I was speaking to my father and he was telling me about how a career can be chosen out of love or it can be chosen out of necessity and loved as a consequence.
As a believer of choice, passion and living life to the fullest, I believe that my line of argument went something like this: If we all did what we loved, we would work harder and be more satisfied, instead of waiting for the clock to strike 5PM .
‘How do you know what you love?’ he asked.
Well for me, it was a relatively easy comeback because I’ve always kind of had a sense of direction. ‘When you do something without worrying about the rewards.’ I responded. Nicely done, Shilpa.
‘What if you didn’t have funding to do so? ‘ he responded softly.
I shut up.
This couldn’t be going in the right direction.
But it made me think. Do we have too many options? Would we be happier if we just decided to do what added up at that moment and lived with the consequences for the rest of our lives? Like an arranged marriage? Like an over-the-counter drug to fix our seasonal flu? To their credit, both have a high success rate.
Or maybe the answer lies in the middle. Maybe the course of the ‘least time wasted’ should be the one taken. I mean, how many times have we decided to do something that we thought we loved (after months of contemplation sometimes) and realized that the minute we got paid by the hour for it, it wasn’t all that much fun? I know for a fact that though animated movies inspire me as an artist, thinking about spending hours animating a frame is well, not as inspiring.
But what happens when we find something we’re passionate about? Something that breaks all the rules? Like true love? Like acting for me? It took me a longer time but when I went in front of the camera for the first time… that was it! I just knew…
So, if it is passion that we are looking for, then it’s bound to show up eventually. Besides, I’m pretty sure that good work is a result of dedication. But groundbreaking, world-changing work is always a result of passion.
Passion that eventually showed up…
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Stop Waiting For Summer 