Do you have a thing you love to do – something you are passionate about? Time seems to fly when you spend time on these activities (for example a hobby) and you feel happy and content with yourself.

However, sometimes a certain passion (or a goal related to the passion) can prevent you from achieving even bigger goals; the ones that could change your life forever.

You may be thinking, “Well … shouldn’t I be doing what I’m passionate about?” and my answer is “yes”. But, at the same time you have to stop for a minute and take a good look at your passion – is it helping you to get closer or farther from your bigger goals?

Sometimes you just have to give up – or at least slow down

Although I hate giving up, and I don’t want you to give up either, sometimes you just have to know when to stop doing something. This is especially true in these situations:

1. Something bigger is on the radar

Let me tell you an example from my own life. I’m very passionate about sports (I’m a marathoner/triathlete), I have a baby in the house, and I’m building my online business on the side.

As you can imagine, when there is a lot going on and I had to put on the brakes – on the sports.

Although I’m passionate about competing in marathons and triathlons, I had to set my athletic goals lower for the time being.

For instance, my original plan was to compete in my first IronMan distance triathlon this year, but I have postponed that goal for an additional year.

This is because of two reasons: I want to spend more time with my family and get my business up and running. For me this wasn’t an easy decision, but it was the only way to make more time for my family and my business.

2. You are overwhelmed and can’t have it all at once

Sometimes there is just so much that you want to achieve. Yet, you can’t have it all – at least all at once.

The biggest issue is time – you may have great difficulties doing everything you want. Even if you try, you quickly realize that you are not able to focus on anything properly.

Rather than hustling with 10 different hobbies/projects/activities at once, you have to give up on certain ones so that you are not totally overwhelmed.

This also solves time problems and sets priorities straight; you have more time to focus on those projects that have the biggest impact in your life.

3. Your own well-being may be at risk

This point is closely related to previous point. When you have too much going on at the same time, not only are you struggling with your time, but your own well-being also.

No matter how fun and interesting things may be right now, doing too much at once is more likely to stress you out than make you happy and alive.

It’s time to prioritize your goals

If you are not making good progress on reaching that big goal of yours, ask yourself, “Am I focusing 100% on my goal?” or, “Am I doing everything I can to reach my goal?” or, “How am I spending my day, so that I have more time to focus on my goal?”

Take your time and answer these questions. The answers may open up your eyes to understand that maybe you have to do something radical to reach that goal. For example, this could be decreasing the time you spend doing your favorite hobby.

Also, it is important to understand that reaching your big goal might have long-term, life-changing effects while your other activities may not.

For instance, if you love knitting but you would like to turn it into a successful business, you have to focus on the business side of things in place of your knitting time.

Although knitting may bring you joy and excitement when you do it, creating your own thriving knitting business has a much bigger, long-term effect on your life and it could bring you even more enjoyment and fun.

Develop proper mindsets before giving up

Here is the deal: when you give up one of your passions (or decide to spend less time with it), you are opening new doors to greater possibilities. In our previous example, you are creating something big in your life (in the form of a business) by giving up on something else (your knitting time).

Also, giving up something doesn’t have to be permanent. You just slow down certain activities temporarily until you have reached that bigger goal of yours.

Finally, times change and your interests change too.

For instance, just couple of years ago I was very excited about software development and I had big plans for it. However, at some point my interest just dried out and I realized that being a programmer wasn’t my thing after all.

Was I sad of giving up on this situation? No I wasn’t. I just realized that it was time to move on to something else and my time as a software developer gave me many valuable experiences that I now appreciate.

It’s your turn now: Did you have a situation when you had to give up one of your passions or goals for something bigger? Please share your experiences on the comments area.

Photo by Eirik Newth