Almost always, people we find interesting come across that way because they’re interested in other things and people.

Such interest often starts with a spark.

For most of my life, catching these flashes of potential was a luck-laden, periodic thing. Sometimes I’d be in the right state of mind to notice the firefly-flicker of interest, and sometimes it would bumble away, unobserved, unrecognized, un-chased.

I’ve gotten better at paying attention, though, and I now understand that for me at least, this spark feels like a little tugging in my brain: a mote of interest that has the potential to expand and consume the whole of my attention for a good, long while if I shift my focus toward it for even a moment.

Sometimes this speck of potential intrigue will emerge organically during a conversation or while reading a book.

A field of interest, a historical datapoint, a technique or capability or option will arise or be demonstrated or alluded to, and my mind will jolt to full alertness, sending Morse-like pulses through my nervous system saying, in essence, “Whoa, okay, pay attention—this seems relevant and important.”

The same sense of cognitive wakefulness regularly diverts me, momentarily, while doing research for a project, reading a book on some random topic, or taking a walk through my neighborhood.

At times these jolts will lead nowhere, or will take me only a short distance down some previously unknown (to me) path before I’m released from that attention reprioritization and allowed to return to whatever it is I was doing before I was diverted—I’ll click a link, click another link, and do some reading, or I’ll ask a handful of questions, expand my understanding of some job or culture or whatever else, and that will be that.

I’ll have some new interesting bit of information in my mental library (which may prove useful later or remain just a nifty bit of trivia), but the journey ends there.

Sometimes, though, these side paths become so fundamental to my thinking and exploration that they’re paved, signage is added, and they’re ultimately incorporated into my main intellectual thoroughfare. The offshoot is woven into the primary design, and that design becomes richer as a consequence.

I enjoy this process so much that I’ve essentially built my life around being able to identify, develop, and pursue interests of various sorts.

My work is organized around this general jumble of concepts, my lifestyle is dappled with intentionally scattered opportunities to intersect with such sparks, and I try to make sure I have the necessary psychological bandwidth and practical time and energy to engage with anything that can catch and hold me for more than a few moments.

You can think of this process as triggering and maintaining curiosity, or you can think of it as cultivating passions; the concepts overlap no matter which labels we use.

These are interconnected ideas, all entangled with each other and all somewhat nebulous if we don’t take the time to identify and organize them in a way that makes sense for how we personally encounter, experience, and enjoy them.

I truly enjoy conversing with (and exploring the work created by) folks who’ve figured out their own framework and rhythm for capturing sparks and kindling them into something that adds to their lives in some way, but my internal process for the same is also satisfying and rewarding, unto itself.

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