Thanks for reminding me Jessica. That’s a tough question.

Both tough and easy question. Easy because it happens naturally. For example, there is a good friend of mine who simply never read a book. I tried and tried to get him to read, to explain to him how interesting books could be - nothing doing. And then he had a girlfriend :-) , very soon afterwards he tells me about the latest Kafka book he read etc. When we love someone there is an enormous amount of energy which is derived from that relationship (whether it’s reciprocal or not, the un-reciprocal ones are often even more empowering.)

When we’re enamored, fall in love, whatever you might want to call it, it empowers us (as you say) to investigate, to learn more about them and their interests, and about the world in general. In fact, a trick women often use is when they’re interested in a subject they will fall in love with a prof. or someone “important” in the field, so that they get to know the field through them. Similarly to how people need to hear stories about the painter to connect with the painting. It’s somewhat the place of power that they fall in love with, but somewhat the  hallway to the field.

So passions give you energy. How to make sure this energy is used to activate thought, and not what is so often the case, to activate obsession?

Look at people’s passion for sports. For some it’s used for thought, but usually it simply activates an obsession. An obsession with statistics, with information. People are passionate about cars. Does that mean they learn how to drive well, or do they simply gather data on the amount of horsepower each car has and how fast can it get from 0 to 60. It’s usually the latter, with everyone.

So again, how do we make sure our passions activate thought and not simply obsession (which always accompanies them)?
I'll have to think about that.

Hi, great posts here.
I believe that we use the word passions somewhat variously. On the one hand, we use the word "passions" to convey topics, objets d'art or mental pursuits in which we invest emotional and intellectual currency. On the other hand, we might use it to suggest deep and perhaps uncontrolled emotions.
If we mean it in the first way, and I hope we do, then I think it simply means the growth, serenity and perspective that we can acquire from becoming deeply involved in something. Whether that's macrame or Michelangelo, it allows us to begin to see patterns both in the object of our attentional affection and, by extension, in other, related things. It is often through the intense focus on one thing that we can begin to see that thing's interrelatedness with other things. Robert Persig's famous book, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is about gaining trust and closeness with someone, in this case the author's son, through their sharing of the work of maintaining a motor vehicle. Detail, balance, observation, the fitness of parts for their purpose, the importance of a disciplined outlook, the beauty of successful design - these are just a few things that really getting passionate about something can tell us about an object, and about many other things.
For me, recording and mixing music in my home studio is a way I really get focus and a sense of accomplishment. Just as a painter usually does not live in a cut and dried, black and white world, so it is with music; instruments and voices must be balanced just so - there are no hard and fast rules. It's different every time, yet requires the experience that doing it a lot gives one.
Those of us who follow our passions have come so far for beauty's sake that we dare not backtrack. We are transfigured, and there is no relearning what we have abandoned along the way.