What exactly is passion? How do we define passion?
Perhaps we can find it in a story.
Anthony was a journalist wanted to write a book—a “travel” book that would be sold at airports and all of the major bookstores.
His plans were ambitious. Tony told the publisher that he planned to tour the world and find the world’s greatest clothing makers and menswear providers and to discover their secrets.
The publisher gave him an advance. Tony was now in business.
He researched and found the best tradesmen and artisans in all the land. Where do you find the world's best haberdasheries? He located them.
Tony also discovered the best time-makers, cordwainers and cobblers, and more.
Tony traversed the globe. He first went to Texas and found the best cowboy boots and western hats. To find the best buffalo fur coats—recall Anthony Hopkins in Legends of the Fall—Tony stuck around west Texas, but eventually made it north to Wyoming for more.
What he found were fantastic craftsmen, all of them.
Then it was over to London to see how the best suits were made, Switzerland for the impeccable watches, and then he spent a few weeks crisscrossing Italy for the finest in leather shoes.
(Along the way, the journalist even stumbled into Papa C Pies in Brentwood, Tennessee just outside of Nashville because he heard that they had the best cobbler in the U.S.
His information was correct, of course. Small snag, however.
The cobbler was of the peach variety. Cost him a mere $13.00. And it was delicious.
Ask for Chad. He'll do right by you. They have several delicious, shelf-stable pies that can be shipped across the lower 48.)
Anyway, after he had surveyed some of the best Italian shoemakers in Florence and elsewhere, Anthony visited a small shop in the Umbrian countryside that reportedly made the most expensive shirts in the world.
Tony met and interviewed a fellow named Ubaldo, the young Italian shop owner.
He asked Ubaldo, who spoke English, “Sir, what is the secret to make the world’s greatest shirts?”
“Well, I can’t answer that,” he said. “But you see that old man over there? That’s my father, Bruno. He started this shop. Over the years, he has taught me all of his secrets. Well, I'm pretty sure he has, anyway. Why don’t you ask him?”
Well, Bruno didn’t speak English. Whether he understood the language or not was another matter.
Bruno was in the corner of the shop, pulling the cotton fabric, cutting it, shaping it. In other words, Bruno was making a shirt.
So, through an interpreter, the journalist asked this veteran Italian shirtmaker, “Sir, what is the secret to making a great shirt?”
The man looked up at the American and his interpreter and he held up his knife.
“The secret,” the interpreter relayed. “I’ll tell you the secret. I do not cut the cloth with my knife.”
Tony was watching the man—who held a knife in his right hand, clear as day—as the interpreter spoke. He stopped and looked at his interpreter.
“Say that again, because he cuts that cloth with his knife. I saw it with my own two eyes.”
Bruno shook his head and put down his knife. He stepped over to a small end table and poured himself a thimble-full of espresso from his Bialetti moka pot. He said to the interpreter,“ditelo all'americano…”
Bruno lowered his head, put his coffee down, picked up his knife, and made another cut in the cloth. The interpreter continued.
“I cut the cloth with my heart. I cut the cloth … with love.”
That’s passion. Love your work.
You don’t have to go work, you want to. You’re not willing to work, you’re eager.
Make yourself passionate about your work.
Love what you do.
Become the greatest.
As always,
Brian
P.S. – We might still have a spot or two available in our Inner Sphere. (Think of an “inner circle,” but with an extra dimension.) We go to work in a couple weeks with our online “mastermind.”
The program will grow from there.
Want to know if you fit in?
If you have something to say and don’t know how to say it or if you need help figuring out how to say it better, we might be a good fit.
Want to become the greatest and see some results?
Get on the list and let’s figure out if we are the right group for you.
P.P.S. — The only pies I buy anymore are from Papa C Pies. That's right, I mail order my pies. Buying a pie "off the shelf" is so below me nowadays.
I love the chess pie from Papa C Pies and, of course, their flagship pie, Grandma Elsie Mae's Apple Pie.
We had Chad Collier, founder and owner of Papa C Pies, on the podcast a while ago to talk pie and sports.
