
Why You Need More Than Passion to be Successful - brianlenney
https://www.hotjar.com/blog/the-passion-fallacy
======
gexla
Don't follow your passion. More specifically, stop following self help advice.
That's probably where this came from in the first place. Whoever pushed that
idea probably sold lots of books, so somebody was successful from it.

Success is a big word which lacks information. What is success? I doubt enough
people can agree on what success is for anyone to talk about it to a wide
audience. For many, success is relative to others, but that's worthless
because that perspective puts too much focus on the others (even if it's just
a little, it's too much).

As Chris Rock said, Bill Gates would kill himself if he had Opera's money. I
could feel down because I'm not where I want to be, but then I walk past
homeless people on the street and realize I could be in a much worse
situation. And the capable homless person might have a homeless friend who
just broke a leg and can't walk. Your situation can always get worse until
you're dead, in which case you don't care anymore.

We're all just trying to survive in the jungle. Even if it doesn't feel bad
for us, it's still someone else's horror show. In the jungle we just have to
assess our surroundings and use what we can to keep improving our situation.
But we'll still always be in the jungle.

As Bear Grylls says, keep moving. Success is in the small wins that you can
rack up every day by the handfulls. It's making a little progress. It's
sharpening a stick. It's setting up a shelter. It's building a trap. Just keep
moving. Even the failures are wins as those failures carry information.

That's probably not very helpful either. I would make a terrible self help
person. ;)

~~~
CuriouslyC
You need to be passionate about what you're doing, if you want to be truly
great. That doesn't necessarily mean change what you're doing, it could mean
just change the way you view it.

A passionless life is just a slow march towards death.

~~~
Avshalom
a passion filled life is also just a slow march towards death.

~~~
truth_sentinell
No, it's not. Passion is the only thing that gives us real purpose. Without
purpose, you might as well be dead.

~~~
Radim
Passion is a bunch of factors (including your hormonal responses) conspiring
to better explore the evolutionary mutation/branch that is YOU.

Yes, putting energy and "passion" into your unique abilities may enable you to
reach your potential. And perhaps ultimately decide whether this particular
mutation was worthwhile, in the long run.

But if you think "purpose" has some mystical meaning, and judge your existence
on achieving it... Passion has evolved only as means to an end, and is not
worth glorifying. Not any more than you'd glorify "hunger" or "pain" or
"pride".

It's an optimization technique in the rat race called "evolution".

------
jharger
I don't think I've heard anyone say you will _succeed_ by following your
passion... I've always heard you're more likely to be _happy_ if you do. I
think that's an important distinction, especially if you define success as
making a lot of money.

~~~
WalterSear
I don't think this is an accurate distinction. I know a number of people who
are living in penury right now due to chasing this boomer fallacy.

People tend to downplay the requirement of a minimal level of material success
for happiness, because the alternative is admitting that society isn't set up
to profit from, not help us achieve, our hopes and dreams. It's part of the
bootstrap fallacy, essentially - you just need to want something enough, and
everything will fall in place.

~~~
CuriouslyC
Material success only matters for happiness to the degree that it alleviates
wants/needs. Truthfully, if you don't buy into all the things society says you
should want, you can live on a startlingly small sum of money, and be
genuinely happy.

The brutal trap is people who chase wealth as a proxy for social status; as
you become more successful your peer group tends to change, so you never get
ahead of the curve.

------
unabst
Passion is fuel. To say you need more than passion to be successful is like
saying you need more than gasoline to get to your destination. You need a car.
But to then turn and say I don't need passion because I have a job is like
saying I don't need gasoline because I have a car. Hence so many workers feel
out of passion and out of gas at their jobs.

The main problem with the passion debate is it's often made more about daily
motivation and the meaning of life which are mainly concerns of employees, not
entrepreneurs (many of whom became entrepreneurs by overcoming those
concerns). And the reason why there is so much despair and disappointment in
the workplace giving rise to all this passion-talk is because there is simply
more boring work than fun work. Most jobs are boring, and if you couldn't find
a fun job, you're probably stuck at a boring one. It's just a numbers game.

