Good Life Project - Six Eye-opening Ways to Feel More Alive, and Less Alone

Episode Date: June 5, 2025

Embark on a profound journey of self-discovery with Jonathan Fields' soul-stirring spoken word essays from his Awake at the Wheel Substack. Dismantle limiting beliefs, reignite your passion, and unlock the courage to embrace life's uncertainties as you immerse yourself in his fearless exploration of what it means to live authentically. Each captivating piece is a masterclass in awakening to your truest, most vibrant self.You can find Jonathan's new writing project: Awake at the Wheel | Instagram | Episode TranscriptIf you LOVED this episode, you'll also love the written essays from this episode. You can find them at Awake at the Wheel.Check out our offerings & partners: Visit Our Sponsor Page For Great Resources & Discount Codes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

So, every few months now, I have been sharing a spoken word roundup, narrating some of my most popular essays from my personal substack and newsletter, Awake at the Wheel. It's where I write weekly in a much more personal, long-form way. And at the end, I always include what I call a wake-up call, which is an invitation to explore a question or take a specific action designed to help you feel more alive and less alone. Today, I'm sharing my third Awake at the Wheel roundup with new spoken word essays and a little poem to tie it all together at the end, all of which led to some pretty passionate

conversations in the comments. One is about that annoying trope, the universe will never give you more than you can handle. We'll see about that. The next explores what I call microdosing attention. The third invites you to hit pause and ask a very important question before you hit the eject button on your current life. The fourth, it's about a complicated guidance to stay in your lane and how I know its value but struggle mightily with it.

Now the fifth is about the myth of losing passion and the final one is a little short and sweet poem inviting really everybody to have a little bit of faith which made me uncomfortable sharing in print but oddly makes me even more uncomfortable sharing in spoken word form. Go figure. So if you're moved by what you hear and would love to spend more time with these essays or read a whole bunch of the other ones that I share on a regular basis, you can read them along with the wake up call prompts over at Awake at the Wheel on Substack. You'll find a link in the show notes.

So excited to share these offerings with you. I'm Jonathan Fields and this is Good Life Project. So first up is an essay called, What If You Can't Actually Handle It? So there's this trope I keep hearing. It comes up in the self-help world over and over. Social media loves it big time. The world, the universe, God will never give you more than you can handle. Now as you know by now, I'm a bit of a self-help contrarian. Not that I'm in any way against personal growth. I'm all in. But I am against ideas or proclamations that get likes on social media, but all too often sugarcoat a more complex truth and without intention,

but all too often sugarcoat a more complex truth and without intention, seed an undercurrent of shame that worsens the pain and deepens the paralysis. I call this second wave shame. The life never gives you more than you can handle pop proverb to me is one example. So why? It doesn't acknowledge the reality of life and the world we live in. It doesn't

speak to the difficulty of profound laws with no rational explanation. It ignores the nuance yet challenging and sometimes brutal reality of chronic illness, disease, and mental illness. It denies the potential contribution of generational poverty, exploitation, and inequality. It implies that you have what you need within you to find your way through anything life throws at you, and if you don't, you're simply refusing to see it. There's something quote wrong with you, or maybe both. First wave pain meet second wave shame. So sure, you may be equipped to handle a lot, more than most even, but there will, in almost every person's life, come a time where you alone will not be able to make it through.

You will be given more than you can handle, more than you are equipped to handle, more than you are resource to handle, more than your skill to handle at a time when you already thought you'd hit bottom. You can breathe all you want, meditate all you want, search inside all you want, draw on your inner strength and wisdom and healing and connection to Source, read all the books, listen to all the podcasts, get all the advice, spend all you want. But it still won't give you what you need to make the moment less hard or at least diminish the source of unease or distress enough to return you to the peace and ease to which you aspire.

