This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "Tribe of Mentors" by Tim Ferriss. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.
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Should you follow your passion? How important is it to have a career that excites you? Should your vocation be central to your identity?
In Tribe of Mentors, Tim Ferriss shares input from experts in various fields to address these critical career questions. Together, their advice can help you think through the questions and settle on the answers that are the right ones for you and your path in life.
Keep reading for insights on whether you should follow your passion.
Should You Follow Your Passion?
Should you follow your passion? Many of Ferriss’s experts agree that a job you’re excited about is the core of a fulfilling life. Political commentator Tommy Vietor argues that true passion should be your number one priority when looking for a career. Record producer Rick Rubin notes that, if you follow your passion, you won’t care whether you find success or not since you’ll be doing something you love.
Design expert Debbie Millman takes this idea further, arguing that, if you’re truly pursuing your passion, you’ll have no reason to worry about maintaining a work-life balance. The work itself will feel like all you need in life. Fantasy author Neil Gaiman voices a similar opinion, stating that work is there to center his life and make him feel content when nothing else will.
(Shortform note: You may not want to center your entire life and happiness around a career you’re passionate about, as Ferriss’s experts recommend. Some experts argue that, if you define yourself entirely by your work, you’ll suffer an identity crisis if you’re laid off or your job is otherwise disrupted. If you can’t feel good about who you are outside of work, losing the chance to work will make you panic. Therefore, make your hobbies and other non-work activities as central to your life as your work so you can cope if something goes wrong professionally.)
| Counterpoint: Being Passionate About Your Line of Work Doesn’t Matter Many of Ferriss’s experts agree that the key to a satisfying career is imagining a job you’d love to do, then going out and getting that job. In So Good They Can’t Ignore You, Cal Newport challenges that assumption, noting that some people in their self-proclaimed “dream job” still find they dislike many of the tasks they have to do. Newport argues that job satisfaction has nothing to do with working in a field you’re passionate about. Instead, people are happy and motivated to go to work when they have autonomy on the job, feel like they’re good at their job, and feel emotionally connected to the people they work with. |
Counterpoint: Work for Self-Development Before Pursuing Passion
Other experts caution against following your passion, at least at the beginning of your career. Instead, they recommend taking whatever opportunities offer you the most valuable skills and learning experiences. Wired founder Kevin Kelly argues that if you focus on improving your skills, you’ll become valuable enough to pick and choose the opportunities that interest you the most, which lets you live whatever fulfilling life you want. BitTorrent creator Bram Cohen notes that his choice to wait to follow his passion—instead building up skills while working for others—is what made his first venture successful.
(Shortform note: Here, Ferriss’s experts frame skill acquisition as an early stage in your career that lets you claim (or, in Cohen’s case, create) the opportunities you want later. However, the authors of The Startup of You note that in today’s world, you should never move out of the skill acquisition stage of your career. Rapidly advancing technology and globalization have eliminated the valuable careers you could retain over decades with the same set of skills—now, you must continuously acquire new skills to reliably create value in the rapidly-changing world.)
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Here's what you'll find in our full Tribe of Mentors summary:
- Distilled life advice from over 130 world-class experts in various fields
- How to navigate non-traditional career paths, appreciate failure, and more
- Why you should allow a small amount of measured chaos in your schedule
