‘Find Your Passion’ Is Awful Advice

‘Find Your Passion(ˈpaSHən)’ Is Awful(ˈôfəl) Advice(ədˈvīs)

A major(ˈmājər) new study questions the common wisdom(ˈwizdəm) about how we should choose our careers(kəˈri(ə)r).

By Olga Khazan

Carol(ˈkarəl) Dweck, a psychology(sīˈkäləjē) professor(prəˈfesər) at Stanford University, remembers asking an undergraduate(ˌəndərˈgrajəwit) seminar(ˈseməˌnär) recently, “How many of you are waiting to find your passion?”

“Almost all of them raised(rāzd) their hand and got dreamy(ˈdrēmē) looks in their eyes,” she told me. They talked about it “like a tidal(ˈtīdl) wave(wāv) would sweep(swēp) over them,” she said. Sploosh. Huzzah(həˈzä)! It’s accounting(əˈkountiNG)!

Would they have unlimited(ˌənˈlimitid) motivation(ˌmōtəˈvāSHən) for their passion? They nodded(näd) solemnly(ˈsɑləmli).

“I hate to burst(bərst) your balloon(bəˈlo͞on),” she said, “but it doesn’t usually happen that way.”

What Dweck asked her students is a common refrain(riˈfrān) in American society(səˈsīətē). The term “Follow your passion” has increased ninefold(ˈnīnˌfōld) in English books since 1990. “Find something you love to do and you’ll never have to work a day in your life” is another college(ˈkälij)-counseling(ˈkouns(ə)liNG) standby(ˈstan(d)ˌbī) of unknown provenance(ˈprävənəns).

But according to Dweck and others, that advice is steering(ˈsti(ə)riNG) people wrong.

“What are the consequences(-ˌkwens,ˈkänsikwəns) of that?” asked Paul O’Keefe(ē), an assistant(əˈsistənt) professor of psychology at Yale(yāl)—NUS College. “That means that if you do something that feels like work, it means you don’t love it.” He gave me the example of a student who jumps from lab to lab, trying to find one whose research topic feels like her passion. “It’s this idea that if I’m not completely(kəmˈplētlē) overwhelmed(ˌōvərˈ(h)welm) by emotion(iˈmōSHən) when I walk into a lab, then it won’t be my passion or my interest.”

That’s why he and two co-authors—Dweck and Greg Walton of Stanford—recently performed a study that suggests it might be time to change the way we think about our interests. Passions aren’t “found,” they argue(ˈärgyo͞o). They’re developed.

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https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/07/find-your-passion-is-terrible-advice/564932/