is this possible? passion and survival

[YIDIRYIDIR]

should there be a distinction between survival work and fulfilling work/passion?

surely, if we think holistically, and consider the major principles of life, one can be at a level where they combine both in almost a contradictory way, by embracing the paradoxical nature of life, adopting the right philosophy, mastering detachment and playfulness, leveraging creativity and problem solving to find fulfilling ways to transcend survival, aka make lots of money.

and most importantly trusting intuition.

I see many examples of broke people that chased their passion in almost immature childlike manner, not giving a slight fuck about practicality or strategy, being delusional and end up more successful than any genius hardworking businesspeople.

this pattern is so repetitive to ignore, and I still believe it is possible. Or is this determined by luck and is nothing but mere fantasy?

see, if we synthesize insights from these principles:

• the wisdom from Maslow's hierarchy of needs
• how authenticity leads to massive drive, motivation, and effortlessness
• power of intuition
• how life is paradoxical
• detachment
• spiral dynamics
• cybernetics
• resistance
• left brain and right brain
• big picture and long-term thinking
• the subconscious mind vs conscious mind
• Ego being the source of most dysfunctional stuff (fear, being stuck, sabotage, self-image, homeostasis…)

we conclude that if one is skilled and developed enough to embody a paradoxical attitude of detachment and non-caring, trusting in how life works, not wanting a specific outcome, mastering fear, mastering ego.

eventually some form of intuition will arise, some inner authentic motivation that'll lead you to doing the exact right sequence of actions that get you to where you wanna be without consciously engineering your way into it.

where you stop obsessively chasing specific outcomes, become less controlled by fear, and begin trusting the broader intelligence of life, but still paradoxically have conscious direction.

because if you just sit there, you won't just stay still until you die, you have authentic desires, for food, money, status, creativity, freedom....

and those constantly generate internal pressure; the subconscious mind may begin organizing behavior toward fulfilling those needs.

and the subconscious mind is far more powerful than the conscious in achieving and finding out a way to fulfill those needs, and in synthesizing constraints and finding a way despite those constraints. it is not linear like the conscious mind.

that's why the people that make it this way do so unconsciously, they are just talented and wired to follow their intuition in this radical and paradoxical way. it is insane to do this consciously.

so, is this kind of intuitive, paradoxical approach to life something that can be consciously cultivated, or does it only work when it emerges naturally and unconsciously when there is barely any conditioning? 

Would really appreciate your take on this @Leo Gura

Edited Tuesday at 10:25 PM by YIDIRYIDIR

[Leo Gura]

You should pursue your passions and highest values but you must do so in a practical, grounded, realistic, strategic way.

The more money you have the more freedom you have to follow your passion. So first you need to generate success, then you can be less pragmatic. Bootstrapping your passion usually requires doing things you aren't passionate about, like earning money. Your passion needs to generate profit and be sustainable, which means it can't just an pie-in-the-sky fantasies. This is where business savvy comes into play. You need business savvy, not just lofty dreams.

[YIDIRYIDIR]

Yes i totally agree, i wasn't asking about myself, i was just wondering if that is something possible. because that's the only way i can explain early and unconscious success, the ones that succeeded in a very unconvetional way.

I'm asking this because i noticed this about myself when i was young up until I'm 16, i was multitalented in arts and sports and school. and i did it all without any self reflection or intention, if you asked me back then "what are you doing and why?" it won't even register in my brain. my environment didn't descipline me, i was never desciplined up until after 16. 

and when i look at so many creatives that made it early, i could almost see the same pattern. and my best guess and explanation is what i said up there. 

[Leo Gura]

You can stumble into success. However, if you leave your success up to chance, you will most likely crash and burn.

Consistent success requires strategic deliberate action. Not happy accident.

You can't look at others because they were just the lucky out of the millions who failed. This does you no good.

You need to understand what you're doing and why.

Edited Wednesday at 08:23 AM by Leo Gura

[Lyubov]

I have done a lot of contemplation work on this. Especially as someone who studies Taoism and Wu Wei.  I’ve explored my definitions and beliefs on some key concepts, I’ll share them. Again, don’t take everything so literally. 

Success - financial and social recognition which allows for new opportunities. 

Abundance - recognizing this moment now is all there is and you are enough / valuable in it, you have all you need to make the next truthful choice with the least amount of resistance. 

Uniqueness - you are valuable and unique and there is no one else like you, unique qualities about you and you being you. 

Passion - Your true self’s highest and most joyful expressions of itself through your uniqueness. 

We need to balance innocence / wonder with wisdom. What does this mean? Well you have bills and need money to live. This is true. You also have authentic passion you love and want to do, the language of your soul. This is also true. As you live you find the passion doesn’t necessarily pay the bills at this time or the way you are going about life neglects one of these truths. The challenge to life is giving proper recognition to both. 

We weren’t born with an instruction manual to life. We have to make choices, make mistakes, that’s ok. I would say the thing that really robs me of my joy on this path towards finding sustainable expressions of my passions is expectations. You got to drop all self judgement and expectations that things have to go how you think they should go. All we can do is make the right choices in the moment and take a bit of time to think with clarity about what choices we may want to make. 
 

Quote

eventually some form of intuition will arise, some inner authentic motivation that'll lead you to doing the exact right sequence of actions that get you to where you wanna be without consciously engineering your way into it.

I think this is mostly spot on and I agree with it but I think it needs just a bit of adjustment in my opinion. “Right sequence” I don’t believe life flows on such terms. It just flows. You may see certain choices at one point in time in your past as a mistake but culminated years later in something good for you. The thing is we live in the unknown. I think such language still has an expectation that things go how you think they should go, according to your idea of perfection. I would be a bit careful with that.