Of course passion can be harmful if not used properly, just as gasoline will
blind you if you pour it in your eyes or set it on fire. But when used
properly, passion is one of the few unfair advantages because it cannot be
bought or obtained at will. Most everything else, even experience, are
technicalities, and can be bought from the standpoint of an employer. Passion
is non-technical.

~~~
eljimmy
Very well put. As a contractor, there have been some jobs I've worked that
have sucked the absolute life out of me. They've made me question whether it
was a good choice to follow my passion of programming into a career.

However, just as easily, there are jobs where I am excited to go to work and
am able to embrace the fact that I am having fun while doing so.

No doubt there are more boring jobs than fun ones though.

~~~
unabst
As entrepreneurs and employers it's part of our jobs to make the jobs we
create as fun as possible... but at the end of the day if the work itself is
boring, there is not much we can add to make it fun. So we offer money, and it
works. In fact it works so well, it practically makes the world go round. And
hence the modern 1st world epidemic of boredom.

------
kafkaesq
Hiding your light and floating with the tide (because you were too afraid to
"fail") can be a sure path to even more systematic failure, also. As the King
of Fun himself so presciently put it for us, just as he was setting out on his
path:

 _And indeed, that IS the question: whether to float with the tide, or to swim
for a goal. It is a choice we must all make consciously or unconsciously at
one time in our lives. So few people understand this! Think of any decision
you’ve ever made which had a bearing on your future: I may be wrong, but I
don’t see how it could have been anything but a choice however indirect —
between the two things I’ve mentioned: the floating or the swimming._

Per last month's discussion on "On Finding Your Purpose: An Extraordinary
Letter by Hunter S. Thompson" \-
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12379809](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12379809)

~~~
sageabilly
I think there needs to be more compassion towards those who are floating in
order to muster enough energy to swim.

I'm snug as a bug in a rug right now, and about as "floating" as one can get,
but my husband and I are saving money and paying down debt like gangbusters so
we can buy a farm in 7-10ish years and leave this lifestyle behind us.

~~~
kafkaesq
Great plan, actually. Sounds like you're synergizing opposites; simultaneously
floating _and_ swimming to your goal.

------
abz10
I oscillate between following my passion and getting paid.

I'm a shell of a human when I'm not following my passion.

------
dvcrn
Here's my take:

First, how do you define success? Is it making a lot of money? Is it being
happy doing what you do? For me it is to eliminate the need of working for
someone else 8h a day and invest my time completely into myself and the things
I want to do. And for that, passion is something that drives you to this
success. But even more so: You need to work your ass off - and that is the
hard part.

To go home after a long work day and STILL work on your own ideas, on your own
business or similar. And if it fails and you crash, you continue with the next
idea and push yourself up. Maybe you gave up your job to pursue your idea and
it fails? Find a new job, get money, get up and keep trying. That's why you
need passion - to keep you going and bear with the stress.

Sure there are lucky people who make the big hit in their first try but for
most of us that won't happen.

I am nowhere near successful. I was almost there with my first project but not
anymore. But I love what I'm doing and I love coding on interesting concepts
and ideas with friends even though it eats a ton of time and pushes stress. If
I didn't have passion for it, I would have probably already burned out and
given up.

That's the important difference in my opinion: Are you someone who has the
will to succeed and willing to keep trying and trying again? Or are you
someone who is happy to rely on someone to give you money and hope to get
successful through that? (Be it stocks, big paycheck, buyout, etc)

------
mettamage
Lets give another perspective on passion. It is one of the perspectives that I
have and heared no one else talk about. It's not the only true or right
perspective there is, multiple views on passion are quite interesting and/or
useful to have. This is just one of them and it should be told more.

Having passion is dangerous. Here are a couple of examples:

1\. A couple of years ago, my then GF was at my place during the summer. For
the first two weeks I didn't see her -- she was sitting next to me -- because
I was completely hooked on a computer graphics final school project. The only
thing I saw was my screen and I did the eat, sleep, code thing. I didn't know
it was a thing, I had so much passion I just did it. She became very pissed. I
didn't care. She became sad. I still didn't care. I was hooked, I was
passionate. When I finished. the project I made it all up, but man, passion is
dangerous.

2\. There was this assignment for security class, it was really hard. I was
pretty passionate about the security class, the education was amazing. The
final day of the assignment was almost arriving. I decided to stay up and code
for 25 hours straight -- well I didn't decide it, it just sort of happened. I
couldn't even do simple arithmetic at the end of the day. I felt like shit,
almost became ill, but I learned a lot and had a ton of fun. Still is this a
healthy way to live? Passion is dangerous.

