The Challenge of Passion

So what is more important - the challenge or the passion?  Or are they supposed to meet in some strange but exhilarating way?  As I look forward I'm not sure which direction I'm being pulled.  A part of me wants to see that my passions and interests should carry me and that new challenges, though hard, are supposed to be enjoyable because I'm passionate about it.  However, I don't know that this is necessarily proved true in a biblical sense.  There are definitely plenty of people who did something because that it where God led them, not because they were supremely interested in it.  So how do you tell if you are moving in the right direction.  I have people on one side, people who I know are part of God's plan for my life, that tell me to look at what God has given me.  I've heard on at least 2 different occasions from two different people this year that I should be a principal or do some other sort of administration.  However, I don't really have this desire.  Is this like people who receive the calling to be a priest?  I don't really know.  I do know that I'm interested in how to get the most out of kids - especially gifted and high achieving kids.  I am also seeking to be challenged to go farther in my thinking.  I'm seeking to surround myself with others who are seeking the same thing.  But I find myself in a situation where I feel myself being whittled, not sharpened.  Or am I being sharpened in a different way?  A way that I'm not aware of?  How do you ever really sort all of this stuff out?  At what point do you simply have to pick a theory and move forward?

 

Honestly there is a part of me who looks at this whole situation and says, I only live once.  I need to focus on what can make me the best teacher, the best learner, the best Christian, the best person I can be.  Similar to the whole "Teach to Your Strengths" theory, what really distinguishes the good teachers from the truly great teachers is that the great teachers realize their strengths and work to improve them and capitalize on them.  They don't spend their careers trying to make their weaknesses into strengths.  I sort of feel like that is what I'm being asked to do.

 

Or am I just being a little kid saying "I don’t wanna!"?

 

How do I really make the decision for which direction to take?