And calling that a personal failure, it just piles self-loathing onto suffering, which is all too often what this trope does. Plus, buying into the false notion that if it's been given to you, you've got everything you need inside to handle it may well stop you from exploring the two doors that are often available to you, even at that moment. Door number one, accept what is real and the hardness that it brings. That doesn't mean relent. It just means acknowledging the toughness and complexity of the moment that you're in and the ineffectiveness of your wisdom and efforts to make things different,

at least to date. This also means accepting that you are not in fact capable of handling what is being dished your way, which unlocks door number two. Drop the I have all I need to make it through everything ethos and reach out to other people who do have the wisdom, the resources, the skills, the energy, the time, the emotional and energetic bandwidth to join with you and potentially redirect your circumstance from one of pain and suffering to peace and possibility. Now, will this always remedy the situation?

Often it makes it better, maybe not 100%, but knowing you're no longer alone, it can change the nature of suffering in a profound way. Still, even with a village in play, resolution may stay away. There may be elements of what you're moving through or living with that, even more expansively resourced, you will not be equipped or able to fix or heal or resolve. At that point, a different kind of acceptance and reimagining enters the conversation. A different type of healing linked to more surrender than salvation.

Continuing to tell yourself or have others tell you, the very fact that you're experiencing something insanely hard is proof that you also have everything you need within you to handle it because the universe wouldn't have served it up unless you did. Well intended as it may be, can make an already brutal experience worse. Much as we love to simplify and sugarcoat along with the myth of on-demand and omnipotent self-sufficiency, the harder things get, the more this trope harms and helps. Nuance and complexity are where both the best and the worst things in life live. Owning that, examining our assumptions, questioning the rush to simplify in the name of false ease is a practice.

One that brings with it the fullness of existence and a lessening of the second wave shame that so often serves to deepen rather than relieve the first wave pain. And that's what I'm thinking about on an unreasonably warm morning in the mountains. Now here's the wake-up call associated with this unburdened second way of shame. So maybe you've been moving through

something hard, maybe you don't feel well equipped to handle it, even if people tell you that you are or you quote should be, if you just looked harder, trusted more and opened a wider channel to whatever. There may still be more you can do, more self-exploration, discovery, and opening that may help, but don't feel like it's a personal failure to reach out along the way to others who may be better resourced or skilled or informed or at a minimum just willing to walk beside you. Drop the expectation that you can or should be able to handle it on your own. Together we can find our way through so much more than we can alone,

including the experience or circumstances that may not in fact be subject to change. So think on it, walk with it, and if you're inclined, share your thoughts. And that brings us to our second piece here, and I call this microdosing attention. So by the time I realize I'm being an idiot, it's over. We have one car and a bike. Not so unusual for Boulder. People ride everywhere in pretty much any weather. Makes them one part cool, one part, well, a little psycho.

Christmas Eve morning, my wife Stephanie needs the car, so do I. She's going further, has two people, and will be out all day. I'm a party of one, with a single meeting, she gets the wheels. So I'm left with the bike. But my meeting is a 20 mile hump, and it's cold out, and it's early, 7.45 a.m. so I order up an uber most mornings I'm out of bed in the sixes but I'm just kind of dragging a bit today and as a general principle I do not people until after 9 not fit for human consumption especially without coffee minutes later the uber arrives my

destination is 34 minutes away I don't want to talk. Telegraph this by popping in my earbuds as I walk from my porch. The driver's an older man, maybe 70 something. A bit grizzled, baseball cap pulled down. Can't tell you more than that because I'm being very intentional about not paying attention. He seems cool just to drive. So I said, Lynn, turn on some music, turn my post-dawn pre-human gaze towards the mountains. But honestly, it's mostly down at my phone. And about 34 minutes later, he pulls up to the building. I extract my earbuds to say thanks. He turns to look at me, looks me in the

eye with the sweetest smile. And it's then that I notice his hat says, veteran on the side. And I feel this shame for having ignored him or noticing or acknowledging him. Every person deserves dignity, even in the form of just a simple acknowledgement of and gratitude for the presence beyond a passing early morning harumph. And then through his smile, with kindness in his eyes and a Santa-like voice, he says, and you have a wonderful day and make sure you love yourself, okay? My heart softens and then saddens. It seemed I have missed an opportunity to spend a little time with a stranger, one who I immediately sense has seen so much more than me, lives such a different life with stories to share and a compass that lets him continue leading with his heart and reminding

others to do the same. I want to know his story now. I want to understand where and when and why he's decided to do what he's doing, to offer a little bit of love and reciprocate his invitation to love himself too, though I also sense it's not needed. I want him to feel words of kindness land from a stranger and to feel seen. His phone pings the next ride, and I'm about to be late for my meeting, so still he holds my gaze, just for a split second. We're microdosing in shared attention. But it's time to go, and so I do. I'm wondering all day how many other tiny moments of shared grace and connection like this I have missed over the years?

