Dreams vs. Passions

NOTE: I know people will disagree with me on a lot of this. And I want to hear how you’ve found ways to live your life balanced. The whole goal of my blog is to open discussion about issues we face as freelancers. So hit me up! Let’s discuss, argue, agree, commiserate. On that note, read on.

I used to have very defined passions. I knew I loved sports, specifically I knew I loved skiing and ski racing. I couldn’t imagine ever having a life without my time on skis. Of course at that time I didn’t acknowledge to myself that I was going to ever stop racing either. All this very specific passion gave me drive. It pushed me in college to multitask. It kept me motivated to stay inn shape. It even gave me one of my favorite college jobs in coaching a local race team. And when I realized that I may have to pursue life after racing and discovered that news and sports reporting wasn’t going to fill either my passion or career desires, my passion for skiing and childhood memories of Warren Miller films drove me to chase what I thought could be a combination of passion and career out of town.

Ironically, this was the beginning of the dousing of my passion. I now had a new drive, a DREAM of a life behind the camera. I chased it to Colorado because in my head I still thought I was going to combine my passion for skiing and my new dream into one perfect life. I had given up way too much for it to not work. And that’s how things are supposed to fall into place right? You sacrifice to chase dreams and everyone lives happily ever after. Unfortunately, as I would come to find out, Dreams and Passion don’t always play well together. For various reasons, and because of various people, my first big step chasing my dream was a bit of a step back. So, after my first real gut punch, I ran away again in search of my Dream. And, in many ways, this again meant further away from my passion for skiing.

The year that followed was one of my hardest and most mentally trying every. It came with heartbreak, struggle, an emptier bank account than I’d ever had, anger towards people and situations and, in another step away from my passion, my first winter EVER without a ski pass. It was miserable in a lot of ways and I only got 4 days of skiing because of it. Younger ski racer me would have slapped me for this departure from what we had always loved. But this new Dream chasing me accepted it as a cost of chasing said Dream life, a clear sign that apparently it had now become more important to me than my Passion.

As the years have gone on things have gotten easier financially and I’ve been able to find at least some amount of success in the film world, even though it wasn’t the world I first set out to find. But despite the success I find myself still lacking that fire for the passion that was skiing. And to be perfectly honest I’m very frustrated with myself because of it. I feel like a bit of a sellout. The goal was always to work in film, yes, but film in the skiing and action sports world. But partly because of the transition from competitive to recreational skiing and partly because of the bitter taste left in my mouth still from the first move, I haven’t been able to recapture the joy and original Passion that drove so many of my decisions early on. I even find myself struggling to motivate my body to get out on skis in the winter, which was never the case in Montana.

This begs the question: Where is the balance? I never saw a difference between DREAM and PASSION, but now one seems to always severely dampen the other. I am passionate about my Dream of filmmaking, yes, and I do still have a love for my snowy mountain home. But now the balance is off, and has been for a while, looking all the way back to my first move. I fully intend on finding at least some of the joy from my Passion for skiing again and I absolutely plan to see my Dream of a life in film continue, but it’s going to take something different, a new approach, maybe a new mindset, to rebuild the kid who was so adamant to live both equally again.

- GALEN MURRAY -

VISUAL VAGABONDS Owner/DP