Guest Post: Passionate

Let’s Get Passionate!

Romantic even. Let’s get ridiculously silly sometimes.

And let’s face it: Passion is a woman’s catharsis. It heals. It refreshes.

Now let me expound….

Last night I was doing two of my favorite things—eating good food and laughing with family—and we were hit with a storm. First, it was just the wind building up. We noticed the trees bending and waving wildly. The evening sky turned shades darker as black clouds rolled in and covered our neighborhood. And as we all gathered outside to revel, the first drops started pounding the pavement.

I love a good storm. In a silly, unexplainable, passionate way! My husband knows this about me, and he grins when my “stormy side” comes out. Truly. Storms do something physical to me—my heart races. I suddenly wish I was wearing a dress from Sense and Sensibility, so I could run out into the rain and get soaked down to my bloomers. And in my disheveled state, I would expect my husband to run out and kiss me really fantastically!

Okay, so, passion. Storms make me passionate—romantic, silly, etc. But I get other kinds of passionate about other kinds of things. A Mumford & Sons song gets my blood racing also…. But in this case, it becomes a heady euphoria, and I feel like I could really, truly change the world. Equally unexplainable. But their music fills me with passion.

But I didn’t run out into the storm last night—not in front of everyone. How silly I would have looked! And I don’t tell people about my stormy side in casual conversation. Of course not. They would listen to a statement or two, a shine of embarrassment behind their eyes, and tell me that they hear their kids crying, or they really should get dinner started, or whatever.

But then I wonder if that’s how it would really play out. What if I told it to just the right person, who listened and then said, “I know! Every time I pass a field of golden wheat, I want to pull my car over and run through it. I can’t explain it. I just need to do it, with a passion!”

Or, “Yes! When I hear my boyfriend play the piano, I want to run over and jump into his lap, take his fingers, and kiss each one! But isn’t that silly?”

I imagine myself looking at that person entirely differently forever—in a beautifully passionate way. I would suddenly recognize a “bosom friend,” someone to be silly, deep and passionate with…

Aka, someone to be real with.

Wouldn’t that be amazing? To see everyone’s passions on the outside? To see a depth in someone—even about something trivial—that we have never seen before? To understand what things truly move everyone around us?

Why speak in Victorian-era statements, when we could be so much more real with each other? I certainly do not mean the kind of real where we tell people their clothing/hair/etc is ugly; where we go around offending people because “Oh, I’m just being real.” No, that’s not real. That’s narrow-minded. It’s mean.

I mean real, where people know I feel deeply about things. Where instead of saying, “Oh, yeah, thunderstorms are cool,” I say, “Yes! Thunderstorms make me want to run out into the middle of the street and hold my arms out in blissful welcome!” Where they see me as a person that is moved, that is emotional, that resounds inside. Someone with passion for….whatever it is that I feel passionate about. What’s wrong with being deep and silly anymore? Why must we look and act detached, controlled, serene, mild, benign, bland, flat?

I am passionate about thunderstorms! I am passionate about Mumford & Sons!

I am passionate about My Husband, My Children, My Faith!

I am passionate about books! About writing; and how words are put together!

I am passionate about the earth around me! About the ocean!

I am passionate! I am romantic! I am real! I am me!

(Ahh, doesn’t that feel good?!)

This essay was written by the delightfully passionate Charity Brooks. You can see her other essay here and visit her personal blog here.