I find it fervently infuriating when someone uses the word passion and degrades it. They degrade the meaning of the word. Passion is the ultimate upgrade of the hobby, a cultivated curiosity. Something you’re currently dedicating your life to. You diminish it when blurting that a person that doesn’t spend any time outside the “obligatory work hours” on his passion, not even a thought, to be passionate. What is passion if it’s not thinking and living what you love.
If someone gets tired from his passion, it’s not a passion. I certainly refer to fatigue figuratively. A passion should keep you up and going, not tire you. If you don’t think about it outside work, it’s not a passion anymore, it’s a job.
That doesn’t imply you aren’t good at it. It’s not an insult. You could be an excellent programmer, programming every day from 9 to 5, not feeling like it’s a chore. But if you do not do anything outside this closed environment that doesn’t make you passionate.
It doesn’t make you a passionate person to have a job. Passion is supposed to be an open door, not an indoor obligation. Passion has lost its meaning. When someone retorts with:
What if I tell you that when my favorite programmer comes home he doesn’t do anything programming related… At all!
No thoughts, no curious stream of information running through his mind. None of his free time during the day are sacrificed for his passion. Only the nine to five hours. I’m sorry but it’s not passion! Your favorite programmer is not passionate, or has lost his passion.
Passion is a ravaging god that needs sacrifices. I’ve very sorry but it’s the truth. You are degrading what passion means.
Those people aren’t living their passion. They don’t wake up in the middle of the night in euphoria shouting “Eureka I’ve found a solution to this problem that’s been bugging me.” It shouldn’t even be referred to as passion. It has become a mendacious word thrown to give people posturing status.
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