Passion Projects

Do you have a Passion project? If not, you should like, totally, like, you know, get one. Actually, you don't get a Passion Project. They get you. You don't even know you are getting gotten, you are just sitting quietly, drinking it all in, but when you get up - you are a changed person.

 They get you and you get sleepless nights, early mornings, late nights, working all hours around your other life, worrying about money not just for your regular bills but for the project because the project MUST go on. You get hours of complete despondency because it all seems like it's going nowhere, a pipe dream, a storm in a glass of water, a sandcastle in the sky, a great mirage of wavering illusions.

You get to meet people who think you are nuts, ridiculous, people who stare at you blankly and ask Why? Why is that important? Why should that matter to me? You get to learn when to speak and when to simply shrug and say with a smile "If you have to ask why, I can't explain it to you."

You get to worry about letting down the people who have helped you get this far and you get to question your own sanity - repeatedly. You get to wonder what the heck you have gotten yourself into and What on earth was I thinking??????

 

Buuuuut you also get the overwhelming joy of feeling alive in the world, involved, inspired, enthusiastic, purpose-driven, the elation when you finally break through a wall and reach the next stage, the pride of having hung in there, made it happen, risked it all and lived to tell the story. You get to feel touched by the extraordinairy, free of the mundane.

You get to meet wonderful people who run on parallel paths and offer spontaneous gestures of generousity. People who think you rock, who believe in you, in your vision, people who ask if they can help, people who put their hands in their pockets and pull out what they can to help you reach your goals. People who say that though they don't know you, they trust you, are proud of you and what you are becoming.

You get to grow as a human being, expand, become better acquainted with who you really are, or think you are, you get to peel layers off of your inner onion and discover just how much you believe - in your project, in your partners, in yourself, in your ability to go after something and manifest your dreams into your current reality.

You get to dream, a passionate and vibrant dream where your life will be one you can look back upon with pride and satisfaction. Not because you changed the world, but because you relinquished the safety of inertia and allowed the world to change you and the ripples of that change made a difference. Even if just to you.

Because when you change, the world changes.

 

 A little over a year ago I went on a ride, on a lark, never suspecting it would turn me upside down, inside out. I wonder now how many lives Offbeat Safaris have changed simply by being who they are. How many lives can I change simply by being who I am? How many lives can you change simply by being who YOU are? Who is your most deep down Self, and what matters to that Self?

That is the question my Passion Project keeps asking me. To be me. The best of me, the most inspired, sincere, authentic, powerful, courageous...me. To not second guess, to not waiver, to not doubt that I am exactly what I am supposed to be, and that who I am is good enough to matter - when I dare to put all my talents to work.