I hear this all the time. Whether it’s a conversation with a friend, a potential client, or someone I just met - when we talk about passion, about doing what we love, I constantly hear “I don’t know what my passion is.”
How do I find my passion? How do I find what I like?
I find it interesting that so many people struggle to answer these questions.
There are so many ways to think about this, by the way. The answers don’t have to be work or business related. In our current society, we’re too often pushed to turn our passions and hobbies into businesses, to monetize everything. Which can be fun, but can also be a great way to kill the passion and fun of it.
Maybe in our personal lives, we tend to know what we like or love, though I’m not sure we all have a passion necessarily.
But I hear the struggle most when people want to become entrepreneurs, start their own business, but don’t know where to start because they don’t feel like they have a passion to pursue.
Here’s the truth: we don’t need a passion to start a business. We can build a profitable business around something we’re good at but not passionate about. We can partner with someone who has the passion while we handle the operations. Liking what we do helps, but it doesn’t have to light us up inside.
But if we DO want to find what we love, whether for business or just for life, the real issue isn’t about finding passion. It’s about something else entirely.
The Real Problem: We Stopped Experimenting
The only way to discover if something could be a passion is by trying it. We’re not born with passions. Sometimes they come from a parent and we “inherit” them. Sometimes we follow friends when we’re young because we want to be part of the tribe, and a passion develops. Sometimes they come later in life.
But ultimately, we won’t know if something resonates until we actually experience it. We need to experiment. We need to be open to trying without letting clichés and misconceptions stop us, because the truth is we won’t know until we do it.
The problem is, as adults, we don’t do that much anymore.
When we’re children, we explore the world constantly. As a boy, I started a new sport practically every season at some point: handball, tennis, karate, rugby. I did tennis the longest. We’re not afraid to try as kids. Sometimes parents even encourage it. Whatever reasons we try for (often as kids we’re influenced by something we saw on TV, or our best friend is doing it and we don’t want to miss out), it’s stimulating. We’re constantly experimenting.
The older we get, the less we do this. Once we become adults, we settle into a job, maybe have a hobby or two, and then we sort of ride life. Sometimes we meet someone new at work or when we move, and they introduce us to something different. But I don’t think that happens to the majority of us. We stop exploring.
Why Do Adults Stop Experimenting?
There are probably a few reasons. Some more valid than others.
⏰ Time and responsibility. As children, we have a lot of time. Parents sign us up for extracurricular activities because school doesn’t take as much time as their work, so those few hours give them extra time at work or to handle “adult stuff.” As adults, between work, household chores, children if we have them... there’s less time available.
However, let’s be honest: we also spend a whole lot of time watching Netflix, scrolling social media, watching sports, socializing. Some of this time could easily be reallocated to experimentation or pursuing a passion.
💰 Money. Some people use money as an excuse. Again, this can be valid, but only to a certain extent. Plenty of activities are free: hiking, running, reading books from the library. Also, if we’re honest with ourselves and look at how we spend our money, I would bet that most households “waste” $100/€100 a month on stuff they really don’t need that could be reallocated to something more meaningful.
Uncomfortable truth: most people suck at personal finance and have no idea how they actually spend their money.
😰 Fear. I think this is the main reason though. Fear of being a beginner at something. It feels uncomfortable. It hurts the ego. It comes from a fear of looking silly or stupid, of not being in control because we don’t know the activity yet.
As adults, we spend way too much time worrying about being judged, about what people will think. Not just if we fail or look silly, but what if they judge what we’re trying because it comes with some misconception? We love our comfort too much. We don’t want to let our guard down. We don’t want to look foolish. So we don’t even try. We don’t take the risk.
There’s also something related to identity and the beliefs we grew up with. Think about the Billy Elliot story - the dad wants him to do boxing, but he wants to dance. It’s hard to start because there are so many associations made with a boy dancing. Based on the values we grew up with, our culture, our environment, some activities are seen as “not right for us” and we just don’t believe they’re for us. It’s not a truth though - it’s a story we tell ourselves that stops us from exploring what’s beyond our beliefs.
My Own Journey Back to Experimentation
As a kid, I tried a lot of stuff. As I grew up, I did less, like everyone else. I did experiment a few times as an adult though: I picked up reading books at 25, and practiced a martial art for 2 years at 28.
Truth is, I’m a very curious person. It doesn’t take much for me to get a new interest (whether they stick around or not, that’s another story 😅). Sports has always been my biggest passion. I practiced a lot, but more importantly, I’ve always watched sports - any sports. I know a lot about many different sports: rules, history, legends. And I can pick up a new sport to watch easily. I recently got into darts and golf!
Have I ever monetized my passion for sports? No. Do I think about it? Yes, often. Man, I would love to get paid to watch all the sports I already watch! That’s the dream! 🏆 But somehow I’ve never been able to find something that clicks and excites me. I could do some YouTube videos or react content, but I don’t like videos, and alone it’s not fun. I could write, but there’s a lot of sports press already, not sure I would stand out. I also love so many sports, I wonder if it would be too much (niching down into one usually helps grow an audience). So for now, sports is my escape, my relaxing time. I’m happy with it.