We can live in Wu Wei, live from spirit and live authentically and in a way we believe is honest and right for ourselves. 

[YIDIRYIDIR]

@Lyubov sorry for the late reply.
your insights are spot on, specifically i like this framing ↓

On 3/11/2026 at 8:45 AM, Lyubov said:

We need to balance innocence / wonder with wisdom. 

I think trying to convert passion into money in the wrong timing robs it of its own joy and authenticity. 
for example, one broad field of humans are passionate about is creativity and creation
and as a creative,
1.you first create to make money (functional creativity),
2.then create to be respected, or for status (esthetic creativity),
3.then you create to be free and fulfilled (creativity as expression),
4.then you create to impact the world, where you stop thinking so much about yourself and impacting others and the world becomes the most fulfilling.

jumping to the last 2 was a mistake I'm making, I need to first master survival and set the last 2 as direction only. otherwise, I would be ignoring reality. 

[Ramanujan]

"Following your passion" Work only in US

American youtubers can say anything they want

Reality is different in 3rd world countries

 

Fuck passion and lifepurpose

[YIDIRYIDIR]

@Ramanujan sure, but there is nuance. if one speaks English, has Wi-Fi. location don't matter.

[Ramanujan]

@YIDIRYIDIR let's say I wanna buy a course. The course cost 400 dollars. 1 dollar = 100 Indian rupees

So I cannot buy that course

 

India only have IT industry.  No other industry exist to support people with passion other than IT

[YIDIRYIDIR]

@Ramanujan you don't need courses bro, the fundamentals of everything are free on the internet, plus if you know how to ask AI, you don't need courses ever. I learned copywriting, ghostwriting, design, branding and more all for free, you just need to know how. also, in 3rd world courtiers, there are sites and telegram groups where you can find most famous paid courses for free. plus, courses are for people that make 5k$+ a month and want to scale, you can make 5k$ a month with just fundamentals of anything. it is not knowledge that's scarce, it is action. 

[Cred]

 

[YIDIRYIDIR]

@Cred bro, no matter how right or wrong is what you say, your epistemic attitude lacks wisdom. the content doesn't matter if the structure screams red flags. 
imo, the stuff you say about neurodivergence isn't accurate. i was diagnosed with ADHD 7 years ago, and i do just fine. it's just the way i do things is different. won't get into details but you gotta rethink your stuff bro, sorry for being blunt. 

 

[Cred]

@YIDIRYIDIR Thanks for the feedback.

1. Yes this writing style is polemic. If I was more nuanced, the post would be longer than it already is. This does not mean that my point is not deep and nuanced.
2. I used binary language for simplicity so of course most people are inbetween the two.
3. The post is mainly adressed at extremely neurodivergent people who struggle a lot in life. But it also applies to mild ND too somewhat.

[Cred]

43 minutes ago, YIDIRYIDIR said:

won't get into details

How am I supposed to know what is wrong with my points if you don't tell me?

[YIDIRYIDIR]

1 hour ago, Cred said:

How am I supposed to know what is wrong with my points if you don't tell me?

the point isn't about the points; it is the attitude in which you come about them. 

[Cred]

I have borrowed a rhetoric from leftists. My goal is not only to tell the truth, but also to get people to ACT NOW

one can't think a revolution into existence.

Edited yesterday at 06:47 PM by Cred

[Ajay0]

On 3/15/2026 at 11:53 AM, Ramanujan said:

India only have IT industry.  No other industry exist to support people with passion other than IT

 Tamil Nadu  in India has an excellent manufacturing industry, especially automobiles. The other day I came across a school dropout Tamilian woman who became a successful farming entrepreneur after creating value added agricultural products. 

Many are becoming millionaires from the farming industry alone. It is not just IT industry producing millionaires. You need to expand your horizons and become  more dynamic.

[AerisVahnEphelia]

On 11/03/2026 at 0:09 AM, Leo Gura said:

You should pursue your passions and highest values but you must do so in a practical, grounded, realistic, strategic way.

The more money you have the more freedom you have to follow your passion. So first you need to generate success, then you can be less pragmatic. Bootstrapping your passion usually requires doing things you aren't passionate about, like earning money. Your passion needs to generate profit and be sustainable, which means it can't just an pie-in-the-sky fantasies. This is where business savvy comes into play. You need business savvy, not just lofty dreams.

total projection of your path.

I did follow all my passion first, found them all empty.

Now I m so enlightened than making money or not do not matter at all. ( it never ever mattered, but European are less restricted than american, our societies provides )

having sex or not doesn't matter at all.
being there or in that place doesn't matter at all.

this is lived experience, not talk.
I m killing time instead of myself <3
 

Edited 7 hours ago by AerisVahnEphelia

[Ramanujan]

5 hours ago, Ajay0 said:

 Tamil Nadu  in India has an excellent manufacturing industry, especially automobiles. The other day I came across a school dropout Tamilian woman who became a successful farming entrepreneur after creating value added agricultural products. 

Many are becoming millionaires from the farming industry alone. It is not just IT industry producing millionaires. You need to expand your horizons and become  more dynamic.

Yeah

my point is , india has  very few industries that exist. if you  have a passion , that wont align with those industries , you are fucked

passion route is not the way to go if you wanna be successful in a 3rd world country

[Terell Kirby]

Can’t pursue passions if you’re hungry and starving. The pursuit of higher ideals and passion is about upon a foundation of healthy living, having all your material needs met.

Some people are lucky for being born into wealth, but doesn’t necessarily translate to living a life of passion, quite the opposite.