And remembering how important it is to keep being kind and human and to make a little more effort to see and be seen, to connect and feel connected. Even when it doesn't come easy or when you're in post-dawn pre-human perpetual introvert mode. It's not about grand gestures or sustained effort. Just a moment, a microdose of recognition, attention, appreciation served with a dollop of curiosity and an invitation to share as we walk the plank of this tiny blue marble with a whole lot of love and gratitude. And here's the wake-up call for this particular essay. As you move through your day, what might happen if just for a moment you looked up and out, you opened your eyes a bit wider to those around you, then lingered in a single passing interaction just a bit longer. Not in a weird or awkward or creepy way, but long enough to see someone you might not normally

see. And offer even the tiniest gesture of kindness. Something that in your way says, I see you, I appreciate you, be good to you. Give it a go, and then share how it unfolds. And we'll be right back after a word from our sponsors. And that brings us to our third essay, which is called Before You Blow Up Your Life. So there's this common compulsion.

Once we know who and what makes us come alive, then we realize we're not with those people or doing those things, we rush to hit the eject button. Every minute spent fitting our round pegsoles into a square-hole job or relationship or location or life becomes torture. We tell ourselves, sure it'll hurt to walk away, but the pain and disruption will be nothing compared to the suffering of a life that perpetually drags the sand of misalignment and discontent into the machinery of our hearts and minds. We counter any potential loss or pain with a dreamy

escape scenario awash in freedom, release, ecstasy, and possibility. We envision the open arms of abundance rising up to meet us as we step into a world that immediately recognizes our authenticity and lavishes us with opportunity. One where all the bad, all the pain, the stifling, the disconnection, the conflict, the lack of misalignment lie in the rear-view mirror. One where, as Timbuktu III promised, the future so bright we've got to wear shades. Sometimes that vision is real, and it's glory and necessity. Other times it's, well, complicated. Especially when we're subconsciously a wee bit complicit in deepening the pain to a level that helps

us justify extreme action, or what I call the nuclear option. I have seen this unfold in my own life. I'd be in that, you know, hallway moment having realized my current reality wasn't what I wanted, though I also wasn't entirely sure what my next move might be, what door to walk through, or whether to just keep going on. And my impulse was just blow everything up and start fresh. Start a new job, launch a new company, find a new relationship, you get it. Many times I did just that. And some worked out great, others not so much. The more I've reflected on those moments and truly inquired into them, I've realized there

was often something else going on, something I was almost entirely unaware of. Not all the time, but more often than I care to admit. In the heat of the experience, my heart craved release, but my brain craved reason. I wanted freedom, but also needed to explain to myself and to those whose perception of me mattered, for better or worse, why I was taking such extreme action. So I find myself doing this weird thing. I would do all manner of things seemingly innocuous, yet damaging in their accumulation, that deepen the pain of my current reality. Agitating and amplifying the suffering, I was setting up as the basis of my impending exit. Not big things. That's what made it so insidious. It would be little

things, ones not big enough for me to really have to own. I'd show up late, blow off a commitment, miss a deadline, stop caring or creating or serving at the level that made me feel good, turn in subpar work, maybe avoid hard yet important conversations, ignore opportunities or drop into just phone it in mode. On a relationship level I'd stop communicating or spend less time with a friend or partner, keep things inside, hide, save my best, most open, kindest, most genuine self for others. Each seemingly innocuous behavior, a consciously unintended but subconsciously wildly intentional notch in the self saboteurs belt. It was a way to deepen the core pain that was driving me ever quicker toward the eject button without having to point any part of any finger back at me.

