I hate the narrative about “do what you love.”
It is a big lie. If you think doing what you love will make your professional life easier, you are lying to yourself.
When I saw this sentence in the mission of a company I used to work for, I instantly knew I had made a mistake accepting that position. It was true.
I do not argue that your professional life should be centered around your inner passion. I am just saying that doing what you love makes your job harder, not easier.
I love what I do. I spend every second of my working day doing what I love in the best way possible.
That’s the problem.
If you are doing what you love, you spend everything you have trying to make it perfect. You will not accept anything below the standards you set for yourself. You will never be happy about what you deliver. You will continuously try to improve it, make it better, and get close to what you consider the best you can do.
This drives you to an endless loop of dissatisfaction.
You indeed need to do what you love. More important is being able to let it go at some point in time.
There is another crucial point to make. Doing what you love leads you to think that your discipline is vital to the company you are working for. That’s a big issue.
That may be true if you are a cardiovascular surgeon, but how many of you are surgeons? Very few.
Your job alone is worthless. You, and your company, can survive only by being part of an ecosystem.
Even the guys cleaning your offices overnight are critical to the success of your endeavors.