How to reignite your childhood passions

Tap into your innate self-knowledge and ability to find fulfilment

Try and return to your childhood emotionally. Look at pictures from your past and remind yourself what you wanted and who you were when you were that age. Read your diaries if you have any. If this doesn’t jog your memories, retrace the games you used to play, pick up a paintbrush, make a Fuzzy-felt picture if you must. How do you feel? What did you want to be when you grew up? Get back in touch with your childhood dreams.

Talk to people who knew you as a child. If your mother says, ‘You always wanted to be an actor,’ dig deeper. How did this childhood ambition manifest itself? How did you make your desire known? How do your schoolfriends remember you? What did they think you would be when you grew up? Have you surprised them with your choices in life?

Think beyond the object or activity to the emotional sense of what realising your aspirations would mean for you. Ask yourself whether you are meeting that emotional need in the present. Are there ways you could do so right now? In the actor analogy, for example, did you enjoy performing as a form of expression? Do you need more creativity or playfulness in your life?