So why would I do this? Why would any of us do this? Simple. It gave my brain, which needed to point to how bad things were in order to justify extreme action, the evidentiary fodder that it needed. I mean, look how terrible it is, I tell myself. I hate it.

Besides, it's not giving me what I need. It's keeping me from my next best self or adventure or job or relationship. Life is too short. And indeed, it is. The question I wasn't asking though, how much of that was on me? Truth is, reality sometimes is exactly as harsh as we make it out to be, regardless of our contribution. But there may also be a second, more obscured yet equally compelling truth running beneath

our conscious experience. We may be at least a little bit complicit in the deepening of our demise in ways we either don't want to or cannot see. This can happen when we get to a point where the thought of continuing to work at making something better is overtaken by an awareness that we live in a world of possibility that feels bigger, more opportune than the thing we're grappling with. Surely other things, activities, people, experiences must be easier and better. In truth, maybe they are, at least at first.

But at some point, not always, but enough times to merit consideration, an odd thing can happen. We find ourselves deposited squarely into our new supposedly better reality, having endured and contributed to the pain of an ending, yet somehow unexpressed bundle of humanity but with different paint on the walls, drapes on the windows, people and partners, colleagues to commiserate with, and things to grumble about. Bound to repeat the same patterns and inevitably shatter whatever temporary illusion of better we've run to. It turns out our patterns follow us until we unfollow them. To the extent we contributed to the situation we left behind, even if it's just the icing on the exit justification cake, we recreate the same morass of dysfunction and eventually

pain that we fled. Because we've never examined and processed the part that was coming not at us, but from us. Not that it's all on us. It never is. The dance of dysfunction is always a conspiracy, never a solo act. But if there was a part that was on us, it remains with, in new clothes, over to a new coast, in a new house, at a new job, with a new crew, a new person. And we continue to blame a world that feels perpetually positioned against us, never realizing a simple fact. In the end, we are still the same unfleeable we. So, truth I've learned. The light we so desperately seek will never shine upon us until it first shines within us. So what if there was a better

first step here? What if instead of blowing up what lies outside us, we broke open what lies within us? What if before burning down our so-called malignant existences, we first hit pause and took the time to look inside, to wake up, to ask the question, is any of what I'm so feverishly feeling compelled to leave behind at least in part on me? And if so, is there a way I can play a more active role in healing that part or at a minimum Stop deepening the pain so it doesn't keep nudging me into the abyss off cliff after cliff after cliff and Then what if before we hit the eject button we got honest?

We did the work needed to reshape our best possible reality in the existing container and connective tissue that already defines the inner seeds of our humanity and outer seas of our daily lives. What if instead of checking out and subconsciously piling on, we did what we could to make it and us as good as we could be before considering the possibility of leaving it all behind? Now, is this always possible or our responsibility? Sometimes yes, other times no. I am not suggesting or in any way condoning martyrdom or encouraging anyone to stay in the path of genuine harm. What you are feeling and have felt is real. There will be times in our lives where the only option is the nuclear option. There will be truly destructive, high-risk people,

culture, workplaces, or circumstances that must be abandoned. The abusive or horrifically toxic partner, the physically and emotionally treacherous person or place that is for all intents and purposes unfixable, unchangeable. Beyond becoming. At least by the mechanism of our own hearts and hands that is for all intents and purposes unfixable, unchangeable, beyond becoming, at least by the mechanism of our own hearts and hands and will and being. It's not about you nor was it ever. There will be other times when we've done all we can do. We've righted the parts of the ship that's writable by us. We've gotten honest, mended what's mendable both internally and relationally,

and things are still not okay. In those cases, the pain of staying truly is greater than the pain of leaving. Even if there is some level of our own work to be explored, we must allide to a place of safety and space and eventually grace and recovery. And if we don't have the insight, objectivity, or clarity needed to understand what's internal versus external, we've got to ask for help from those who do. That way, if we still choose to walk away, at least we'll do it from a place of not only far greater conviction, but also embodied self-knowledge and this sense of alignment and radiance that often generates a level of clarity and honesty and self-compassion and possibility not available when our exit

