It's OK to have many interests even though society wants you to be a specialist.

Hey multipasionate!

So…

You’re multipassionate, meaning you have many interests.

Congrats! You are now a minority, which means that society will often disregard your needs and suffocate your dreams.

Hold on, there must be some good news… Right???

Actually, there is!

There are SO many multipassionate people out there, and you can join forces with them to feel less alone and discriminated against.

To be clear, we are not so much discriminated against as we are completely ignored and misunderstood. I don’t think the world even knows we exist, which is probably why most multipassionate people don’t know it's OK to be who they are until their late 20s or maybe even later.

Think about that, there are many people out there who think there's something "wrong" with them because nobody told them the truth.

And here's the truth...

If you’ll notice, society is built around specialists, or people who specialize in one field/skill and build a career around it. If everyone had many passions and wanted to pursue them all, the world would surely be a hot mess.

However, just like the specialists have their strengths and make the workplace a stronger force, so do multipassionate people!

You have superpowers you may not even be aware of.

For example, you’re a genius when it comes to seeing the big picture, aka holistic thinking. You’re also pretty good at transferable skills, which means you can apply any skill anywhere and anytime you need it. And you’re a wiz at making cool combinations and thinking outside the box, which the specialists are not so great at. If the specialist is a mad scientist, you're a mad creative!

“Your mind is a beautiful tapestry of creative ideas and experiences, and the world needs that.

With your creativity and out of the box thinking, you complement the other 80% of the world’s population.”

(I totally made up this statistic, numbers aren’t really my thing.)

Basically, you facilitate innovation and rebellion. :)

Can you imagine "the workforce" without the creatives?

What a dull place that would be. There would be no innovation, no originality. Everyone would do everything according to the rules... Yuck.

The fact that society wants to keep you in check is not your problem.

You're a revolution within yourself, and I think you should be damn proud of that and stop whining about not being unable to choose something because you’re not meant to. If you were to give up and choose, to conform, you would be going against your nature and wasting all of that creative potential.

Just because why... you want to be normal? To belong? Wow, that's exciting. (And if you don't understand sarcasm, then we shouldn't be friends.)

And here's my theory...

About multipotentiality, and yes, it's a real term.

“A multipassionate person is like a puzzle maker without a box.”

You go through life collecting the pieces, but you don’t know what picture they will form eventually. You just have to go on faith.

So you can't cheat by looking at the box. You have to trust that it will make sense in the end, and keep connecting those pieces. Because if you stop, you’ll miss out on your own creative convergence – the culmination of all of your skills and talents and interests into the ultimate creative path (whether that's a career or a business), the one you were always meant to take, to carve for yourself.

It’s easy to get disheartened and drop the ball when the whole world is against you – including everyone who knows and loves you – but please, hang tight and don’t lose yourself. Don’t lose your multipassionate magic. It’s the one advantage you have over most everybody else and it’s the one thing that will help you stand out in the crowd, among the sameness, and reach your dreams, the ones you were born to dream up and make a reality. Only you can do it.

“You weren’t born to conform, but to soar over the world’s limitations and even your own limitations.”

I truly believe this. :)

Let's break some myths...

Myths and stereotypes can be very dangerous, for society as a whole, but mostly for the individual, who internalizes these myths and stereotypes and starts to believe they were born different and that they'll never be happy, ever.

I've been there, and you might still be there, so this is important.

(And if someone in your life is putting you down because of it, please read them this comprehensive list and ask them to please stop it.)

