Is she like a person that can come and go? Or is it a thing that we can set down and lose? Or is it always inside us until we sense her and let her out? “La Pasion” in Spanish is a female word. Is passion male or female?
We all experience passion from time-to-time. It is the time-to-time nature of the experience of passion that I want to explore today. How long has it been since you experienced passion? That may be a rather personal issue if we are only considering intimate relations. But passion has a multitude of definitions, applications, moods, and shades of meaning. An interesting dichotomy is that passion can be ignited by a positive emotion and/or a negative emotion. So, is passion itself positive or negative? Or is it neutral until initiated by something positive or negative? The Google dictionary definition of passion is a “strong and barely controllable emotion”. Do you agree with that? Yes, or no? Why, or why not? “Barely controllable?’ I love that––so is it controllable or not? If it is a happy emotion, why would we want to control it? Shouldn’t we want to let “a happy” passion run free and ignite others? When is passion happy and good? When is passion negative and bad?
Since passion can be good or bad, that tells me that something inside of us is making that determination. That something would be our brain. That means that we can control it. “Can,” only implies the possibility. It does not take into consideration the probability or plausibility (whether or not we will). Since passion is the result of a state of mind; Why would we not enjoy more of it? Why do we allow it to diminish or go away from time-to-time. And why does that time-to-time sometimes become days, months, years or…?
I believe that passion is the spark: that ignites our adrenaline; that propels us into action; that accomplishes results; that transforms thoughts into reality. We need and want that positive energy to drive transformative power in our lives. We can have it and utilize it in our lives by applying the right mindset (state of mind). It is within our ability to control, amplify or diminish our passion.
The next time you get excited about something, ask yourself if this is something you want more of (great feeling) or less of (worry or anger). Then you will know whether to feed it or let it pass. Journey On!
