The Colours of a Garden – The Love Project

When you describe your most memorable experiences, what do they sound like? When I think about this question, I always connect the best moments of my life to the days when I challenge myself to try something new. Whenever I take a leap towards a new activity I tend to fall in love with it because I was able to overcome the fear that was limiting my abilities. My perception of life becomes meaningfully beautiful following the exploration of these new experiences and I often discover a passion I was longing to be apart of. I realized that by separating the fear apart from the activity, it is easier to appoint energy towards my objectives and conquer. Overall, fear plays a huge role in holding us back from unearthing our passions, but we all have the ability to transform what confines us into a positive light. And when this switch occurs, the colours of our garden transform from light pastels to vibrant hues.

To explain this thought further, I used to sing and play guitar during my teenage years and I dreamed of making a career from this passion. However, I was so afraid to sing in front of an audience because I was infatuated with what everyone else would think or say about the songs I wrote, my guitar skills, and my voice. Eventually, I gained confidence in my abilities and I started a YouTube channel, auditioned for school choirs and major productions, and sang whenever I had the chance! It was the greatest feeling to believe in myself and follow my heart to accomplish my goals, especially when others did not see this path laid before me. But once I overcame this fear of singing and playing guitar on stage, I realized that I wasn’t doing it to benefit myself. Instead, I was merely trying to impress other people and prove to everyone that I had talent.

So, I stepped back from playing guitar and singing and looked elsewhere for a hobby that didn’t make feel like I needed to become something for someone else. In time, I joined a journalism club at my old high school and discovered a passion that I am transforming into a career. From this experience, I was able to understand that it’s OK to have several hobbies, step out of your comfort zone, and to love something without having to perfect it. Through writing I’ve also learned the importance of loving what I do without having to seek validation from others. I used to want those around me to take interest in the things I love because I wanted them to care and to be proud of my accomplishments. However, everyone has their own hobbies and their lack of interest for yours does not make what you are doing less meaningful. Life is worthwhile when people can direct their focus to the love they have for their passions without the need to feel rewarded by others.

In my opinion, not only do hobbies help to reduce stress and provide healing through traumatic situations, but it allows people to connect with others who might have a different cultural background, viewpoint, and/or level of expertise. By putting oneself into an unfamiliar learning position, it creates the foundation for mastering intricate skills and fabricating a sense of community. A lot of times people will want to learn something, but they do not want to be judged for being a beginner which relates to my story of being fearful to sing and play guitar. Although, stepping out of one’s comfort zone is essential to grasp new tasks and gain a higher self-esteem by believing in themselves. It’s perfectly OK to acknowledge that we are not an expert and to ask for help to become more advanced within that area. Overall, it is the process and determination that truly counts towards the happiness of transforming ideas into passions.

Consequently, it’s easy to slide into playing the comparison game with your mind when you are attempting to pursue a newfound hobby. I’ve learned that it’s human nature to reflect on your personal qualities, wants, and needs, and wish that you were standing on a different plate in the game. But we can all get discouraged planted on our home base and feel that we will never make it to the first. However, having patience and the dedication to run the field will take a certain strength and time. This is demonstrated when there is a love for what you do and an understanding that the strike outs allow us to learn from the challenge. Using your home base is a beneficial way to motivate yourself to advance your knowledge of the hobby and to eventually outgrow your own expectations. I think all humans want to be good at something – and sometimes they want to be the best, but there isn’t an advantage of beating yourself down about your current position. Instead, pat yourself on the back, put one foot in front of the other and have faith that what you’re doing will lead you to where you desire to be. Soon enough, the curve balls become a walk in the park and you’ll reflectively embrace the time when your feet felt stuck on the home base.

“When I think of love I think of passion. Like you will do as much as you can to achieve something. Just like philosopher’s love reading because they love knowledge or how athletes bounce back after a really bad injury because they love the sport.” – Dami Alesh

I will admit there are some days when I do not have the energy to accomplish an activity that I hold passion for such as running. Although I always feel so refreshed after I run and whenever I fall into a moment when I don’t want to do it, I remind myself why and regroup. Knowingly, I partake in these actions because they allow me to express myself, feel connected to others and become inspired to practice other ways of being. There are so many perfect moments when I choose to do the things I love because they make me happy. So the key is to understand that your hobby is a choice and that it should never feel like a chore. If it makes you happy then by all means continue, but if what you do no longer serves a purpose in your life, know that it is never permanent.

One of the most important assets to following your passion is finding the balance between work and play. This is an area that I constantly struggle with because the reality of life is that we need money to afford luxuries and our basic needs. Therefore, people tend to overlook having a hobby due to the standard of living that has been strung within the western society. People fall into this trap of hating what they do because they decided to pursue a network receiving the highest income rather than following their passion. We do need discipline in our lives in order to make work deadlines, but there needs to be a space created to do the things that you love in life. Interesting enough, I recently read a sign saying, “the meaning of life is to give life a meaning”. And the idea of balance exercises the significance of this by manifesting a life you love through work and play.

Overall, our passions are about feeling happy and at peace with ourselves because where we focus our energy is often what we give back to the world. Our hobbies are apart of how we define who we are and when we see them as a beautiful piece to our flower, we not only add colour and meaning to life, but to others’ lives too. This creates a deep feeling of belonging that is derived from the belief that individuals are tied to the universe due to some larger contextual meaning. I think this concept relates to the general idea that we are all on a quest to unearth our purpose in life and this feeling is blanketed by the activities that bring joy to our lives. And as we dig within our identity and interests, we will likely discover a passion that gives life purpose.

Written By Tessa R. Adamski