My least favorite question: what are you passionate about?

My dad spent his entire career as a CPA at one firm. He made partner in his 40s and recently retired when he turned 60. I love my dad so much. We are very close and have always had a great relationship ever since I was a kid. My dad never really pushed me to study hard or get good grades. He never told to me to be a doctor or a lawyer. In fact, he told me not to be a lawyer since all lawyers were liars. He did always encourage me to read, to be considerate of others, and to dream big. He has also continuously asked me: what are you passionate about? What is your passion?

When I was laid off, my mom freaked out and immediately wanted to know how and when I was going to get a new job. My dad just asked me if I was okay. When I said I was, he told me that all was well and I should take this opportunity to rest since I had worked so hard. Because my dad has been the one asking me all along what my one big passion, I have struggled so much with this question. Perhaps if anyone else had posed it, I would have ignored it or felt it unworthy of my time and attention. Perhaps if my dad figured out his passion, I wouldn't feel so compelled to find mine. When my dad retired, he told me it was finally time for him to figure out his own passion, the thing that he loved, since it certainly wasn't accounting. While he felt proud of his work and thankful that it supported our family of four, it was not the end all, be all.

I have such a hard relationship with working, my work ethic, having a career, etc. While other young girls imagined what their weddings might like like and the house full of children they'd be laughing in, I dreamed of living in a NYC apartment, looking outside my window, reveling in my success. I don't think there has ever been a moment when I wasn't stressed or worried about my future and operating from a place of wanting to go into the future, to feel better, more accomplished, or happier then. I built my entire identity around a shallow sense of achievement. I thought that if I was able to achieve the things that I wanted that I would be happy. I never questioned if the actual substance of those achievements would actually make me happy.

I applied to my first choice, Yale, early action and got in. I did not bother to apply to other schools, as I had already gotten into the place I knew that I belonged. I felt it the moment I stepped on campus, a school we only visited at my dad's insistence on our way back from touring Amherst. I was afraid to vocalize aloud, to admit that I wanted to go there. And when I got in, I felt recognized. Finally, someone (the admissions officer) had seen my great potential. But when I got to Yale, there were so many smart, beautiful, successful people. Again, I felt compelled to achieve, to show that I was worthy. I only took classes that I knew that I could do well in rather than explore the depths of my intellect. I chose good grades in easy classes over true pursuit of interest. Maybe that's where it all went wrong. Instead of figuring out, experiencing, and learning about what I liked and felt passionately about, I chose the easy way. When it came time to look for jobs, again, I chose the easy way. I did not know why I wanted to be an investment banker (likely because I had zero desire to be one, as I did not understand the role) but I chose that path. I could not turn down an offer with a shiny salary and the opportunity to be the glamorous NYC career woman of whom I had always dreamed.

After graduating from Yale, I moved to NYC. When I left that shiny investment banking job six months in, I did not have another job lined up. I just didn't want to be there anymore. But because I was a young, bright, and eager recent Yale grad, I had three job offers within a month of leaving. I chose to pursue a job in tech that I thought I would like. I felt that the company's product, mission, and the role were all aligned. And this happened yet again with the job I took after that one. But, I never liked any of those jobs. I never even came close to figuring out "my passion," the one that my dad said when I found it, I would really thrive. The honesty of that statement, that I was not thriving in my career, was gut wrenching.

I continued to take personality tests and career assessments, desperate to figure out what my true calling in life was. I felt that my MBTI did capture me quite accurately and looked to the list of typical INFJ careers. But all of them were things like artist, photographer, massage therapist, clergy member. Though I had pursued some things in those veins like reiki and yoga teacher training, I never really considered them to be true options available to me. Being certified to do reiki was only acceptable because I was working a highly coveted tech startup job. As I continued to research and consider different things, I finally got interested in climate change. I attended a conference that took place at Yale, hosted by the school of Forestry & Environmental Studies. Two years later, I started graduate school at Columbia to earn a degree in environmental policy.

However, before I had even graduated two years later, I could already start feeling that perhaps climate change wasn't my thing. I certainly cared about the topic and felt how important an issue it is for society, but was it really my life calling to work on this issue? Working on the issue, seeing it up so close made me depressed when I looked at the numbers and facts on where we needed to be to avoid catastrophic climate disaster versus where we were. I had managed to get a dream job working as a consultant advising climate tech startups and nonprofits. It was everything I had hoped to manifest six months before and even to this day, that was by far the best job I had. But, I didn't think it was my calling to help clients come up with solutions on topics they understood far better than me. I didn't understand how any of my work could possibly impact the catastrophic climate disaster awaiting us and our future generations. The dissonance between my job and reality made the work feel meaningless and like a waste of time.

Since then, I've become interested in yet a new field, but sometimes I look at the projects I'm working on and again wonder, is this it? Is this really my passion? If this really was my passion, wouldn't I know for sure?

I wish I could answer my dad's question, if not for my sake, for his. To this day, I still don't know what I'm truly passionate about. The things that bring me joy have nothing to do with work, my career, or earning money. I am like most people. I enjoy spending time with people I love, eating good food, traveling and trying new things, and watching Netflix. I no longer dream of living in a NYC penthouse, wrapped in my success. I dream of a future where I don't have to work, where I am not defined by my job or how I make money, and I sure as hell don't ever want to live in NYC again.