Ask HN: How do you figure out what you're passionate about?

Take a vacation, and after a few days, think about what your mind naturally drifts to when there's nothing that you have to do in particular, and no special obligation. Maybe that will help point you in the right direction.

I'm in a similar situation. At my previous job, I burned out, and it led to some serious health problems. Now I don't even know what I want to do anymore. I was a software engineer for 20 years.

Talk to people. Find out what interests them. You might pick up a really enjoyable hobby or two, or latch on to an exciting project. I can't imagine Jobs without Woz.

I didn't find my complement, but didn't mingle widely until later on, when jobs put me in contact with many.

A friend I met after changing coasts liked trains, but it was a good excuse to carpool to fishing locations near those lines. I couldn't fish worth a damn, but those were beautiful locations, and they revived my photographic bug.

Things do connect, but not in isolation. Hobbies, either by association, or just getting out, create opportunities.

I have 4.5 years of experience, but I am in the same situation as you. To be honest, I think I am in an even worse position. I do not sleep properly. Day in and day out, I keep asking myself What is the frontier work I want to do? What is the one field I truly want to enter and say, “This is where I want to work for the next 30 years of my life,” and fully commit to it?

Thinking about this has become an endless source of misery for me. Still, every day I take on some challenging work and start working on it, whether it interests me or not. If it does not, I switch. If the next thing does not work, I try harder again.

I have also started talking to more people and trying to find a group of highly ambitious people. One thing I have noticed about people who have succeeded is that they nailed two things. First, they found a direction. Second, they found an ambitious group that acted as an engine for them.

Time does not matter as much as direction does.

First, look for more fundamental reasons why you're so tired. Are you sick? Are you depressed? (Though finding something you're passionate about may help with depression.)

Then, are you looking for something that you are already passionate about, but are unaware that you are? Or are you looking to discover something to become passionate about?

Either way, talk to people - people at work, neighbors, people at church or the bar or the gym or the park. What were you talking about when you suddenly realized that you'd been talking for 45 minutes? You're pretty interested in that. Or, what was the other person talking about for 45 minutes, and you weren't searching for some kind of graceful way to get out of the conversation? You're pretty interested in that, too.

Passion can be misleading; the literal definition of passion is something you'd suffer for. You can be passionate, productive, and deeply unhappy.

The nature of work also combines passionate with non-passionate stuff. We may love writing high quality code, but most of the day requires hacky low quality code, meetings, or digging through documentation. Or part of a pipeline of gathering, cleaning, and selling data to a financial institution that uses it for medium interest loans.

The better measurement is find out what work energizes you. You might not feel any flow or fun. You might not feel any emotion whatsoever. But you get out of it like a good workout - both tired and energized.

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Appreciation comes from understanding. Most things are interesting if you learn how they work.

For instance I didn't really care about football until someone explained all sorts of details about the game to me.

You can also develop that appreciation by doing things. The more art I make, the more art I like. I had a brief and unsuccessful woodworking phase that makes me stop when I see nice joinery or beautiful furniture. Years of reading about plants and smelling flowers made my forest walks slower and much richer.

So I guess be curious? Seek a deeper understanding of many different things.

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It's worth noting that a lot of research heavily supports the idea that passion is a trailing indicator, it is something you develop over time as you build mastery and competence, rather than an innate trait you find fully formed.

Do with that information what you will, but it might be that you are looking at passion wrongly, expecting to 'find' something you are magically passionate about.

Beyond that, take care of your health, rest and play around with things to increase your surface area of finding something that works.

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I think part of it is that many programmers genuinely enjoy their work, so work and hobbies blend together. After 15+ years of constant new frameworks, models and updates, it's easy to get caught up in the excitement. Spending time outdoors and maintaining real-life friendships helps keep things in perspective.

For me, my goal is to be useful, to make the world better. I think I 'become' passionate about the things I do well. I know I'm doing something well when it helps others, when I see results. It's all a chain: try to solve problems -> sometimes it really helps -> I want to do more and I am more and more passionate about it.

My focus isn't "me": what am I passionate about. My focus is the "other": how can I help a few people a lot, or a lot of people a little.

So, for me I do not try to find my passion first. I try to pick something small that helps someone. Energy will follow.

just pray about it

If you have to ask, you'll never find out.

The answer is already in your question: Find the reason you don't have energy.

In my own experience, which I'd recommend you disregard if it isn't useful for you.

Try lots of things, see if something sticks, it might take years, or decades, but the variety of trying many things is interesting in itself.

Try to connect the dots in your own life, for example what were you like as a kid, what interested you, has any of this followed into your adult life, what about looking forwards e.g. where do you want to be 30 years from now and can your current or new interests get you there.

Having kids will certainly give a person purpose and eat up all of that free time if that's in the plan for you.

You could find a job coach or head hunter and they might be able to ask you helpful questions to guide your search. A job can give you meaning but not necessarily happiness. A job can give you joy/fun but not necessarily meaning. It might help to distinguish what you want. A journal might help your thinking and soul searching.

You could walk. If you have a lot of money and time, you could do some or all of the Camino de Santiago. Or you could do daily walks around your neighborhood. Movement helps the brain/spirit do their thing.

Good luck!:-)

this might not be the answer you're looking for, but passion isn't in the "thing". it's a state.

when I'm in it, everything's a joy. dishes, kids, day job, night job, whatever.

sure I gravitate toward certain things, but (ideally) they're an expression of my state, not a way to fill a void (temporary at best, misleading at worst).

when I'm not, finding passion in anything is a candle in a storm.

even if I get it lit it flickers out, and I think: wrong candle. need to find a better one.

from your post, you're seem to be in the second bucket. which means hobbies aren't the fix -- you'll just keep hunting candles.

got nothing but love for you, man. tough place to be.

i'm almost 40 and have felt versions of this cyclically through the years. only now seeing breakthroughs.

If there is something that, once you start doing it, you often lose yourself in it—for example, before you know it, you’re busy until it gets dark—then that is the thing you truly passionate about.

Something that helped me in the past, at a period where I was lost; is to take a notebook and write every night what part of the day actually gave you energy. Can be a sub-part of work, or something outside of work, whatever.

What helped me is that there is usually a difference between what you are naturally good at, which is what you will tend to gravitate towards because you get results, vs what actually gives you energy. Over time, you can see trend and find a sport where both are true at the same time.

Oh, and also internalize that fact that those things may change over time as you grow as a person :)

-> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikigai

Maybe thinking in terms of your "obsession(s)" will lead to more clear and long-term answer. Obsession is something you love and hate at the same time, but still continue with it and in the end don't want to quit. Obsession also protects more strongly from loss of motivation and loss of "passion", because it tend to return you back to it again and again. It's like true love, which survives all the hardships.

This might help you:

https://archive.jamesaltucher.com/blog/reinventing-yourself/