Last week I wrote about self-confidence defining it as one of the most important feature of a successful freelance translator. Today I’d like to take a closer look at passion which can motivate for further development and increase self-satisfaction.

Psychologist differentiate between obsessive passion and harmonious passion. Obviously, both may be related to your work, but only one, the harmonious passion, delivers positive results and is truly productive. It is a source of motivation and inspiration that turns your work into real adventure and makes you lose track of time. In other words, it keeps you moving forward and gives you energy to overcome any potential downsides.

                                                    (Photo by D. Pawlak)

Passion helps to come up with creative solutions and lets you go the extra mile to satisfy your customers or develop a highly successful and realistic business plan. Being passionate about your work makes you feel accomplished and increases the overall self-esteem.

To be truly passionate you don’t have to turn your passion into your career (which of course would be the ideal scenario), but you can also try to find passion in your apparently unexciting work. There are number of ways to ignite harmonious passion in your daily tasks, starting from reducing routine, through rewarding yourself and communicating with other passionate people. The latter is a real energy booster that can virtually help you break new ground.

Dorota Pawlak

Dorota helps digital brands infuse their content with a local touch. She is a localization consultant, translator specialized in IT, prompt engineer, and a book author. Dorota teaches online courses on localization, writes for her blog and a Medium publication. She also runs a Small Biz AI, a Substack newsletter for freelancers and small business owners ready to discover handy AI tools.