Many years ago, my wife considered herself a computer widow. At the time, 'computing' was my hobby - more like a burning passion, but that's a matter of opinion! Computing is such a wide area but to those around me, I was obsessed with computers. As I was not in a position, at the time, to afford the best computers, I had to make do with what I had - so I built PCs, patched them and upgraded them for others in order to build a decent enough PC from the leftovers to do the things I wanted to. Many of the tools, the free/shareware ones obviously, were not always what I wanted so I programmedas well.
In fact, it was not computers, per se, I was obsessed with, but the publication of information - factual and artistic - particularly, over the Internet. In the last few weeks I realise that I still am, I have just been side-tracked by the development side over the last few years but it is all coming back to me now. Also coming back to me is how involved I can get when I am doing something that hold my interest, other things start to slip. That got me thinking.
When you are passionate about something - learning about it, reading about it, doing it are all very easy to do. These are all the right things to do for success in the chosen field - however - it has to be controlled otherwise the balance is lost. We see it all the time around us with some of the most talented (famous!!!) people suffering drug and alcohol abuse, divorces and family disputes because of their obsession with being the best at what they do. Those around them start to suffer from the passion that drives these people and that makes all, including the star, unhappy.
It is obvious that no matter what it is you do, bills still need to be paid, children still need to be looked after, partners need to feel like they are partners and jobs still need to be done, that is, there is a time for everything. This is where the self control is required. According to Reference.com - Discipline - "Self-discipline refers to the training that one gives one's self to accomplish a certain task or to adopt a particular pattern of behaviour, even though one would really rather be doing something else. For example, denying oneself of an extravagant pleasure in order to accomplish a more demanding charitable deed. Thus, self-discipline is the assertion of willpower over more base desires, and is usually understood to be a synonym of 'self control'. Self-discipline is to some extent a substitute for motivation, when one uses reason to determine a best course of action that opposes one's desires."
Conversely though, you have to defend the time you require to follow your passion, creative juices etc don't always flow from 9am to 5pm so some sort of flexibility is also required. It is so easy to get sucked up into general life issues that you fail to follow your heart and then you can do nothing but make excuses for why you hate your life.
It is finding the right balance and then applying the discipline and motivation to maintain it that is the difficult bit.
May you find the balance.
[First published on my Talking2Myself blog on specified date]