is more cut and run than did the work, and a future mapped by a more genuine capacity to create something not just new but truly better. And I wake up call for this particular essay. What are you feeling the urge to leave behind right now? Explore the circumstance. I mean, really look at it. Look at what is happening, who is participating, and what if any your contribution might be. Not saying you're making things worse, just ask the

question. This is not about shame or blame, it's about opening a window to both responsibility and possibility. Turns out the more we contribute to the conditions that disturb us, the more agency and power we actually have to change them. You cannot change the scenes of a play in which you've relinquished any semblance of authorship. Now ask, what if anything might I do to make this as good as it can be before I bring it to an end? Again, this is not always appropriate or possible. No one should stay in the face of harm or be a martyr. And if you've done the work, there's peace in your decisions. But if you're getting that intuitive hit that some things are not only within your control but also capable of meaningful positive change, what might that look like?

What might your first steps into that experience be? So think on it, journal on it, and if you're inclined, share. And that brings us to our next essay. And it's entitled, Stay in Your Lane. Wise words, soul crushing advice, or both. So I started working on a novel, ish. It's October 21st. My friend Jenny Blake says, she's doing NaNoWriMo, but in her own way, which duh is the way she does everything. For those not in the know, meaning most humans with a life, NaNoWriMo is short for this project called

National Novel Writing Month. And hundreds of thousands of people would commit to writing a quote shitty first draft of a novel, some 50,000 words in 30 days. Do you want to do it too? Jenny asked me. So let's see. I'm running two companies in the middle of a big launch that's consuming every free moment producing two shows and recording three podcasts a week, building a team flow and product for a second big launch in February, and deep into my own 2x20, running a symphony of experiments to help figure out what my next season of contribution is going to look like. And while I have written a bunch of books and dreamed of writing fiction for years,

I've never written a word of it. Nor do I have the slightest inkling of what it would take to write fiction or how to do it. My life is already beyond crunchy with commitments and balls that I'm struggling not to drop, and this is wildly outside my comfort zone and current skill set. I'd have absolutely no idea how and where to even begin. I am comically overextended when she asks. Plus fiction is not what I'm known for or what I've spent years building a platform, a following or community around. It's quote, not my lane.

Risky bordering on reckless, but something about this stirs me. Purely on an artistic level. So sure, I tell her I'm in. It's not about whether I can write something sellable when I say yes. It's about the aliveness that comes from trying to do something I have never done before. The fear, the growth, the revelation, the dizziness of the blank white page. It's about not writing about how I see a

particular aspect of the world we live in, which I've done publicly for more than two decades. It's about breathing life into a world that does not yet exist. Characters, moments, places, and happenings yet to be born. So November begins, atrocious writing commences. I don't know about for anyone else, but for me, I tried to stay in the awe, AKA abject fear of the aesthetic challenge. But as so often happens with me, the business and branding impulse starts knocking at the door of the amygdala.

Dude, what are you doing? You spent years developing a reputation, a point of view, a voice, a following in the world of prescriptive nonfiction. You're the how to live a good life guy, the voice, a following in the world of prescriptive nonfiction, your how to live a good life guy, that how to make work amazing guy. You know how to do that, how to sell it. That's what people want from you, what they know you for. If you write some story, even a good one, about who knows what, one that's totally made up and has nothing to do with anything you've ever done, no one will ever be there to support it or you when and if it ever comes out You know this better than anyone. It's a branding thing a positioning thing clarity in the marketplace thing

Come on, man. Stop screwing around Taking a risk like that. Just do more of the thing You know the thing you've got down, the thing you know people will still celebrate and support. Stay in your effing lane. This voice is not alien to me. In truth, I have given this very advice to others many times and as much as I've ignored it, it's not entirely wrong. Staying in your lane, doing the thing you already know how to do, the thing you're known for doing, the thing people value and are willing to pay for, it is safer, no doubt, and easier, more secure for sure.

It's a much more reliable, stable way to create and offer value, to build a career, a company, a practice, a life even. If you value the same lane different day, qualities, safety, security, ease, the known life, more than creative expression, growth, novelty, adventure, and possibility, staying your lane is actually pretty good advice. It's a higher percentage play, likely to get you where you want to go faster and with more certainty. Or if that lane you're in is deep or wide enough to keep you genuinely and perpetually engaged and excited and energized without being so overly broad that it dilutes people's understanding of who you are and what you have to offer, that is amazing too. I mean, what a gift. If that's you,

no judgment. Seriously, you do you. Much as I sometimes wish it was me, it never has been. I have tried to stay in my lane, succeeded even many times, long enough to build brands, businesses, books, products, programs, shows, positioning, a reputation and a following, often sustaining the story and the ecosystem for years. But with rare exception, at a certain point, it starts to feel suffocating. It's not that the lane that I've been living and building in is bad or fake or failed. It's that it's become overly known to me. And hard as it sometimes is, as a maker, I come most alive when I live in the realm of the

unknown and then work to cultivate the wisdom and the skills and the resources needed to give shape and form to the aesthetic ether, to turn it into something real, something new, something manifest, something that matters, something that moves people, starting with me. The longer I stay in my lane, the harder that is to do. Which is why, if you look back over the seasons of my working life, I have been a painter, a club DJ, an SEC enforcement attorney, a mega firm dealer,

a personal trainer, a fitness facility founder, a copywriter, marketer, teacher, yoga studio owner, blogger, author, speaker, facilitator, podcaster, producer, workplace researcher, innovator, consultant, community leader, five-time founder, CEO, and creator. Probably much I've left out. Lanes are safer, but the longer I travel down them, the more likely they are to wreck me. Maybe one day I'll find one, two at most that break this pattern. I would actually love that. And I keep searching for it. There's an argument that says my lane is and has always been that

of a maker. I make ideas manifest. The maker is in fact my primary spark a type or impulse for work that makes me come alive. It's why the top panel of my website has said for years, you know, like I make things that move people, but that's more of a primal impulse than a clearly delineated lane. It's so vast and nebulous, it doesn't tell people what to expect from me

or how to engage me to provide a specific outcome or value. A lane is a more narrowly drawn, defined expression of this deeper impulse, like being a prescriptive nonfiction author with a focus on work and wellbeing, a lifestyle podcaster or a private equity lawyer. And for me, at least to date, lanes tend to have an expiration date. And I've learned to accept this and navigate lane changes in a less jarring way. So instead of abandoning or blowing up a lane that I'm in, I'll find ways to transition more gradually, to use that lane as a lever, sort of onamp to provide social, temporal, or financial lubrication and momentum as I shift into a new one. Sometimes that looks like selling a company or winding a project down.

Other times it's about bringing in others to take the reins while I take a back seat and free up bandwidth to focus on the next thing. Sometimes it's about acknowledging that I've done what I came to do or I haven't and now I believe I can't or no longer want to. And still other times I run deliberate experiments on the side, allowing them to reveal and resource and then help me build the next lane over time. So it's there for me when I'm ready to just shift into it, which brings me back to what seemed like a wholly indefensible and irrational quest to start writing a novel last November, which, having lodged 15 years in the prescriptive nonfiction author space and never written a word of fiction, would have been a huge change for me. So a year into my 2x20, this seemed like the

perfect experiment. I had no idea how to do it. Could have been the start of something amazing, a new lane or a total failure. Either way, I'd learned something and that was enough. So I spent the last week of October devouring everything I could find about structuring and writing fiction. But I didn't want to go too far also, just enough to help me get a sense for the orc and type of a story I thought I might enjoy crafting. And then I wanted the experience of writing as my primary vehicle for self-expression, self-discovery, and revelation. I missed my word count wildly by a lot. Life and launches

did in fact take over the months that followed, but it got far enough into it to experience moments of constructive bewilderment, shattering awe, profound exhilaration, and this sense of expansive possibility that comes from not just learning a new way to create, but also one that is utterly unbounded by the limitations of the material, real or practical world. Where this goes, honestly, anyone knows. Whether I change lanes, add a second one to shift in and out of, or shut the whole thing down, still a big open question. I'm about to actually step back into the writing process as I speak these words. And what a blessing this sense of openness has been.

And that brings us to the wake up call with the conversation around lanes. So how do you feel about the age-old advice to stay in your lane? Does it work for you? Does it make sense for you? Does it make you feel relief, which is totally cool, or grief?

If you think about it, you feel relief, which is totally cool, or grief? If you think about it, what is your current lane? And if you're itching to shift out of it, what might a new, different, or even complimentary one look like? So think on it, feel into it, walk with it, journal about it, and as always, if you're inclined, share what's on your mind. And we'll be right back after a word from our sponsors. And that brings us to the final essay from my sub stack, Awake at the Wheel. It's entitled, You Haven't Lost Your Passion, You've Outgrown It. So I recall the moment I realized my passion had left the building. For seven years, I

owned a yoga studio in Hell's Kitchen, New York, taught this dynamic, highly physical style of vinyasa yoga, and immersed myself deeply in the practice. It worked for me and for my body and my mind, and I loved teaching it. And back then, yoga wasn't just what I did. It was who I was. It defined my days, a big part of my social circle, my livelihood, and in no small part, my identity. But gradually, teaching and running the business became exhausting. The studio felt like a heavy obligation, and even my personal practice, once energizing, started to feel hollow. My body began reaching for a different kind of physical and spiritual practice, a gentler way, not bound by the structures of vinyasa or even yoga. And my mind too yearned to

explore a more expansive set of modalities. It was, how do I put this, unsettling. How could I lose passion for something that had once meant so much to me. How could I even consider stepping away from identity and career that had worked so hard to build? So maybe you felt something similar. Waking up to the uncomfortable realization, something that once spoke to a deep curiosity, brought you joy, purpose, or excitement, now leaves you feeling indifferent, or worse, drained. It's confusing. It's scary. Questions flood your mind. What's wrong with me? Have I lost my way? Am I just lazy, ungrateful, burned out? Here's the thing. Oftentimes in these moments you haven't lost your passion. You've simply

outgrown it. Which begs the question, what exactly is a passion? So passion is often born of interest or curiosity. Over time, as you follow the thread and invest energy into it, it builds into something more, a profound emotional and motivational state driven by meaningful engagement and often tied to our sense of identity and purpose. Research tells us that passions may also emerge from activities that fulfill deep psychological needs like autonomy, competence, and connection. They feel inherently rewarding, energizing, even effortless at first, and many may last

for years, a lifetime even. That said, passions aren't always permanent or static. They can be pretty dynamic, shifting as we learn, evolve, and mature. So what captivated us at 25 might feel trivial or unfulfilling at 45, not because we've failed, not because we're lost, but because we've evolved. Yet we often resist acknowledging these changes, especially when we're particularly skilled at or publicly recognized for the passion that we've outgrown. When they've in some way become a part of the narrative of our lives, we cling desperately to outdated identities, fearing judgment, loss of status, or the uncertainty of what's

next. And sometimes it's not actually about our own grasping. Others may want us to keep centering that old passion in our lives because their relationship with us is built around it. Friends who knew me primarily through yoga struggled with my decision to sell the studio, to walk away from my identity as the yoga guy. My change forced them to confront a shift in their relationship with me, creating discomfort on both sides. So it's understandable why we hesitate. Letting go can feel like losing connections we deeply value and yet the more we cling to a fizzled passion, the more we foreclose the possibility for new ones to emerge.

Consider the successful corporate executive who suddenly realizes climbing the ladder has lost its meaning even though it's their primary identity, or the celebrated artist whose passion for a particular medium or approach, school or style fades, leaving them feeling trapped by public expectations and personal history. Or perhaps it's the popular writer or podcaster who feels a deep disconnect from the topics or genre they've built their brand around. These aren't signs of personal failure or ingratitude. They're proof of growth beyond previous versions of themselves. Passions are built to ebb and flow, and so are we.

And that said, I'd be remiss if I didn't also note that certain elements of our identity do in fact remain fairly consistent throughout adulthood. And we research into personality psychology, particularly what's often known as the big five personality traits. Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism, suggest that these traits typically stabilize once we reach maturity. Your innate

openness to new experiences or general level of introversion or extroversion likely remains relatively stable over long windows of time, if not for life. But many other aspects are values, priorities, interests, and indeed passions, can and do change, sometimes profoundly. It is entirely normal that the work, hobbies, or relationships that we felt the sense of passion for earlier in life no longer align with who we've become or yearn to become. And here's the thing. Clinging to a fated passion leads to smallness and suffering. Holding tightly to a passion that keeps pleading for keys to the exit often leads to significant

suffering, self-doubt, and resentment. It feels like self-betrayal because it is. We betray our evolving selves to protect a familiar but outdated version of who we once were. Recognizing this truth can be painful yet profoundly liberating. When I finally acknowledged that yoga was no longer my passion, it was a moment of reckoning. Yet owning that truth allowed me to release it as a defining element of my identity.

I eventually sold the studio, clearing space to explore emerging curiosities like writing, podcasting, and a more expansive set of questions about how we grow and evolve and live. The grief of letting go was real, but momentary. And the freedom on the other side was enduring and powerful. What I've come to believe is growth often masquerades as loss. Beneath the discomfort of letting go lies quiet wisdom signaling readiness for something new. So losing the fire of a passion isn't failure, it's intuition whispering, you're ready to move beyond old identities and limits. And that brings us to our final wake-up

call here. So here's a gentle invitation. Pause. Consider whether there's something you once were passionate about that doesn't quite tickle you the same way anymore, but that faded passion still claims a fair bit of your emotional, cognitive, or even financial resources and time. What if you let it go? What might that look like? What might it free up for you. Give yourself permission to grieve its loss and maybe the part of your identity that was tethered to it and that you're leaving behind and then ask yourself, what quietly excites me now? Maybe it's subtle, a new interest, a quiet curiosity, or a gentle pull towards something previously dismissed. Take a moment to listen carefully to that inner voice. Write down one small curiosity that you have noticed but haven't yet explored and then take the smallest possible step towards it today. Your passion hasn't disappeared. It's evolving and so are you. Think on it, feel on it,

and as always share what's going on if it feels good. And that brings us to our final piece and this is something I wrote many, many, many, many years ago but actually shared fairly recently on my sub stack, Awake at the Wheel. And interestingly, you can hear me saying this as a much younger version of myself, but there are tones of it that I think really still lend with me today. And it speaks to so much of what I've been sharing in the earlier essays. This is spoken word piece. Originally, it was a poem called Have a Little Faith. To all those whose eyes lay upon me, to all those whose expectations yearn to define me, to all those who wish me to rise to their measure of success, to all those who want

me never to experience the pain of failure, to all those who watch and wonder if I really know what I'm doing, to all those who stand in judgment waiting for the other shoe to drop. To all those who look to me for proof of what's possible for them. To all those who love me with every fiber of their being. To all those whose backs remain turned to me. To all those who want the very best for me. I share these simple words. Have a little faith. Have a little faith that I'll make mistakes, but be able to recover. Have a little faith that I have within me the resolve to move through adversity. Have a little faith that I know my heart and mind and will not leave them behind. Have a little faith that this life is not a race to be won, but rather a story to be spun. Have a little faith that this life is not a race to be won, but rather a story to be spun.

Have a little faith that I'll know when to work harder and when to walk away. Have a little faith that I have not just the will, but the capacity to succeed. Have a little faith that what's right for others isn't always right for me. Have a little faith that I will not put myself at unjustifiable risk. Have a little faith that will rise higher together than apart. Have a little faith that my heart is in the right place. Have a little faith that you can never be replaced. Have a little faith and a whole lot of love. And that wraps up this montage. This is our third episode where I share select essays from my Awake at the Wheel newsletter and sub stack. If you enjoy

these you can find a link in the show notes to that publication where you can take your time and read through them and actually look at the different prompts, the wake-up calls, and sit with them and actually do them, see how they land with you, reflect on them. And as always, if you feel like sharing any of these, share this with other people because I found these prompts to be just really incredible prompts for conversation between you and those that you want to go deeper with. And if these were interesting to you, you can also take a look at some of the other posts that you'll find on that same Subtec

publication. As always, be well. I'm Jonathan Fields and this is Good Life Project.