Appassionato

Barbara C. Gonzales

Appassionato is the past participle of a Latin word that means “to impassion.” It is found in music
sheets, where the composer wants us to interpret a passage with passion. It should have been tattooed
on our palms as we were handed to the stork for delivery. Then we would have been saved from
vacillating between deadening dullness and paralyzing panic, from the trouble of learning on our own that
life without passion is like salad without dressing – safe, healthy, not fattening, and unspeakably drab.
Passion comes from the Latin word for “suffering,” hence the Passion of Christ. It implies suffering
for a cause deemed noble. Christ believed in His divine mission and carried it through to an extremely
uncomfortable death. We see that passion transcends the physical, and contrary to common perception, is
neither totally mindless nor totally blind. We determine with our reason how we want to live and recognize
the companion pieces of our choice – the possible grief, the potential rewards, our trade-offs. We desire
smothers diffidence, when we opt for paths less travelled, corners less explored, then we live life without
passion.
Analyzing passion is like defining love. We teeter dangerously on the brink of mawkishness.
Groping for imagery, I find myself thinking of love as a cup of warm chocolate and passion as hot, strong,
almost thick coffee. Chocolate soothes, comforts, is sweet. Coffee unleashes energy, has a full-bloodied
flavor, a touch of bitterness unpleasant to others, but delicious to the drinker.
Love is softness; passion is smoulder. Love might be contentment, but passion is adventure. It
must be free, untethered. It must explore, drive beyond the boundaries, break moulds. Passion discovers,
unearths, examines, magnifies, reveals in details. Love rolls up details into a coherent whole. Love is
passive; passion hyperactive. Where love is melancholic, passion is pain.
Love and passion are inseparable. Extreme desire for another person’s body without awe of that
person’s soul is lust. But when we desire for another body proceeds from a need to connect with that
body’s cherished uniqueness, its soul, then desire becomes passion. Lust quickly disappears. Passion is
insatiable.
I asked a friend to recall a lustful encounter. She quickly described the mechanics of that episode –
how they met, where they met, how they meshed, how quickly the storm passed. I then inquired about a
man with whom I knew she had had a passionate connection. “He turned my blood to smoke,” she said,
staring into a distance, and though it had been many years, I knew she remembered in her gut what it had
felt like to be with him.
Passion is visceral. It stands outside traditional thinking. It ignores conventions like distance, time,
social acceptance. It dares into uncharted waters. It used to be primarily associated with romantic love.
Today, thanks to authors like Tom Peters and Nancy Austin (A Passion for Excellence), passion’s
boundaries have been extended to embrace work, entrepreneurial endeavors, corporate success.
And why not? Work should be done with passion. I abandon myself to my career as would to a
lover. I take professional and personal risks. When I win, I soar. Other times I hit the pavement with a
resounding thud. In between I do battle with indifference. I have been, for the most part, successful; not
because I am the best but because I do my best and that for me is a passionate, fulfilling life.
If passion is so good, then why do many fear it? Because by its etymology (from the Latin word
“passus,” past participle of “pati” meaning to suffer) it brings pain. To be capable of passion one must be
open, vulnerable, and brave enough to stare pain in the eye. It is safer, easier to be closed, unfeeling,
unhurt.
Also, passion picked up an unsavory reputation along the centuries. A murder committed by a
person who found his/her loved in the arms of another was labelled “a crime of passion”; encouraging
many to shun “passion” when they should have avoided “crime.” If instead the killing had been called “a
crime of murderous temper,” then perhaps more people could have surrendered to passion.
I believe that a life lived with passion shimmers, shines, rises above the ordinary. Allow me to
seduce you into passionate existence. To think, to sing, maybe even to sigh – appassionato.