The Power of Passion

In all areas of human endeavor, nothing great has ever been achieved without passion. Passion is an intense desire that can motivate us to do amazing things.  Being passionate about something—football, music, academics, art, business or taekwondo—gives us the energy to maintain the effort required to progress and master our chosen field, regardless of the difficulties we may face.

Debbie Fields was only 20 years old when she followed her passion for making homemade chocolate chip cookies. “My father believed that true wealth was found in family, friends, and doing what you love,” states Debbie. She took that advice and started a small business that ultimately grew into Mrs. Fields’ Original Cookies. Debbie turned her cookie recipe into a $450 million company with over 300 locations throughout the United States and 22 countries. Mrs. Fields is one of the largest retailers of on-premises, freshly baked cookies, and brownies in the United States and is the largest retailer of soft-serve frozen yogurt (TCBY) in the country.

There are thousands of success stories like Debbie Fields’, and they all have one thing in common—passion. The type of passion where you put more energy into something than is required to make it happen. A passion that is more than just enthusiasm or excitement, it’s principled ambition, which turns into action where you put your heart, mind, body, and soul into something.

If you have young children, don’t worry about them trying to find their passion. Most kids are too young to understand the concept, and it’s unfair to try to force them into discovering it. What you can teach them is to stick with something once they start. I’ve seen eager kids joining Taekwondo, only to watch them quit after four classes saying, “It’s too hard.” Then I watch their parents agree with them and let them quit. That tells me that the parents probably did the same thing when they were young. Unfortunately, it’s hard to break that kind of failure-mindset cycle.

As parents, we need to teach our children the right life principles so they can one day discover and pursue their passion. Those principles are respect, discipline, confidence, self-control, persistence, courage, and compassion, which will help them develop a spirit of not quitting when things get tough. Without knowing and applying these principles, they will not have the right tools to get them through the tough times that they will encounter once they discover their passion.

Our Little Tiger Series children’s books are designed for this purpose. Our first book in the ten-book series, Little Tiger—Respect, is going to be published in November 2019. It will be followed by our second book Little Tiger—Guardian of Peace, in January 2020. The series is written to help young children understand and comprehend the life principles mentioned above. The books are also designed to make reading more fun and enjoyable using animal characters and easy to understand language.

My co-author, Olivia Dybik, and I hope you will join us in our quest. Our passion is to change lives, one child at a time.