There are days when it all just makes sense. Today was one of those days.

We started off the day by heading to a rural part of Tennessee to interview a goat farmer, who, after fifteen years of accounting, just wanted to find something where she could be outside. Zach and I toured the farm, seeing as many as sixty goats, but none caught our eye more the fainting goat. The fainting goat actually faints, although the babies do not. The adults freeze up because of a sudden boost of adrenaline caused by fear. So when the Puppy (aka Zach) wildly chased a goat, it was no surprise that the goat helplessly fell to the dirt with legs stretched skyward.

Back in the city after our country experience, our next interview was with an articulate, environmentally conscious entrepreneur, who at twenty-seven year, just moved to Nashville from L.A. with his banjo playing fiancé. With eyes as green as his cause, this first time entrepreneur and former male model explained how he planned to put “sexy” into the worldwide green movement through the means of bamboo underwear. In stage one and a quarter of his business plan, his company will be called “Bambooty.”

Over beers that night we interviewed Chris Pandolfi, a banjo player with the Infamous Stringdusters bluegrass band. The Stringdusters have recently received worldwide recognition, taking home three IBMA awards this week in Nashville. Now 28, Chris has been playing the banjo since he enrolled in Dartmouth for environmental studies several years ago.

The thing that interested me the most about the interview with Chris was that when asked “what would be the one thing he would tell his twenty-three year old self,” he thoughtfully replied that he would like to hear what the younger Chris would have to tell him today. The reason for the answer was that the younger Chris played the banjo for fun. Today’s Chris plays professionally. With the territory has come pressure. Pressure to perform. To live up to expectations. To deliver. It’s a completely different feeling Chris derives from playing now compared to ten years ago, so much so that he has begun to play the drums on the side to regain the innocent sensation he once had when he first picked the strings of the banjo.

The number one answer interviewees respond with when asked the question we posed to Chris is to “take risks.” Or “believe in yourself.” As interviewers, we’ve made the connection that although the question asks what an interviewee would tell their twenty-three year old self, the answer we receive applies to their current situation. So the question subconsciously reads, “what would you tell yourself?” And more often than not, their answer revolves around fear, and going back to the optimism of their twenty-three year old self.

Today we were exposed to experience and inexperience. We saw how fear, drawn from experience, can literally paralyze, like the fainting goat on its back with its legs stuck in the sky. Or how a lack of knowledge, like a first time entrepreneur, a baby fainting goat, or picking up drumsticks can afford that innocent sensation that the world is a clean slated canvas.

After CBS big leagued us, and our lunch date cancelled, Pursue the Passion did what it does best. Improvised.

Right now, as I write this, I am in the Metrodome in Minneapolis, stealing wireless internet from the Minnesota Vikings while watching the Twins thump the Mariners. It is 12:55 CT, 10:55 PT on a Wednesday afternoon, and we have a couple hours to kill before our next interviews with a 83 year old boxing trainer and the only female to solely own and operate a boxing gym in America.

I’m not too interested in the ballgame. I’m more interested in who the hell has time for a baseball game on a Wednesday afternoon. It is, after all, the official hump in hump day.

So who is here? Lots of screaming camper kids adorned in the brightest t-shirts you’ve ever seen. Hot Orange, Lime Green, Bright Blue, you name it. They’re having fun. There is not too many business executives here; just the ones trying to close a sale with a client. And a handful of dedicated dads with company logo collared shirts.

The imbalance makes me wonder…if America can’t break away every once in awhile for an afternoon baseball game, what can they break away for?

We were talking last night with our host Christian, a passionate public defender, and discussed his recent vacation to Thailand. We talked about how he had to beg and plead for a two week vacation.

On his vacation he met people from all over the world that were on similar adventures.
But the difference was that the other Aussie and German travelers he met weren’t on a two week getaway, they were on a two-three month vacation.

Here in America, we call that a leave of absence.

These two thoughts came together to make me think, “Are we too caught up in the workplace? Are we so engulfed in our work that we can’t break away for an afternoon ballgame with peanuts and cracker jacks? (Hell, they have wi-fi at the game, you can even check your email while you’re there!) And are we so indispensable that two weeks vacation is an unreasonable request?”

