"Curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back."
It expresses the idea that the inane pursuit of something curious might consume the pursuer, but if said pursuer can satisfy his curiosity, it was worth his while. I'm sure folks like Marie Curie, Thomas Edison, Ben Franklin, (and more modern examples such as:) Tim Ferriss, Brene Brown, and Mike Rowe can testify in favor of pursuing curiosity.
I have a confession, dear reader. There exists within me a bit of a contradiction in terms. I am fully in favor of the pursuit of curiosity. I am also fully opposed to instructing people to follow their dreams or passions or whathaveyou. Once my mind wrested these statements from the depths of my subconscious biases, I sought to reconcile them. So here we have it:
Three Differences between "Curiosity" and "Dreams" in a Wavering Attempt to Prove that my Opinions are not Simply Semantics
1. A Difference of Kind - a pursuit of curiosity begins with a question, whereas a pursuit of one's dream or passion begins with the answer.
There are two questions that you should be asking right now, and that I am going to attempt to answer: is that true, and if so, why on earth does it matter?
I think it's true (obviously). Whenever the sensation of "curiosity" occurs within me, it occurs because I have noticed something that I cannot explain, and prompts a question. How does a bird, larger than my cat, weigh only a fraction of her weight ... and why? Curiosity prompts me to investigate and learn that everything about a bird is designed to be light so that it can fly. Most notably, their bones are strengthened by a lattice so that they can be mostly hollow, yet remain strong.
A dream skips the "why" and the "how" and moves directly to the "what."
I have dreams like you, no really! Says Flynn Rider,
Just much less touchy-feely.
They mainly happen somewhere warm and sunny.
On an island that I own -
Tanned and rested and alone,
Surrounded by enormous piles of money!
That, my friends, is a dream. He's passionate about warmth, sun, solitude, and money. Some are passionate about music and wish to become musicians. Others are passionate about writing and dream to be come writes. Passion for art, food, politics, medicine, acting cause people to dream about becoming artists, chefs (or critics), politicians, doctors, and actors. All perfectly reasonable professions to aspire to, but an answer and not a question.
The next two points hold the key to why the distinction between question and answer is important.
2. A Difference of Orientation - curiosity turns a person's focus outwards and causes him or her to pay attention to the real world, whereas a dream pulls it inwards; a person's dreams or passions may align with the real world, but they also might not.
To pursue curiosity means that there is a tangible basis for a person's investigation because something in the real world must have prompted it. Because dreams simply presume an answer, there is no room for a real world check upon the dream.
Once upon a time, philosophers were a highly sought-after commodity and could earn a living that way. In our time, philosophers usually end up working in another field to pay for their academic loans. There just isn't the demand.
That says nothing about philosophy itself, by the way. A good friend of mine is a philosophy major at a well respected school, with no intent of going into "philosophy" as a career. He finds it a subject worthy of study because curiosity leads him to ask questions about the world that philosophy can answer. He believes that it teaches him the skills of critical thinking, careful analysis, diplomacy, and discretion that will serve him well in his intended field of practice: law.
Ultimately I think that it is a good quality in a person when he or she knows what they like and what they want to do with their lives. However, generally those people are also able to evaluate honestly how to achieve those goals, and whether or not they are realistic. The unfortunate aspect of the phrase "follow your dreams" is that it does not take into account whether those dreams are prudent, beneficial, or even attainable. So we find ourselves in the unfortunate situation of the bald guy from Tangled who helped Rapunzel and Flynn Rider escape from the tavern:
Go, live your dream! We say to the talented neurosurgeon.
I will. Replies the aspiring Philosopher.
Your dream stinks. We say. I was talking to her.
Yet even the fact that we really have to cherry-pick carefully with this phrase would be less harmful if not for the third distinction between a curious mind and a dreamer.
3. A Difference of Connotation - the context in which we use these two phrases tends to differ wildly. "Follow your dreams" / "Do what you're passionate about" tends to apply to careers. Meanwhile, "be curious" rarely has anything to do with the profession a person chooses.
To illustrate the harm that a "passionate" person can do when passion is all that matters, I present The Anecdote of the Painters:
Scene: a painting crew arrives at my house and begins work on several projects in order to prepare the house for sale.
Actors: My Mother (an incredibly patient woman), the Painter (aggravating in the extreme), and Me.
My mother is the director of the whole affair. The lead painter on the project, for some reason, insists upon droning on about how customer service is the most important part of any job, while consistently screwing up the job. Then he disregards my mother's attempts to point out where he has messed up.
All of this, however, takes place in the most passive aggressive manner possible. In our most recent interaction, he took it upon himself to wax eloquent on how "following your passion" is the most important thing in life. Indeed, that's all that really matters! I later informed my mother that listening to that drivel without retort required the most strenuous exercise of self-restraint that I had undergone in more than a year.
Recall, dear reader, what you have heard mothers always teach their children: if you haven't anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. In the face of that painter, I fulfilled the adage to perfection. In the face of a blog with no accountability, I break it with glee.
The pursuit of passion or of your dreams might have no inherent issues. But left unaccompanied by competency, quality, communication skills, humility, and a healthy respect for the wishes and opinions of other human beings - especially the ones whom you would call customers - will leave your credibility as broken as your lofty, but unfulfilled dreams.
Because curiosity does not presume the answer, because curiosity must take stock of the world as it exists, and because curiosity does not imply a career choice in modern vernacular, it is a pursuit that requires no "caution" sign.
I don't wish to disregard passion, because I do believe that it is important to enjoy what you do. I think that passion actually contributes to competency and quality and all those other attributes necessary to create a good product or a good service.
If you still wish, my dear reader, to follow your dreams, then do so! But I beg you, temper your passion with all the things that accompany curiosity: if you must presume the answer, then also ask the question how am I to get there? Evaluate your destination within the realm of the real world: is there a demand for what your passion would produce? If so, as in medicine, then fantastic! Turn your dream into a career and Godspeed to you. If not, then do as my philosophy-major friend and remove your passion from the context of a career. Instead, use your career to fund your passion. If you recognize that the job that pays well, but may not be your "dream," funds whatever your dream actually is, you may find more fulfillment in your career than you originally thought.
So, with regards to passion and your dreams, I desire to repeat the under-appreciated, yet ever-esteemed Mike Rowe: don't follow your passion, but always bring it with you.
Best wishes,
Nicole
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