Prioritize Your Passions
Here's something you know: what fuels you, what you love, what puts a smile on your face, and what makes you feel whole. So why is it that you often don’t make time for these very things?
The simple answer – you're not prioritizing them.
I'm bringing a little tough love today. These are your passions and every single day you have a choice, as to what you focus your energy on, what gets your attention and time. And yet, your passions, which are the things that are MOST important to you, sadly get left behind at the bottom of a to-do list that never ends.
Happiness research predicts that making time for a passion and treating it as a real priority and not an ‘extra’ to be fitted in at a free moment will bring a tremendous happiness boost. This means that your passions need to be at the top of your to-do list, not just if you get around to it.
What you devote your attention to grows.
It’s so easy to get caught up in life responsibilities, and lose yourself in the busyness of life, so prioritizing your passions is essential. If you don’t, they will never be honored or expressed, they will be put on the back burner every single time and eventually you'll begin to resent your responsibilities for taking you away from your passions. Or you just may deny that they were ever a passion of your. Without prioritizing them, they'll fade into the land of "someday when I have time”, “I’ll get to it after I finish project X”, or “once I clean the house”. Your passions will always be just out of arms reach.
Write out everything that you love, all your passions no matter how big or small. Start with a brainstorm, or a mind map, and narrow it down from there and my Passion & Purpose Workbook is a great place to start. My list includes bigger passions such as contributing to others, and traveling the world, as well as some simple passions like getting out into nature daily, or practicing drawing.
4 WAYS TO PRIORITIZE YOUR PASSIONS
1) CLARITY
Recognize and clearly define your passions. Spend the time exploring, being curious about what lights you up and why. Know that your passion can also include a specific way that you want to feel and not a specific type of goal.
2) VISIBILITY
Write them down to have them visible using sticky notes, a planner, a vision board, dry erasr maker on a mirror... anyplace where you get to see them multiple times a day.
3) MAKING TIME
Integrate your passion into your daily life by scheduling time for it just like you would anything else (the gym, groceries, the doctor,etc) Put it on the calendar and watch it come to life.
4) CHECKING IN
Anytime you feel a little off, maybe bored or frustrated, a good question to ask yourself is, "Am I honoring my passions?", most likely the answer will be NO. Consciously make a change, and go back to step one & repeat.
Don’t you deserve to feel like the fullest expression of YOU? Isn’t it time that you felt passionate about what you do?
We have to make it a regular occurrence.
If you don’t make time for yourself to enjoy the things you love, you will become further removed from your source of happiness and your sense of self. I talk about not being able to 'pour from an empty cup’, because I believe it’s one of the most fundamentally important things you can do for yourself, and for those you love.
Now, grab your calendar, and start scheduling in some things you love! Set an alarm, enroll a friend to do it with you, create a progress chart for yourself, give yourself a reward, whatever you need to do to make it happen, and do it. Set yourself up for success.
Let’s integrate your passions into your daily life and create a habit out of them so you don’t even need to think about them, they’re just a part of your every day world.
YOU GOT THIS.