This may sound like an infomercial America. But it’s not. This is reality.

What do you got for me in response?

Yesterday I came across Whitney Johnson’s “Dare to Dream” blog. She had an interesting point on one of her posts that said, “for all your readers know, you may be daring them to dream, without having dreamt yourself.”

This quote frightened me. I’m scared that you, the reader, think that I, the author, am just some 22 year old kid telling you to follow your dreams. I am going to share with you how, and why, I am pursuing the passion so you do not get the wrong impression of this site.

My Story:

I chose accounting when I was deciding what my major should be in college. My step dad told me that accountants made the most money and had the most opportunity out of school, and since I was insecure and money driven at that point, I chose accounting.

I never planned on being accountant, but that was the path I was led down by default. All of my classmates either were continuing their accounting education by obtaining their masters degree, or were accepting offers at Big 4 firms for fifty thousand dollar salaries in the fall semester of 2005. I was stuck in the middle. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life.

I had twenty interviews with potential employers that fall semester, and one thing became apparent. Not everyone had it figured out.

But that damn question of “what should I do with my life” lingered over the heads of everyone I talked to in the interview waiting rooms. Even after I accepted an offer with an accounting firm that fall, that question still remained on my mind.

In my very last interview, I got this funny feeling. I was overcome with fear that this would be my last interview. As I watched my interviewer ramble on and on about how much she loved her job, I realized that I liked interviews. I discovered that I liked interviews because I liked people. And what I enjoyed most about people was talking with them about their passion.

I went home that night and thought about what I would do during the summer between graduation day and my official start date in Corporate America. I got out a pen and paper and jotted down the things I wanted to do. I wanted to travel. I wanted to be close to sports. I wanted to better myself. Most of all, I wanted to continue having the feeling I had when I talked with people about their passion.

These desires that I wrote down is what you now see with Pursue the Passion. The RV came as a necessity because we had nowhere to stay, and I actually thought that when I bought Maggie Miracles (the first RV), that I was making a sound investment. Three hours into the first trip, broken down with green liquid spewing from the engine, I quickly realized that it had not been such a financial savvy decision.

That summer I interviewed 75 amazing people. I traveled 10,000 miles by RV, my mom’s 4Runner, plane, and train for 2 months. I went to places like Nike, Microsoft, Playboy, many sports stadiums, the homes of welcoming strangers, and cities I had only read about. It was the time of my life.

The summer also had an inadvertent effect on my Corporate America experience. It completely soured it before I even stepped in the door. I knew, that after being exposed to all different occupations and possibilities, that I had made the wrong choice to go into accounting. I was selling out by going into a secure, stable, well-paid position because it just wasn’t me. But because I was contractually obligated to show up on September 4th, I was going to show up on September 4th.

On August 23rd, two weeks before my anticipated start date, I reported to a “real job.” The corporate lifestyle benefits came throughout the week, ranging from extravagant lunches to all types of corporate goodies. I temporarily forgot about all that I had gained and gleaned during the summer.

But as the months passed, I began to revisit the advice that was given to me. I began to write a book about the pursuit of a passion, despite not working with a passion myself. This was troublesome to me, and even more so as I continued to receive emails from people around the world who were inspired by this site.

I felt not only like a corporate sellout, but also a hypocrite. I thought to myself, “how can I have a site that says to pursue your passion when I’m not pursuing it myself?”

I guess that was my “aha” moment where I said to hell with this. I started to get by on a PB & J diet, sacrificed Saturday nights, and saved up so I could go on a second PTP tour. I sent out over twenty carefully crafted sponsorship proposals to corporations, schools, and small businesses to see if they’d be interested in sponsoring the tour. No luck.

One day I received an email from the boss saying that she wanted to see me. I made the decision that it was now or never for me. It was time to quit the job I despised.

I walked into the office belonging to my boss at the scheduled time on the scheduled date with my heart pounding and my roommate’s co-worker’s resume. My boss was seated on the other side of the desk with two envelopes. Much like a classic western gunfight, I drew first. I quit. BAM!

I left the two envelopes on the table, one containing a raise, the other a bonus, and said goodbye to steady paychecks and corporate security.

