Finding your WHAT? – Area of Interest

Well everyone wants to find their why (their calling) or find their who (their partner), and these things take forever to resolve or maybe never.

But very few of us are on an active lookout for our WHAT, as in ‘what do I want to do right now or next’?

Problem

“People do not know what they want to do next or how to find what they want to do next”

This arises because of the way our society functions, we have very little control over what we want to do, it is mostly defined by your educational qualifications, your peers, your parent’s half-baked dreams, or what ‘Sharma Ji ka beta’ is doing.

And when you do not actively think about ‘What next?’, you end up at terrible places you never intended or anticipated to be in.

Solution

Short Answer:
It is not simple, it evolves, find your current “area of interest” and work on it.

Detailed Answer:
We all know we wanted to be something weirdly unpractical at the age of 6, something in the lines of an Astronaut / Pilot/ F1-racer / Army, not because we thought we could achieve it back then, but because our world view was so short that those were the only things we could imagine about.

As you grow older, you observe, your world view expands and your aspirations grow, aspirations which we sometimes hide behind the term “hobbies”.

And as you grow older, your worldview keeps expanding and you keep coming across new professions you can picture yourself being in.

The real question: How do I expand my worldview fast enough to discover my WHAT?

Simply start chasing your current obsession, it could be anything from painting, drawing, sketching, singing, dancing, taking pictures, athletics, or playing games.

Choose the one which excites you the most or club multiple into one single thing and start working towards it.

Once you start doing it, and you dive deeper, you will discover related things.

Jump to those related things and repeat the process, the key here is to know when to jump and exploring other possibilities when you reach a dead end.

At any given point you should be working on your current obsession and that will keep you on the track of finding your what.

Let’s see how chasing your Area of Interest guides you towards your WHAT.
Quick Story from my life:

1. Loved computers and robotics in school.
2. Love for computers brought me to startups and robotics brought me to engineering.
3. Love for startups brought me to startup communities and engineering brought problem solving.
4. Startup communities helped me build a network and that brought me my first internship in Search Engine Optimisation (never had an idea what that was).
5. Search Engine Optimisation brought me to Content & Copy writing.
6. Content and Copy writing brought me to Digital Marketing.
7. Digital Marketing brought me to freelancing.
8. Freelancing brought me to solving business problems through consulting.
9. Consulting helped me understand UX.
10. UX and Marketing brought me to Product.
11. And I am still figuring out what next.

6-years back I didn’t know the terms Marketing, User experience and products in terms of professions.

And of course there were multiple nodes that I explored and sucked at, but that’s exactly how you grow forward.

Chase your immediate obsession (Area of Interest) and things will fall in place and say a big FUCK YOU to your five year plan, because it will guide you to a place the 5-year older version of you wouldn’t want to be in.