Who are your creative role models? Who are your favorite creators? Who else do you admire? Think for a minute until you have at least five names. Now answer these questions: Do these people love what they do? Do they find their work completely absorbing? Could they produce great work if they didn’t, if they did it only for the money? These people do their best work when they are driven by passion. You, too, will do your best work if you can discover and harness your passion.

What drives creativity?

Motivation can be extrinsic, or intrinsic. Extrinsic motivation comes from outside. When you are encouraged to do something by external rewards, like bonuses, salary increases, or awards, you are being motivated by extrinsic factors. On the other hand, intrinsic motivation comes from yourself. When you do something because you want to face a challenge, or because you enjoy the activity — when you do it simply for the satisfaction of using your skill to do something great, you are being motivated by intrinsic factors.

Research has shown that extrinsic motivation does not promote creativity. It’s the intrinsic motivation that feeds our creative selves. Given this, it’s hardly surprising that those who are most consistently creative are motivated from within. It’s not that they mind getting external rewards, but that’s not why they create.

You hear the same sentiment over and over again. Here’s Walt Disney: “You reach a point where you don’t work for money.” Steve Jobs said, “I was worth about over a million dollars when I was twenty-three and over ten million dollars when I was twenty-four and over a hundred million dollars when I was twenty-five, and it wasn’t that important because I never did it for the money.” Thomas Edison said, “One may think that the money value of an invention constitutes its reward to the man who loves his work. But... I continue to find my greatest pleasure, and so my reward, in the work that precedes what the world calls success.” And Richard Branson said, “I never went into business to make money — but I found that, if I have fun, the money will come. I often ask myself, is my work fun and does it make me happy? I believe that the answer to that matters more than fame or fortune. If something stops being fun, I ask why? If I can’t fix it, I stop doing it.” For all of these creators it was passion, not money, that drove them to do their best.

What is passion?

When you’re passionate about a thing, you love spending time on it. You love doing it. You love learning about it. You love talking about it. You get so lost in it that you lose track of time. But what is “it”? It may be a hobby, an interest, a sport, a group of people, or even your profession. In the best case, several aspects of what you do will excite your passion. For example, Richard Branson says of new ventures that “A business has to be involving, it has to be fun, and it has to exercise your creative instincts.”

Confucius said, “Find a job you love and you’ll never work a day in your life.” How about you? Do you love what you do, or do you do it only for the money? If you don’t love your job, what is it that you are passionate about?

Why is passion so important to creativity?

“The only way to do great work is to love what you do,” said Steve Jobs. He was not alone. “Nothing great in the world has ever been accomplished without passion,” said the German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Why would that be true? The more passionate you are about what you do, the more you love it, and the harder you work at it. The more time and effort you put into it, the more deeply you will think about it, and the more likely you are to think what no one else has thought, and to create something new. Remember what Thomas Edison said: “Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.”

The world’s most creative people produce outstanding results because they love what they do, because they are passionate about their work. Passion gives you purpose and tremendous energy to work hard and persist, not because of the money, but because you love what you do and see it as important. Passion and a sense of purpose fuel and drive your work and creativity. So if you haven’t yet found your passion, follow Steve Jobs’ advice to “keep looking. Don’t settle.” And be sure to read my next column in two weeks, which will teach you techniques for finding what you love.

© Dr. Detlef Reis 2012. This article was published in parallel in the Bangkok Post under the same title on 21 June 2012.