The downside to being passionate about something.
I facilitated a workshop on curiosity today with some of Copenhagen's ballsiest disrupters, speakers, and consultants at DareDisrupt.
Put on this earth to wake the world up to the future that is knocking on our door, these are people who genuinely love and care about what they do, and who also experience something many of us do: encountering people who don't care as much as we do about things that feel really fucking important (to us). Like global warming, sustainability, being open-minded, and embracing AI.
I was once reminded, as a person who cares passionately about most things I do, that We All Have an Eternity. Not everyone is going to wake up tomorrow, or even in this lifetime. My attempts as a disruptive force to provoke someone's mission any sooner than they are ready ultimately lands me in the violator position (and corners them into becoming victims). And really, that's the last place I ever want to be.
But that awareness is not enough, I'm finding. Because even with that awareness it's still possible for me to feel as though my mission is superior to those who aren't on the same one as me. It can quickly become a competition of Me versus Them.
I have to drop the judgment and get curious in this spot, which REQUIRES me to let go of control, open my heart, and be compassionate to where others are on THEIR journeys. Being a beacon, blazing a trail, and ultimately evoking inspiration in others, means necessarily taking the surrendered position of being curious about THEM and less absorbed with what I'm doing.
The example I gave today in my workshop, is this: in three weeks I'm going to Gabon, a country in West Africa with fairly undeveloped tourist infrastructure, where I'll be spending two weeks deeply immersed in shamanic rituals and initiation with the local people.
This is my version of an Adventure Awake, but this is not everyone's version of Adventure Awake, let alone even a vacation.
AND THAT IS NOT A BAD THING (for either of us!).
Yes, my journey is certainly adventurous, and certainly requires a great deal of surrender, vulnerability and courage from me. But so does hopping on a cruise ship for many others.
It's important in my journey that I am both in approval of the needs I have for my own growth and expansion while also holding deep levels of respect for where others are on their own paths.
If my true desire really is that everyone in the world has an opportunity to level up, I don't do that by rubbing my wild and crazy experiences and viewpoints in their faces. I do that by finding out what drives THEM, and expanding and reflecting THAT thing so that they can see it, grab onto it, and build from there on their own volition.