Misplaced Passion

Have you ever been yelled at by someone and their energy was just over the top? Or perhaps you got in someone’s way while driving and they lay on the horn so loud that it is just a bit unreasonable? How about, have you ever seen someone go off at a restaurant or at a store when they didn’t get the best customer service and they just have to let the whole world know? I have a new term for it!!! It’s called MISPLACED PASSION!!!

I’m seeing it all over the place. Drivers on the road who are really stressed about their bills at home act reckless and blame others. Family members who are stretched to the max handling babies, children, bills, jobs, companies, husbands, wives, vacations, insurance, taxes and millions of other things, get fired up when they don’t receive enough calls, or parents on the soccer or baseball fields screaming at their little kids to perform, when what they really should be doing is cheering all of the kids on for just showing up and learning the rules and about good sportsmanship.

I believe that I’ve had a lot of misplaced passion in my life. When I wasn’t working towards a goal that psyched me up, I would place my energy behind issues of customer service. If someone did right by me I’d go to the ends of the earth to let their company know what a great employee they had on board and that the person should be recognized as the star they are! And certainly, on the flip side, if I don’t get invited to an important family function then I will let everyone know! Or if a company did something unethical, or cheated me out of money in a way, I have demanded a return plus a bonus for my trouble. Being a media person, I’ve always thrown that in there, and promised to let the whole world know of their mistake if I didn’t receive the proper compensation or get treated fairly. I normally get whatever I ask, and never make a big deal of it if it wasn’t completely fair, but I’m guessing I am probably stressing someone out with the threat of negative media attention!

Finally, though, I have a passion that I’m getting behind, that is a cause worth sharing with the world. I’m on a mission to educate the educators and teachers and counselors who work with children who have high sensory issues and ADHD because if they have those two, they might have others. If they have up to 6 issues that are uncovered, it bumps them to the Atypical autism scale. These children mostly go undiagnosed, or are mistreated. As a result, the families are stuck with trying to figure out their children, who actually might have some information processing issues that no one knows about. If they get a proper diagnosis, then the children receive lots of additional help from the state and can be treated without the family spending thousands of dollars with no insurance coverage.

We’ve worked with probably 15 different doctors who never suggested we get a neurological assessment for our son. And now that we have one, we’re thrilled to have a deeper understanding into his personality and his brain and his development. He’s a super gifted child, with a few quirks, but now he won’t get in trouble for these quirks as he did before. We have a road map and with that, we’re having much success with him and enjoying our family life for the first time in a long time.

My misplaced passion has been replaced by enormous energy, and focus to let the world know about this misdiagnosis. I’m happy that I won’t be wasting my energy and focus and passion on trivial things that don’t matter any more.

But still, if you’re a customer service person and are treating someone with disrespect, I’m still guessing I won’t bite my tongue. So I guess my passion isn’t going away completely… but my guess is too that when it’s completely channeled, you’ll be hearing a lot about atypical autism!!! And that absolutely THRILLS me!!!