With no paycheck, I scrambled to get by. I hired my friend Jay, who graduated in December with a college degree and is now on the tour, and paid him minimum wage to help me get things in line with the Pursue the Passion tour. He crashed on my couch, and we ate free Hot Pockets and Stouffer’s products, given to us by Nestle, until we couldn’t take the taste anymore.

Every day I would rise at 5am, wake Jay up at 8am, and we’d work until 9pm or 10pm. Then we’d bounce back the next day, looking for sponsors, passionate people to interview, and couches to crash on.

It wasn’t until I focused all my time on Pursue the Passion did I start to see results. After all those hours of writing sponsorship proposals, we found a sponsor in Jobing.com right in our own backyard. We went from having four people visit the site a day to an average of two hundred people per day. We made a pact not to eat Hot Pockets again.

Things started to click and hit full stride come July 1st, the official start of the second Pursue the Passion tour.

We’ve been on the road for over a month now, pursuing our passion, and the question that I frequently receive is “so, are you any closer to finding out what you want to do yet? What you going to do after this?”

People don’t realize that I am a passion pursuer and a crazy entrepreneur that will not stop until the bank account says zero. My goal is to turn this website into a resource that will help people who are in the same situations I found myself in as a student, and in the working world.

I am whole heartedly and no longer hypocritically pursuing my passion, and I invite you to join the journey as well.

One of the joys in my life is reading the stories that come in every day through our “Submit a Story” page. On average, we receive about fifteen to twenty a day. These stories range from a native american flute maker to a woman prison guard in Sweden.

Every once in a while I read a story that sends tingles through my body. The story below is one that I read yesterday, and I thought I’d share it with you.

Here it is:

During my career I never played a very active role in where I headed. The promotions and job changes were spaced out well enough to give me the illusion of progress, but in reality I simply ‘floated down the river’ letting life take me from one place to another. None of it truly felt like it was my ‘right’ work. I was unhappy, but moderately comfortable.

Cruising down Crenshaw and Slauson in Watts, an area in south central Los Angeles, Noah Pollock and I are being exposed to things that we’ve only heard about in rap songs. And you know what? It’s not as bad as two white kids from the suburbs would imagine it to be.

Talking on the phone arranging it to be picked up for dinner, I give directions to the voice over the phone. “Killingsworth and Alberta? You mean, uh, Northwest Portland,?” Apparently the area we are staying in is referred to as the “ghetto” of Oregon. But you know what? We saw more crazy people on the suburban streets of Lake Oswego today than the area that led the voice on the phone to cancel dinner plans.

I recently posted about the limitations of passion, was even quoted yesterday in the Chicago Tribune about passion’s limitations; but having a preconceived opinion without experiencing it first is a completely different kind of limitation.

You can only grow as far a shell will allow you to when your limitations induce shell like living.

Yesterday Pursue the Passion dropped by the Long Beach Summer Pro Basketball League, a league designed for basketball players holding onto the dream of playing basketball professionally. Players that take the court have literally traveled the globe to realize their dream, playing in far off countries ranging from France to Bangladesh. We figured that if you could go to Bangladesh to play basketball, you had to be passionate.

Growing up these players lived and breathed basketball. It was (and still is) their life. All day long they would watch Michael Jordan and imitate his moves on the playground, imagining one day they would rock a NBA basketball jersey and get paid to play the game they love.

But something happens along the way of chasing hoop dreams. Players begin to do the math. One thousand colleges multiplied by twelve players on a team with only sixty annual NBA draft picks made by thirty teams equals a better chance at winning the lottery than being a lottery pick.

Once a player does the calculation they have two choices. Players can hold onto their dream of playing basketball professionally, or they can quit because they won’t make the NBA. It’s as simple as that. More often than not, the player quits his pursuit because of one reason…he doesn’t know about the possibilities.

“I’ve played in China, Bangladesh, Israel, France, Saudi Arabia, and Las Vegas, man.” said Antoine Broxsie, a six eleven power forward who graduated from Oklahoma State in 2002. “I just love basketball, and if they’re paying me, then I’ll go anywhere to play the game I love.”

Artis Grant, a level headed Long Beach State guard going into his junior year, was asked if he thought young players were aware of the possibilities to play basketball professionally.

