let’s get some structure.

(Maybe this seems a little egotistical. Well, take a cue from the title of this blog … I have a website where I write about my life, and it’s named after me! I think that’s far enough, one more post isn’t going to hurt)

So then. Starter for 10. I love websites. I love reading blogs, listening to podcasts, designing websites, programming PHP, writing wordpress plugins, supporting people on the wordpress forums (not done that in a while, actually) — I just really love it. So there — I have publicly given myself permission to be a web geek. If you are a web geek, you need to do the same.

I love writing. I can’t think unless I write something down. I have an urge to be read. Not just to think about stuff, but to show it to other people. Why live just on the inside of my head? This ties in with the paragraph above. I love writing as a means of communication, but I actually enjoy the physical process of writing, especially typing. (Sorry if I’m boring you by the way — if you want me to be funny, meet me in real life. Or add me as friend on Facebook, I’m quite funny there too. Gonna start being funny on this blog again any time soon!)

So that this post isn’t totally selfish, I want to write about passions in general. How you get passionate, what to do with them, that kind of thing. I spent a good deal of my youth not really knowing who I was or what I wanted to do, and it’s not a happy place to be. Passions are a road of that fog. They’re clues as to who you are, and they’re really important, I think, to living life to the full.

I am not naturally Mr Enthusiasm. (I’m more like Eeyore.) I have had to learn to be passionate and enthusiastic. And I’m still learning! These are some of the lessons I’ve learnt.

Prise your fingers off pessimism

It’s hard to do! Pessimism seems like it protects you from making the wrong decisions or wasting your time, but it doesn’t. Life is basically very good, even though it has its shockingly terrible moments. Refuse to believe that life is nothing other than an opportunity.

Passions don’t just suddenly appear

They grow, like babies or trees, from small things at first. It might be something you always thought about as a kid. I used to play with sentences in my head, to see how the tone affected the meaning of the sentence, even though it was just the same words. I spent ages as a teenager messing around on computers. Not playing games, just wasting time, really, but now I’m not at all fazed by technology. As a student, I spent most of my time writing this very blog. While my degree suffered (due to lack of time management, not writing this blog, I might add) I learnt loads about web coding, which is now making me money.

So these things didn’t just pop into my head, fully formed. They’ve grown as I’ve found like-minded people, and seen them from new angles. Did you know that you can become wealthy from blogging? You need business skills, yes, but you can do it. And did you know that you can change people’s lives? Or make relationships with people on the other side of the world? It started off as a geeky obsession, but now it’s a passion. And a possible income stream!

Nurture them properly

I once talked to someone about knowing what I wanted to do with my life, and I replied with the almost obligatory vagueness. They said, “so you’re still waiting for something to crystallize.” I thought it was an excellent picture, and then forgot about it.

Then years later, I was miserable because I was in a crappy job and I suddenly remembered the comment. it occurred to me that crystals only form in saturated solutions.

Let me explain that …

You’ll never grow a sugar cube out of a glass of water with only one teaspoon of sugar in it. You have to keep adding more sugar until no more will dissolve. Then the crystals start to grow. It was the same with the inside of my head. The more miserable I was, the more negative my “dreams” were — because they had nothing else to be made out of.

I changed (painfully, slowly, step-by-step) the way I saw the world, and now my head is a happier place to be. I’m still on that journey, but it’s worth it for the positive dreams that are coming into my head.

Anyway, this post has gone on too long, and I have shopping to do. So long!