Every person needs passion in their life. It is a driving force that gives life a sense and makes it meaningful. People may have many interests and that means that their intellect is being stimulated by more than one area in life. Voltaire said that a person can change everything, except their passions.
What I am passionate about is art, especially film art. In my opinion art and culture are very connected. I like to watch films an make some short films. That is a very personal process and it makes a person grow. The soul makes a selection of what we should consider paying attention to and studying more and what we should disregard in order to save our energy.
The purpose of life is to enjoy it and that is connected with doing something you love. In order to be able to do the job or hobby you love, you have to gain sufficient knowledge and experience by doing it. The only way to learn is to observe, read and do practical work.
Voltaire said that: „It is not sufficient to see and know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it“. The point is to reach the level where we can completely understand and appreciate a work of art. There can be many kinds of art and people understand it differently. All of them have something in common and that is a deeper meaning to it. Voltaire is talking about that deeper understanding which is the process that a soul makes.
An individual has to invest a lot of time into studying and analyzing what interest them and it is not hard to do because they already love what they are doing or aspire to do. That is what I am interested in doing. When I am doing what I enjoy, I feel satisfaction even if I get tired.
Marcel Proust said that: „We don't receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take us or spare us“. That means that we can only learn through experience. I have seen it for myself numerous times. I like to watch documentaries and when I find the one that interests me, it affects me so much that I begin to explore its topic in real life.
In order to create something new, one has to be willing to take risks. It is both dangerous and fun. However, it is not recommended to gamble with the most important things in life. For me, family and humanity are most important things in life. I like to explore what makes us human and what forces us to create.
I believe that every person has to a need to create. However that need is dormant in most people. Children are creative and as they grow up their creative potentials are lost due to the way they are brought up and educated. That is why it is essential for a person to read a lot and to be taught how to observe life from early childhood so that they can grow up to be independent and self-confident individuals.
Marcel Proust said that: „Our vanity, our passions, our spirit of imitation, our abstract intelligence, our habits have long been at work, and it is the task of art to undo this work of theirs, making us travel back in the direction from which we have come to the depths where what has really existed lies unknown within us“. This observation is exactly what I was previously stating. A person has to overcome the superficial and dull occurrences in life and to get to the depth of human existence.
The best authors are like children, only experienced. They look at the world the same way as a child would look at it for the first time. That is why they end up being original. Of course, an artist isn't supposed to invent something that never existed before only to arrange things in an unusual and innovative way. The unique approach is the key. Every person is unique, but few people are able to express their originality.
In order to learn, one has to make a lot of mistakes. I did that and I learned from experience. It cost me time and money and nerves. However, I feel that I am getting closer to my goals every day. When I try new things, I make risks and become vulnerable. I expose myself to the world and that makes me feel alive.
There is a proverb from ancient Greece that says „Know thyself“. It is the hardest task for a human being and it is never complete. It takes years of introspection to be able to analyze oneself in the right way. Analyzing others, including fictional characters, helps one understand themselves as well.
Philosophy is about simplicity and it takes time to reach that level of understanding and create your own path. Life is simple, but we make it complicated because we are on a never-ending quest for the unreachable. It is human nature to set goals. When I achieve my goals, I go for the new ones. There is no end and no beginning.
I like to travel because it inspires me. That way I meet other culture and learn about them. Understanding different cultures is essential for enrichment of your own culture. I like to study foreign languages as well, travel, read books and follow the new tendencies in art and culture. Different kinds of art influence each other too and I like to explore that. Taste has to be developed and worked on constantly and I am aware of that.
It is duty of every human being to develop their own potential. I like to develop myself through exploring art and culture. I find film to be most exciting artistic expression. Television is also interesting because it is aimed at wide audience and therefore has power in educating the masses. Television film which is educational can have huge potential to create positive impact. We live in a society where people use the language they hear on television. They also acquire the patterns of behavior they see in a tv show or a film. That is why people who are interested in art and culture should make effort and get involved in creating educational contents. That is the foundation of a healthy society. People need to be encougared to find what really interests them and to explore their own limits.
Aristotle said that „All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsions, habit, reason, passion, desire“. I can relate to that. Based on my personal experience passion is what starts the creative process and inspires action. It is the root of all achievement. Desire is what encourages us to explore our passion. Reason accepts these processes as normal and desirable. Repetitive behavior creates habits and compulsions. If we really care for a cause, we will find a chance to work on it and nature will be our ally.
Ralph Waldo Emerson said that „Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen“. This sentence is true. Whenever I believe that something will happen, I make effort and it becomes real. It really seems that we invite the universe into the depth of our soul and it takes care of us. There is also the saying that we have to pretend that we are successful until we become successful and that is what the universe is teaching us. When we feel like we have the ability to make something happen and we believe that it will happen, the universe will help us. It is like the law of attraction. Our wishes reflect our inner nature and they attract real actions. New opportunities are revealed to us when we make a decision. It is suggestive. When we believe that we will make an achievement and be successful, we unleash our potentials and we become what we wanted to become.
Alessandro Baricco said that „Things happen that are similar to questions. A minute goes by, or years, and then life answers back“. This is also a topic that is related to what interests me most. Sometimes I don't know what I will be intrigued by and life brings is in a form of a question. It means that a question is also an opportunity. We can say yes or no to it. When we say yes we invite it into our life and if we say no, we also get the answer from life. Life is unpredictable, but we can control it by controlling our feelings. It is all connected.
Time is relative, but we have to make the most out of it. Our time on earth is limited and we mustn't waste it. I know that it is normal to make mistakes and some of them can have serious consequences, but all mistakes happen for a reason. It is best when we can learn from them. That is the school of life. Nothing can substitute it.
As I said in the beginning, my passion involves art and culture. My favorite means of expression is film. I also like to learn about the world through documentaries. I like them because they show the truth but in an artistic way. It is so rewarding and satisfying when I see that a story of the underprivileged has been told. We see ordinary things every day, but we have to find a way to accept unusual things.
I believe that my purpose in life is to explore what excites me. The best way to do that is to be relaxed and accept the life path that is before you. There is no wrong way of doing things, as long as you are not harming other people. The best outcome is when everybody wins.
It is in human nature to tell stories, and it has been like that since ancient times. The cave paintings also tell stories of ancient times. Modern people have evolved, but their nature remains the same. Human needs vary from essential to those related to self-expression and self-accomplishment.
My goal in life is to work on realizing my dreams. I may succeed in that or I may fail, but as long as I keep going on, I know that my life will have a purpose and a meaning.
Works cited
Voltaire, Philosophical dictionary, Web. 8.12.2014. https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/v/voltaire/dictionary/chapter111.html
Proust, Marcel. In Search of Lost Time. New York:Viking Books, 2003. Print.
Aristotle, Rhetoric, USA: ReadaClassic.com, 2010. Print.
Willoughby, Richard. The Quotable Emerson: Life Lessons from the works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Over 300 Quotes. USA: CreateSphere Independent Publishing Platform, 2011. Print.
Baricco, Alessandro. Lands of Glass. UK: Hamish Hamilton Ltd, 2002. Print.
