Passion fruits are known to be unique in taste, described by people in different ways: sweet, sour, citrusy, floral, good, bad or all of the above. Passion fruit yields contrasting distinct tastes based on its color and stage of ripeness.

Similarly, our passions are a fruit that we spend our entire lives simultaneously cultivating and reaping benefits from. As people, we all have different experiences depending on the nature of our interests and how ripe they are.

A few months ago, I was crying my heart out while walking around a mall after a contest, still decked out in my competition shirt and cap. Bystanders could come to only one logical conclusion as they stared at the girl sipping on a matcha frappuccino while bawling inside Watsons, by the ATM, and while pushing a grocery cart: she didn’t compete well.

But the truth was the exact polar opposite. What had actually happened was that I realized my passion for writing had deepened after my entire experience at a writing competition. If anything, I fell more in love with it than I already was, which I never thought could be humanly possible.

But how come I haven’t written anything in months—even after that epiphany—if it was already cemented that writing was truly my passion?

Inputs and outputs

While we look at our passions as a relation of inputs and outputs, we’re always more inclined to measure it based on the outputs alone. A lack of quality harvests, or many subpar ones, is when people think they’ve lost their talent for their passions. However, this isn’t always the case.

As Na Hee-do puts it in the Korean drama, “Twenty-Five Twenty-One,” “Your skills don’t improve consistently, but in steps, and when people hit a wall, they want to give up. Once they get over the hill, they’ll improve exponentially, but they don’t even realize it.”

Entering a “funk” or an era of silence is not synonymous with being in an unproductive slump—it’s a sign that it’s time to learn in order to grow and further nourish your fruit, so that you may once again reap a bountiful harvest in the future.

Although we usually sow and reap at the same time, there’s a window that life gives which is especially dedicated to just growing. Like any other plant, the growth of our passion happens internally, which is why it may seem frustrating—but it’s essential.

Just because we don’t live, breathe and eat our passions 24/7, it doesn’t mean that we’ve completely lost our love for it.

Passion isn’t a constant variable that remains the same way forever—it’s a river that flows as unpredictably as nature grows. Sometimes the streams are weak and narrow, and sometimes they fall into a gushing waterfall, but no matter the season of passion—it will always be moving. True passion never disappears, even when the waters seem quiet.

It is during our cultivating and growth do we finally see our passion fruit for what it truly is.