"It perhaps wouldn’t be jaw-droppingly surprising if this manic focus on passion-finding were to have some counterproductive effects – and sure enough, [[Cal Newport]], who runs the academic advice site Study Hacks, at calnewport.com, reports a chorus of cries for help from agonised students. **They’re worried they haven’t found their passion; or they’ve found too many and can’t decide between them; or their passion is working with animals, say, while their career path is electrical engineering**. "What all these worriers share, [[Cal Newport|Newport]] notes, is a belief that passions are a priori, existing ‘out there’; that, as he puts it, ‘they’re some mysterious Platonic form waiting for you to discover. This is a dangerous fiction.’ **[[Cal Newport|Newport]]’s main point is that passion is the feeling you get from mastering a skill, not some magical quality unrelated to hard work: you create passion, rather than ‘finding’ it, and for any given person there are probably hundreds of activities that might suit**." --- **Tags** -- [[quotes]], [[intrinsic-motivation]], [[passion]], [[career-development]], [[expertise]], [[life-advice]], **Source** -- [[20241114100017 - B - Help!]]