Since turning 30 and investing in my personal growth, I also learned to stop caring about what people think about me.When I realized that I should live a life based on what’s important to me, on my own terms, I stopped letting other people’s opinions stop me from doing what I want.
How did I develop that? Two factors: understanding the value of life and its fragility (so not doing what I want because of others just isn’t worth it), and watching a lot of Gary Vee’s videos to be honest. His message really resonated with me and helped a lot.
A big “try stuff and see” moment for me was yoga. 🧘♂️ Rosie dragged me to a class in 2018 when we moved to Miami because she didn’t want to go alone. I was 30 years old. I thought it would be rubbish: some stretches for flexible girls, no thanks. I went anyway to support her.
I got hooked.
I practiced 2 or 3 times a week for 3 years there. Met SO many people through yoga and attending classes. And ended up having 2 businesses related to yoga! I would have never predicted that. I had completely wrong assumptions about what yoga was, and I only discovered the truth by actually trying it.
Rosie has been instrumental in opening my mind since we met when I was 22. She was way more open-minded, and she instilled that in me. She always challenged my close-mindedness and pushed me to be open to more. She still does by the way.
Since then, I’m not afraid of trying because I’m aware that I don’t know what I don’t know, and that the only way to find out is by doing.
That’s actually how I started my coaching practice this year at 37. I’ve thought for a few years that everything I’ve learned through my personal stories could help others. When the yoga school stopped early this year, I didn’t have anything else lined up. That was the time to give it a shot. I don’t have a certification or formal experience, but I have lived experience and dedication to learn and be good. That was enough for me to try.
I think being curious and good at figuring stuff out is a real superpower. And it’s incredibly useful as an entrepreneur and traveler.
Here’s the Thing About Business Specifically 💼
We don’t need to be passionate about the activity of our business. It’s not an obligation. Like I said at the beginning, we can build a successful business around something we’re good at but not passionate about. We can partner with someone who has the passion and handle everything else - the operations, the business side.
But here’s what I really want us to understand: I don’t think chasing business ideas is the best way to succeed.
Just live life. Do stuff for fun. Find a hobby. Experiment. And then sometimes the business will naturally come because we observe a lack, a need, a gap in the market. It’s a much better approach than “I need to find what my passion is to make a business out of it.” That’s the wrong reason to get into something.
The best business ideas and aha moments come when we’re not thinking about business at all.
My yoga businesses? I didn’t go to that first class thinking about business opportunities. I went because Rosie didn’t want to go alone. The business came naturally later because I was in that world, I understood the community, I saw what was missing.
If you want help thinking through your interests and skills in a structured way, I created a free Ikigai discovery tool on my website.
It can help explore where interests, skills, and potential opportunities intersect. But don’t overthink it, sometimes the best move is just to go try something for fun and see what happens.
(I also wrote more about this approach to finding business clarity here if you want to dig deeper.)
How to Start Experimenting Again
So how do we restart that experimentation mindset as adults? Here are some practical ways:
✅ Start with what matches our actual constraints. No budget? Pick something free that doesn’t require a membership, like hiking or online resources. No time? Look for activities we can do from home, which saves commute time. The less friction there is to try something, the more chance we’ll give it a proper shot.
💡 Sometimes investing a little helps. Let’s say we want to learn golf or tennis. On our own, it’s hard. We’ll quickly get frustrated by the lack of progress and most likely give up. Investing in a trainer in those cases would give the activity a fair chance to reveal itself.
⏳ Don’t give up too quickly. Activities take time, especially as adults - we don’t pick them up as quickly as when we were young. Try something for at least a month, ideally three months depending on the complexity, so we can actually make a fair judgment.
🎯 Listen to your gut about the process, not just the results. Sometimes even if something is hard and frustrating, we feel inside that the process is actually fun and brings us something good. When we’re dreading doing it, we don’t have fun during it, and we complain after - that’s a sign it might not be for us. Listen to what feels good and brings joy.
🚶♂️ Don’t attach too much importance to the outcome. Focus on the journey, the learning process. It will be much more enjoyable that way.
🪜 Start small if needed. Depending on the activity - like traveling or van life - start with a weekend instead of selling everything and going off for 3 months.
😎 Get over yourself. This is the biggest one. Truth is, everyone sucks at something at some point. No one is born an expert in anything. Also, most people are way too concerned about themselves (like we all are) and how they look to actually pay attention to how we’re doing. So move on, live life, be silly. Who cares if someone laughs anyway? Laugh with them!
The Bottom Line
We discover our passion by trying, by experimenting. Not by thinking about it endlessly or waiting for some magical revelation.
As kids, we understood this instinctively. As adults, we’ve forgotten it. We’ve let fear, comfort, and other people’s opinions stop us from exploring.
But it’s not too late. We can start small. We can experiment again. And we might be surprised by what we discover - not just about what we like, but about who we are when we give ourselves permission to be a beginner again.
Stop chasing the perfect passion or business idea. Just go try something. Anything. And see what happens. ✨
The worst case? We’ll discover something we don’t like, and we’ll know one more fact about ourselves.
The best case? We might stumble into something that changes our life.
Either way, we’re moving forward instead of staying stuck asking “I don’t know what my passion is.”
Now go experiment. 🚀