“Most young players have their sights on the NBA, and have had them there since they were kids. Once they realize they can’t make it, they’ll quit and go do something else.”

“Are you going to quit if you don’t make the NBA?” I ask.

“Naw man. Obviously my goal is to make it to the NBA, but there are other ways of playing professional. Overseas and stuff. I’m not going to quit. I will play basketball professionally.”

Artis is averaging 1.3 points a game. Not your typical professional basketball player numbers. But Artis’s reply is our lesson learned.

As a young person in the workforce, the biggest obstacle we face is that we don’t know what is possible. We have our sights set on one goal, whatever it may be, and we see one way of getting there. If we don’t make the goal and things don’t go as we planned, then we begin to give up on the pursuit.

Narrow mindedness is our biggest shortcoming.

But just like we had no idea Bangladesh plays basketball, we have no idea about the endless amounts of ways we can make a living with our passion. There are many different paths you can take to do what you love. There are possibilities are out there, and it doesn’t matter if you are averaging 1.3 points a game or never attended an Ivy League school.

You don’t have to make the NBA to make a living in basketball, just like how you don’t need to work at the New York Times to be a writer. If Artis can find a way to play professionally in some foreign country because he loves to play ball, then we can find a way to do what we want, too.

My roommate Zach accepted a job to accept a job out of school. As an accounting major, the natural next step for him was to take an accounting position. He reassured himself that the work would be temporary before he would move on to the next step.

I have been fortunate enough to observe his behavior as he continued to work as an auditor. I watched him flirt with career changes like becoming a coast guard, or a pilot, or a ski bum. I witnessed him get accustomed to a new city. I saw his long distance relationship fizzle, and stood silent as he spent money on things like a new car and expensive vacations. I also noticed that he constantly made himself busy by working out, going out, watching TV, and reading to take his mind off addressing the issue at hand- the question of how to get out of auditing, and find a job he could be passionate about.

Zach is the subject of today’s post because he is the stereotypical recent college grad trying to figure out what to do with his life. He is also the subject of today’s post because he broke out of the stereotype Monday, when he put in his two weeks to officially quit the job he never intended to stay in after starting eleven months ago.

Read the full interview »

“I could line up two Africans, two Europeans, two Australians, two Asians, two South Americans, two Canadians, and one American, and still pick out the American,” a Canadian (but recently turned Phoenician) Amy stated to me during a poolside chat.

“No way!,” I said. “How would you determine that?”

“The American would be the one that’s narrow minded.”

Read the full interview »

Kimberly Pirtle is an intuitive life coach and holistic healer. She blogs about the power of positive thinking for creating bliss in our lives at http://www.uncoveryourbliss.com/blog/

Being wrong (or worrying that we will be wrong) about something as important as what we want to do with our lives is hard. It’s one of the fastest ways down the path of indecision and fear. What do we do if we invest time and money working towards a goal and then we get there and it’s not what we thought it would be? How can we trust ourselves if we took risks and now we’re headed down an uncharted path? Here’s the truth: That is life to its most basic definition. Life is change and the unexpected. Even if you live a charmed life and always know what you want to do and go out and do it you will be faced with unexpected events and people. I would go so far as to say that most of our meaningful living is done within the flow of change and unexpected events. Those are the times when we can’t run on autopilot and must call on who we are to find our way.

Read the full interview »

Wake up from your dreams by following them. Don’t let responsibility wake you. Too often during our daily routine we are living in a dream before we are woken up by a co-worker asking us to do something. Or by an email that requires immediate attention. Or by a phone call. Or by, or by, or by.

Aren’t responsibilities like a useless dream catcher dangling from the dash? Our daily duties are consistently finding their way through that small, little hoop to abruptly wake us from our dreams.

Wouldn’t it be nice to wake up in a different way?

Instead of a co-worker popping their head into your cube and asking for a favor, what if you woke yourself by having a plan of action on how you were going to materialize an idea? Or instead of being interrupted by an email, what if you prioritized your day so you would have time to dream?

I’m not daring you to dream. I’m assuming that you are a dreamer just like me. What I’m daring you to do is prioritize your dream, make time for it, and most importantly, make time to think about it.

Read the full interview »