3\. I used to play a lot of video games. Those are also the days that I only
knew guys and was only social with fellow gamers. I knew nothing else. I
wouldn't play much sports, I would slug through school and I'd always go back
to the computer to play more games. I loved it, I was passionate, but the
problem is I gave up so much. Passion is dangerous, really.

The thing is: when I feel passionate for an indeterminate amount of time. I
really do not give a single f--- about the rest of the world, including the
rest of my life. It is like drugs. Passion may be differently experience by
people. I've learned that the way I experience passion is akin to addiction
and it tends to deregulate my life and smash me of balance. So I try to steer
clear from it when I recognize the addictive feeling part that comes with it.

An implicit 2nd perspective / idea that is in here that passion does not have
to last a life time. In a lot of cases it lasts for a couple of weeks.

~~~
TeMPOraL
I wish I could summon this on demand. It is dangerous, but not as much as one
may think. What I discovered thanks to random sparks of passion and frequent
cases of procrastination is that a lot of the "rest of your life" is made of
time-consuming bullshit and doesn't really need that much of an attention.

~~~
mettamage
I'm in my end student phase. What needs attention for me is: my program,
extracurriculars (e.g. a Buddhism class or random CS classes or doing a
board), friends, girlfriend (when I have one) and hobbies (if I have one,
really depends), sidejobs (when I have one). I have a general passion towards
studying a lot, which my friends and especially my previous GF don't
appreciate because I don't see them enough (to which I agree, e.g. friends
would be once a month).

I do prefer a more balanced motivation that feels like "ah this is a marathon
and I'm going to run it one step at a time."

------
platz
You don't need PASSION.

You don't need GOALS.

You need SYSTEMS THAT IMPROVE YOUR ODDS OF SUCCESS OVER TIME.

~~~
erobbins
and you need to play 23 dimensional chess!

I actually think this is 100% correct. Goals are nice but you need a system to
achieve them.

~~~
truth_sentinell
What do you mean by system?

------
ScottBurson
> [Passion] made me arrogant

No. You were arrogant already. Be passionate and humble and your chances of
success will improve.

------
erobbins
The true key to success is doing something that other people find
difficult/objectionable that you are good at and can enjoy or at least
tolerate doing.

------
panchicore3
A good advice from Ben Horowitz as well
[http://www.bhorowitz.com/some_career_advice_for_all_you_rece...](http://www.bhorowitz.com/some_career_advice_for_all_you_recent_graduates)

------
eiriklv
Cal Newport's "So Good They Can't Ignore You" offers a lot of insight here.

Book - [https://www.amazon.com/Good-They-Cant-Ignore-
You/dp/14555091...](https://www.amazon.com/Good-They-Cant-Ignore-
You/dp/1455509124)

Talk -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIMu1PGbG-0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIMu1PGbG-0)

Edit: Grammar / formatting

------
lazyant
The Problem with “Follow Your Dreams”
[https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/test-case/201304/the-
pr...](https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/test-case/201304/the-problem-
follow-your-dreams-0)

The word "passion" applied to personal or professional pursuits is loaded, I'd
rather use specific tests, for ex I'm "not passionate" enough about
programming since I'm not staying any more at 4am writing code for fun, but
I'm "passionate" in the sense that in a lazy afternoon I may be reading
somebody's blog about programming or fooling around with a new
framework/language.

------
pascalxus
I'm so glad someone finally understands this and that this article has been
written. Starting a business is about creating value for others - that's the
essence of it - not indulging your "passions". Passions are for your free
time.

~~~
brianlenney
The post talks about passion being a multiplier of success, not the reason for
it. Spot on.

------
maxxxxx
I envy people whose passion is useful for others. Most of my passions are
totally self-centered and will never produce anything anybody else will be
interested in. So following my passion would not make any money.

I would much prefer if my passion was to sell things.

~~~
sliverstorm
Everybody is "passionate" about some kind of vice or leisure. But you probably
have some useful passions buried in there too. It's a waste of braincells to
lament how unfair it is that your only passions (drinking & sleeping) are not
very marketable skills.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Drinking is a marketable passion - you could become a beer/wine connoisseur,
or something like that.

