You have to give your passion power – the wings it needs to take flight. Otherwise, your passion is only potential.
But how do you do that?
Well, much of it is through what you uncover with the help of resources like Seyopa.com – the inspiration, insights, and mindsets needed to propel you into action, the expert tips and techniques for moving your passion forward, and the like-minded communities to support you on your journey.
The underpinning to all of that goodness, though – the common denominator – is…YOU! Only YOU can give the wings your passion needs to take flight. Only YOU can turn your passion into power. That’s why it’s not only about doing more of what you love, but also about being more of who you love. That’s why it’s not only about realizing your dreams, but also about becoming your best self.
But what if you aren’t functioning as your best self? What if you’re being held back because of physical pain, a lack of confidence, fatigue, stress, or all of the above?
Perhaps you’re not quite suffering, but perhaps you’re not THRIVING either. As a Functional Medicine Health Coach, I know that being your best self also means being your healthiest self.
Because passion without health is like trying to stoke a fire built on soggy wood. Why? Why can’t your passion and your skills alone carry you all the way? To answer this deeply, let’s look at what health really IS.
The World Health Organization has two definitions of health. The first is what we naturally think of: a state of being free from disease or injury. But it’s the second definition that we’re going to focus on here, one that almost no one has heard, yet once you are able to internalize this definition as more important than the first, your life can radically change for the better.
What exactly IS health?
Health is our ultimate resource for living life – for the achievement of goals and attainment of aspirations.
Achievement of goals…attainment of aspirations…sounds just like seizing your passion, doesn’t it? Can you seize your passion from a place of sickness or weakness? The word ‘seize’ itself implies vitality and strength!
Back to the fire analogy – let’s envision trying to build one. We’d start by picking a place that’s dry, contained, and protected from wind…the right context or environment for the content of a comforting fire.
Content and Context are Linked
The content has to match the context – for example, we’d expect a cactus to thrive in the desert, but not the rainforest. Likewise, would you fault your fire building skills if you couldn’t get one going in a hurricane?
Of course not!
To imagine this another way: if you had a flower that was wilting, rather than viewing the flower itself as the problem, you would check the soil, the sun exposure, the watering frequency, and for pests.
Similarly, if you don’t have the health you dream of, viewing your body as the problem – viewing the content itself as flawed rather than understanding the role of the context it’s in – is not only objectively misguided, but also practically counterproductive – guilt and shame will create a chemical cocktail in your body that will move you even further away from your goals.
Just as we wouldn’t assume the flower had bad seeds, your body is NOT inherently broken. On the flip side, just as the seed is designed to thrive under the right conditions, our body is built to heal and grow, and in fact…to provide a quality of energy and life that most of us have never experienced.
The ‘right’ conditions are 1) what we FUEL our body and mind with, 2) the way we CHALLENGE ourselves for growth, and 3) how we RECOVER to integrate the right context with the full potential of our content.
Fuel -> Challenge -> Recover
As you probably already understand, there’s a very wide spectrum of choices that lead to optimal health – ranging from nutrition that provides the chemistry of life, to relationships that can boost you or burn you, and all the way to mastery-level management of your mind. Each of these buckets is full of the potential to have you either bristling with energy or be chronically fatigued, to give you crisp focus and mental clarity or be weighed down by brain fog, to feel physically light and free or be in a spiral of chronic joint pain.
And let’s not go any further without addressing the obvious, which has become abundantly clear in recent times – we can’t control everything. There will always be factors we face that are outside of our scope of influence.
But here’s what I can promise you as a coach who has helped people dial in the conditions I mentioned above – what we CAN control is far more powerful than what we can’t.
So while we can’t create more hours in the day, or choose certain predispositions we may be born with, or like in our flower example – prevent the world from handing us heat waves and hailstorms- we CAN expand our capacity to handle it all in a way that not only allows us to survive those outside-our-control conditions but even to ultimately thrive through them.
We can become stronger, more resilient, and literally GENERATE more energy to tackle what lies ahead.
So, when you’re conscious of this, and have the tools and resources needed, and therefore are able to powerfully and consistently act on it – what’s possible?
What’s possible is a life not just free from disease or injury, but a life ON FIRE with passion, purpose, and contribution. A life in which you can BE more, so you can DO more. More of what you love, more of what serves those who matter to you most, and more of what our world so desperately needs.
Check this idea out as a visual below – representing each of us in the balancing act of all the things that matter to us and affect our everyday life.
Health & Your Capacity
I’m sure you can relate to this juggling act– but notice what happens when we develop deep health. We expand our capacity. Quite literally, it’s as if there’s miraculously more of you to go around. Not only do we drop some of the baggage weighing us down and slowing us down, but we gain freedom and capacity to take on more of what gives us the sense of a life worth living!
As your health increases, your capacity for living, for achieving your goals, and attaining your aspirations increases. ACROSS ALL DOMAINS of your life! You will be increasingly able to have the clarity of mind to know what you want, the ability to forge towards what you want, the foresight to step over the hurdles you know are coming, and the resilience to pick yourself up when you trip over the hurdles you didn’t see – to stay positive and get back on your path.
Sounds awesome, but how?
Back to building that fire. Let’s start with gathering some kindling. Little bits that, under the right conditions, will give you the starter fire that you’ll build over time – adding healthy log after healthy log of personal development, all the while fanning the flame with your passion.
I’ve created a cheat sheet for that kindling – a collection of actions you can take right away that will begin building what can one day be a raging fire that gives energy and light to your life and passions.
Sign up here to receive that PDF, and to stay in the conversation about cultivating deep health.
Pursue the deepest of health, my friends. The world needs you!
Functional Medicine Health Coach
I’m Tom Taylor, a Functional Medicine Health Coach, and I’m absolutely fired up about fighting the normalization of disease in our lives. Not only because there’s an unnecessary amount of suffering, but because I know what it means for the future world I’m raising my kids to be a part of – a world that needs people operating at their best to solve increasingly complex issues. I have a degree in Exercise Science and certifications such as Health Coach, Behavior Change Specialist, Nutrition Coach, and Personal Trainer. MORE importantly, though, I’ve woven that background and 20,000+ hours of experience into a new understanding of health that draws from different fields. I’m on a mission to use that understanding and play my part in reverse engineering chronic disease and pain.
Not Subscribed? JOIN over 20,000 others and get direct access to meaningful, insightful, and empowering content, delivered straight to your inbox! GET INSPIRED to do more of what you love, to be more of who you love, and to live your life to the fullest - with joy, meaning, purpose, passion, power, and fulfillment! Join us. Subscribe now:
