Passion is the force behind the momentum of our lives.

Chapter 9 of the book "Magnificent Mind at Any Age," talks about passion. Passionate living, it says, is the soul of success. We must ignite our passions to light up the brain circuits that drive success. This whole chapter got me thinking about my own passions.
I'm a woman of purpose. I love having a purpose or responsibility. Once my dad told me, "Jen you're into whatever you're into." At the time that he said this I was young and changed my mind all the time about what I wanted (to do, to be, to have). I am driven by my dreams and goals. But I feel like my dreams and goals were changed after my injury (14 years and 8 months ago). At the time of my accident, I was driven by school and academic achievement and my yearning to have it all (good grades, good job, be physically fit, be social, and have tons of friends). In retrospect, I think I was becoming a little unbalanced, but I think balance should just come with age and experience--you learn over time what is really important and what makes you really happy.
I can feel this blog topic leaning in another direction and I'm about to start writing about how my brain injury has changed my life. So I need to stay on topic: my passion.
What is my passion?
Well, what I was trying to say with that whole off-topic, car accident thing, is that I feel like I lost a lot of my passion after my injury. I could no longer do things I did in the same way, at the same speed as I did them before. School was too hard, I had to sleep a lot, and I forgot everything all the time. Oh geez, there I go again. I can't help but define my life by my brain injury. So that being said, HERE ARE MY PASSIONS: (I'm a list person. I love lists. If only I could express everything about my life with a list):

1. People. I'm motivated by people. I love to make people happy (pretty much exclusively my family and close friends--I say that almost in jest because I consider most of my friends to be also close friends, and I have a lot of friends).
2. Health. SIX IMPORTANT WORDS: I. Love. To. Eat. Healthy. Food. And I love to exercise. I love the physical energy that results from combing healthy eating with physical fitness.
3. Food. This one only really counts if it is combined with one of the first two. I love to make food for people. I love to eat food with people (especially at restaurants). The best thing is to eat healthy food with friends.
4. Kids. I like kids. Especially if they are related to me. Everyone thinks their own kids are the cutest. I don't have my own kids (yet) so I'm going to say my brother's kids are the cutest and leave it at that.

TRY THIS ONE ON FOR SIZE: Watching my brother's kids eat healthy food. That combines all four of my passions!