The worse thing that could happen is to discover - like I did - that your
passions are in inverse relation with work. I loose positive feelings about
programming and start to stress out pretty much immediately when a project
starts to feel like an obligation, which makes me 10x less productive at work
than on my hobby projects.

------
benjohnson
I would like to add that it may help to frame what you're doing more
positively so as to understand your contributions better.

Poor framing: I do IT support. Better framing: I help people do awesome stuff
with their computers.

------
Myrmornis
The problem with "follow your passion" isn't with techie entrepreneurial
types. The problem is the choices inflicted on millions of teenagers and
university students by parents who grew up in the anti-scientific 60s and 70s,
and who want their children to do arty subjects because they think that to do
otherwise is to succumb to the evil capitalist squid, and because they think
you still just need to have a degree in any subject from a good university to
have a good career in some honorable non-STEM area.

~~~
JKCalhoun
I don't know — I pursued engineering and am ultimately not passionate about
it. Going to work every day is often a drag.

Why do I want my kids to make that same choice? Only for financial reasons.

Only.

~~~
Grishnakh
I pursued engineering too, and I love doing certain engineering jobs. But
going to work every day IS a drag, and I'm almost never passionate about what
I work on for money.

It'd be great if I could work on programming and engineering projects of my
own choosing, on things that I think are really interesting. Unfortunately,
the world doesn't work that way.

If your kids are smart enough to engineering but aren't drawn to it, and just
want to make money, they should pursue medicine or business or finance
instead. If you don't care about engineering work, don't go into this field;
there's other fields for people who have no passion for their work, and
finance is a really big one in the US. You'll make more money, you won't work
in a workplace that's a sausagefest, you'll have a much easier and more fun
time in college, and you'll get to live in much better cities when you're
working.

~~~
pipio21
I don't know. Financial industry is a big bubble in the US right now.

It has been a great ride for those that lived it. But when the bubble pops
people are going to handle pitchforks against anything resembling "financial"
on its name. Already happened in the 1930s and a little in 2008.

~~~
HeyLaughingBoy
[shrug]

Then ride the bubble until it pops and look for something else after that.
Sometimes you really need to live in the moment.

------
j45
The master skill to develop is discipline. What needs to be done.. needs to be
done regardless of how motivated or passionate someone is, or isn't feeling.

There is no easy street, everything is hard, nothing gets easier, you get
better at it. There is no arriving and feeling on top of everything if you are
always growing. To always be growing you need to make sure the stuff that
needs to get done, gets done so you can focus on direction.

In that way, I see it less as passion, and seeing it as no other way to go but
forward.

------
hyperpallium
It's very exciting to notice a needed gap in the market that _you could fill_
\- you could make a difference. Passion can follow opportunity.

I liked this: "follow your contribution"

------
rezashirazian
To me, on a personal level success is another word for happiness.

The difference is usually when it comes how others perceive you. People are
more liberal at labeling others with success based on various metrics that
align with their standards and understanding of success.

They don't do so with happiness.

~~~
dasil003
Even the concept of happiness I find to be fraught. I'd be happier if I wasn't
so worried about being happy.

------
Mendenhall
I started by ruling out things I did not want. I followed my passion of
getting away from things I dislike.

When I hear people talk about passion I always view that as a starting point.
I dont take it to mean all you need is passion.

------
happy-go-lucky
Passion may change with the wind and obligations may override passion. IMHO,
it's our purpose that keeps most of us going. To me, passion sounds more
theoretical than practical :)

------
piedradura
Today I read about reinforcement-learning in the wikipedia and The Wealth of
Humans: Work and its Absence in the Twenty-first Century. Perhaps both ideas
are useful to be successful.

------
bloaf
What if what you love is terrible?

[http://i.imgur.com/GripW3M.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/GripW3M.jpg)

~~~
yannyu
I was going to link to the original comic on picturesforsadchildren.com, but
ended up refreshing myself on exactly what happened to John. It's unfortunate
that the whole thing ended in such a bizarre way, but hopefully she's happy
now: [https://killscreen.com/articles/how-disappear-completely-
int...](https://killscreen.com/articles/how-disappear-completely-internet/)