A multipassionate is not flakey or indecisive, it’s just someone who likes to expand their knowledge and experience more than a specialist would. Basically, you want to know and try everything and to live wide.
A multipassionate is not lazy or shallow, they're actually a person who likes to learn a lot and who enjoys going deep into subjects really fast which makes it seem like they didn’t do enough, but they did for their own standards. Remember, your goal is to collect those puzzle pieces, not just go deep into one puzzle piece and stay there forever. Yuck.
A multipassionate is not confused or scattered, except when they don’t know it’s OK to be multipassionate, duh. They're actually a person who likes to learn a lot of things that seem disconnected, but in the grand scheme of things, everything will make sense eventually. And if you feel scattered that just means you’re not managing your time properly, not that you’re supposed to be naturally organized or something.
A multipassionate doesn’t have to “choose one thing” and we don’t have to “be serious” about anything other than being ourselves and growing beyond the limitations that society imposes on us. Just think of all the potential you’d be killing if you conformed, and how miserable you’d be if you had to live on someone else’s terms for your entire life.
Multipotentiality is not wrong or something that needs to be fixed. It’s a specific trait of your character, a way your mind works, something you were born with and then developed further. Would you say that having a good sense of humor is wrong or that brown eyes are wrong? Hell no! So begin to see your multipotentiality as a strength, and leverage it. We’re not born to become normal, we’re born to become ourselves.
A multipassionate person spends most of their life hopping from one passion to another, not because they're not sure of what they're doing, but because they're collecting pieces for their puzzle and secretly looking for a way to bring it all together. It’s not like they teach this in schools or like you were born with a multipassionate manual attached somewhere. (Eww?) Even if you don’t realize you’re trying to “converge,” that’s the logical next step that will bring you joy and fulfillment. (Which doesn’t mean that you should rush it, sometimes these things take a long time.)

Phew!

Did you know all this stuff or did you have a bunch of aha-moments?

Back in the day when I was floating about, from project to project and from job to job and from industry to industry, I had no idea I was actually a badass and the world was wrong about me. I thought I was lazy and scattered, and if I could choose something already, everything would be all right.

WRONG.

What actually happened was:

I tried it “their way” and failed, multiple times, got exhausted and frustrated beyond reason and said, Screw it, I’m gonna do it my way now.

And I haven’t looked back since.

“When you finally step into who you are, you achieve a level of flow that you never dreamed possible.”

When I finally embraced my multipotentiality, I became a better version of myself – happier, more productive, more consistent, and more focused even!

I became all of those things I thought were never going to be given to me. But the goal is not to beg for scraps from a world that wants to "give"you all the wrong things, but to give yourself what you need. Dammit.

And that is the truth about being multipassionate. :)

Now all you have to do is find YOUR truth, because none of us are just one thing. You’re a medley of callings and needs and challenges that you have to hop on with as much enthusiasm as you could muster.

And, find the people and resources that will help you get there.

RESOURCES:

Emilie Wapnick’s amazing TED talk for "multipotentialites" (about how some of us don't have just "one true calling," but many callings)
Refuse to Choose by Barbara Sher (Barbara calls us "scanners" and her book is full of helpful definitions and actionable techniques)
Liz Gilbert's talk on Oprah is about how you don't have to have one single passion, but follow your curiosities (she calls us "hummingbirds")

TAKE ACTION:

Make a list of your disadvantages. Maybe you can never focus on one project, so you always have to work on 100 things at once. Maybe you think you’re stupid for not being able to figure out what you want. Maybe you’re afraid that you’ll never “figure it out,” that you don’t deserve to…
List everything negative your inner critic says about you.
Ask yourself, How much of this can be linked to my multipotentiality?
Put a checkmark next to everything that could be linked to your multipassionate nature. Then look at each item and see if you can turn it around or negate it with one of your strengths. Like the fact that you’re pretty good at multitasking when you want to be. Or the fact that you pick up everything you learn super fast. Or maybe you’re proud of your ability to think out of the box and help your friends come up with fun ideas.
Look in the mirror and tell yourself what you admire most about yourself, and include all those positive things you used in the exercise.

In conclusion.

I really hope this helped you move forward on your multipassionate journey, and I'll include something that could help you even further below this article.

Remember, you're not alone, there are many multipassionates out there, and I know because almost every day they contact me and thank me for opening their mindset and helping them come to terms with their multipotentiality.

If you know someone who needs to read this, please forward it to them.