It can be so frustrating to hear people say, “Just follow your passion!”, when all you want to tell them is, “Yeah, sure, I’d love to if only I knew what my passion is.
What people fail to realize is that finding your passion isn’t just about careers and money. It’s about finding your authentic self, the one you’ve buried beneath other people’s needs.
For Connor Miller, finding his passion was the best decision he made in his life after spending four years of his late teens and early twenties chasing an elusive high that led him down the rabbit hole of drug and substance abuse.
Connor Miller believes the key for anyone to find their passion is to try a bunch of different things.
“There was a day a few years back where I got home from the office and was just feeling extremely burnt out,” he shares. “ This was the time when I decided I needed to find joy in other things besides just running the business. I remember sitting there looking at my wife and telling her I was feeling depressed and unfulfilled. She looked at me and asked, “well, what are you doing for fun?” My response was “I’m not really sure.” Then she asked me” what do you like to do?” The crazy thing about this question was I had no idea what I liked to do. So what did I do? I started to try different things that could potentially bring me joy and fulfillment,” Connor Miller further explains.
After trying several things, Connor discovered his love for photography, and creative storytelling through visuals.
“This has become a huge passion of mine and has allowed me to share my story of overcoming adversity and beating drug addiction in a whole new way. It has allowed me to build a platform where I can share hope, love, and strength which are three things the world needs much more of.”
Connor Miller believes you don’t need a mentor to find your passion.
“For the most part, everything I know is self-taught. There was a point in my life where I made a decision that I wasn’t going to wait around for someone to look up to or someone to teach me. While a mentor can certainly help people build meaningful careers, I don’t think you need one to be successful. I’ve never had a traditional mentor and neither have many of the professionals I know but we’ve still found success in our careers.”
For anyone trying to find their passion here is Connor’s advice for you;
“The only way you can find your passion is to start doing. You have to be in DO mode. No one is going to discover your passion for you. No one is going to hold your hand and help you find fulfillment. That’s your job. It’s up to you. You can sit around and think about a lot of things to do but, that’s going to mean absolutely nothing until you get out there and start trying out things.