A fairly newish blog I’ve been checking out posed a brilliant set of questions last week that really got me thinking. The title of the blog was Hate something, Change something to match the Honda advert, you can read their blog here.

The instinctive reaction for a lot of people is that hate is bad. It leads to bad things and makes a lot of wars happen etc. But does it always? I don’t think it does.

I think when we hate evil things it can lead to good things. Hating slavery can lead us to do something about it, like giving money to charities or raising awareness of a particular slavery related issue.

As the blog I’ve linked to says ‘to love good is to hate evil’. With that in mind it helps people find out what they are passionate about so the blog posed three questions. I’m going to answer the same three questions.

What do I hate?

I hate seeing creative people not creating because the world has stopped them doing so, either by encouraging them into a non-creative job because it’s ‘safer’ financially or because they’ve been put down so many times they don’t believe they are good enough any more. Whatever the reason, it really really makes me angry. I don’t want the world projecting it’s idea of a person on to them so they can no longer be themselves the way they were meant to be, and unfortunately this is often parents who say they want what’s best for their child.

What do I love?

My favourite moments are when I’m in a group of creative people and the ideas are literally flying. When everyone is so secure in who they are as a creative and the ideas all bounce off each other. For me there’s nothing more exciting and fun than sharing a small tiny idea I’ve got with some other people and hearing what it sparks in them, until that idea grows and becomes something it never could if I had kept it to myself. They are some of the most satisfying creative moments in my life.

What do I obsess over?

Probably learning. I love to experience and learn as many new things as possible. New cultures, new ways of thinking. I’m so curious I think I’ve heard the line ‘curiosity killed the cat’ more times than my own name. Of course with me being me I’d come up with several replies to that by the time I was ten, ‘satisfaction brought it back’ is one of my favourites but ‘that’s why the cat has nine lives’ also used to work quite well. I have a desire to understand things on such a deep level it’s like an unquenchable thirst.

Now I already know how these three things lead to what I’m most passionate about and considering I’m doing a lot of it I won’t say much about it here, but for those not quite so sure and for those wanting to check they’re doing the right thing. Why don’t you sit down and think about the answers too. You can even add them to the comments section on the original blog if you’re feeling brave enough to share.