Des motivations

"[...] qui leur fera faire par goût et par passion ce qu'on ne fait jamais assez bien quand on ne le fait que par devoir ou par intérêt."

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, "Les considérations sur le gouvernement de Pologne et sur sa réformation projetée", Ecrits politiques.
Rapporté dans "Manière de voir", Le Monde diplomatique, no 112 (août-septembre 2010, p. 30).

Allegorie

"Pour allumer les plus grands feux, une petite allumette suffit!"

Marie-Hélène et Laurent de Cherisey, Passeurs d'Espoir (vol. I).

On passions

"All the urges of the passions express vital natural impulses, and it is the animal in us which gives rise to them. The wise man is conscious of them, he knows how to give them their true name and to make use of them as you direct your donkey. But the wise man is rare, and egoism finds a thousand reasons for giving those impulses legitimate motives and flattering names. The human passions are life impulses which have been perverted... and so skillfully perverted that it is very difficult to discover, beneath their complications, the almost divine power which is their source."

De Lubicz, quoted by Ram Dass, Remember: Be Here Now, chapter "Cookbook for a sacred life", section "Karma Yoga".

Choix de carriere

"La décision de rechercher ce à quoi on est appelé, sa vocation la plus haute, au lieu de rechercher son avantage immédiat (...) constitue un choix de carrière."

Rajmohan Gandhi, président d'Initiatives & Changement international (et petit-fils de Mohandas Gandhi), discours aux Etudiants d'Oxford, 2005.
Cité par Antoine Jaulmes dans Changer International, 337, Mai-Juin 2009.

Passions

"Venir à bout des passions les plus cachées me semble bien plus dur que de conquérir militairement le monde par la force des armes."

Mohandas Gandhi, Tous les hommes sont frères, chapitre "Religion et vérité".

Addiction

"At the core, an addiction is a way to keep ourselves from feeling. Thus, anything we do that keeps us from knowing ourselves and fully experiencing the world around us can become an addiction. Work, television, food, money, sex, sports, and other activities can all be addictive when we rely on them to avoid dealing with inner problems or deeper emotions. For every addiction there is a fix, an experience that we repeat over and over again, giving us the illusion that we are alive, while in fact numbing us to the real world and our real self, until it damages or destroys us.
The extension to corporate behavior is clear. We can become addicted to the deal, the power, the action, the excitement, the conflict, the aggression, the victories, the defeats, addicted even to the chaos and the stress, addicted to the point at which we feel empowered to do anything as long as it is legal (and perhaps not even legal), oblivious to many if not all of the effects of our actions on the environment, on society, or on ourselves."

Paul Hawken, The Ecology of Commerce. A Declaration of Sustainability. (Chapter "When an ethic is not an ethic").

Insatisfaction chronique

Cette citation de Sigmund Freud explique sûrement pourquoi j'ai l'impression de perdre ma passion (cf post précédent):

"La persistance d'une situation désirée par le principe de plaisir ne donne qu'un sentiment d'aise assez tiède; nos dispositifs sont tels que nous ne pouvons jouir intensément que de ce qui est contraste, et très peu de ce qui est état."

Sigmund Freud, dans Le Malaise dans la culture, cité par Bernard Maris, dans l'Antimanuel d'économie. 2. Les cigales, chapitre "La pulsion de mort au coeur du capitalisme".

Au contraste du "je windsurfe 3 fois par an quand je me retrouve près de la mer" du temps où je vivais en France, je suis passé à l'état du "je surfe et windsurfe quand je veux" depuis que je suis à Hawaii. Peut-être le fait de partir ravivera ma passion en me renvoyant dans le contraste ! Ce n'est donc pas à cause des mauvaises sessions, qui sont aussi nécessaires au maintien d'une telle passion que les bonnes sessions, puisque si les dernières étaient monnaie courante, on s'en lasserait vite...
Ceci est valable bien évidemment pour toute passion, notamment amoureuse !...

Losing passion

Sorry for this post, which is not a quotation, but merely some thoughts on a personal experience that I would like to share, because keeping it for myself is highly frustrating.
This is about passion, or the loss of it.
Passion about some sports, but it could apply to passion about anything.
I had a passion for windsurf and surf, for the particular relationship with the sea they provide, for the bliss of riding a good wave or jumping high in the air. My passion lead me to Hawaii, where I could enjoy it and keep it alive for more than 7 years. But little by little, something changed. I still get the urge to go in the water when I see a surf or a windsurf movie, or when we make our own surf movie with my friend François, with footage of us surfing, that we took several years ago already, and carefully select the best rides, the best moments, like in real surf movies. It always gives you a false impression that you just need to go in the water to get a thrilling session. It makes you forget the countless bad sessions, the injuries, the broken equipment... in short: real life ! But it is passion that makes you endure all of that for the reward of this rare wave that is worth all the sacrifices. And it is what I am losing.
I get more and more frustrated by the time spent in vain driving two hours for just getting in the water and not taking even one wave, like the day before yesterday, because it was bigger than forecasted and over my capabilities, or rigging my windsurf equipment and taking barely one small wave before the wind dies or my equipment breaks, like yesterday or last Sunday. I get so frustrated that I think to myself: "This is it, I am going to sell my equipment and stop losing my time doing these damn sports !"
But, like a drug addict, I know that I will eventually go back, give it another chance, get frustrated again. But I am not sure how much longer the bliss of the rare good wave will keep me going. Perhaps this is all the better like that, because I am leaving Hawaii soon... Even though, losing one's passion makes you feel awckward.