Don’t Stop Pursuing Your Passion

Last week was filled with meaningful catch-ups.

Two inspiring Zoom catch-ups with my clienteling consulting counterparts in Paris and London.

A lunch meeting with a senior leader from a lifestyle membership club.

Dinner with two long-time dear friends – each at the very top of their field – one in property development, the other in financial investment.

Happy hour with my beloved friend, who is courageously building up her art therapy business.

A Saturday outing with a renowned artist friend who is in town for a portrait painting.

In between all of this, I was also fully engaged in consulting calls, sales pitches, and conversations with senior stakeholders.

Different industries.

Different geographies.

Different life stages.

Yet there is one common theme:

The holidays are over, work is piling up, and if we are not intentional, it is incredibly easy to fall into what needs to be done and forget what we truly deserve:

Alignment with our values, our sense of fulfillment, and spending time on the things (or people) that light us up.

On the other hand, the people who are truly thriving – even those working just as hard (if not harder) have one thing in common:

They have found the sweet spot between their passion, their expertise, and the problems they want to solve. In other words – their callings.

I like how Dan Koe differentiates amongst a job, a career, and a calling:

A job is work you do to survive.

A career is what you tolerate for the eventual promise of more status and money.

A calling is work you discover and can’t pull yourself away from.

So how do you know what your calling is?

Looking back, I realise I have been service-obsessed since my late teens.

Every time I went to a restaurant, I couldn’t help but notice:

How quickly the waiter or waitress greeted us.

Whether the smile was genuine or merely courteous?

If there was a customer evaluation card on the table – and what the questions were really asking.

The same curiosity “followed” me everywhere – hotels, shopping experience, taxi ride, and so on.

Any situation involving human interaction fascinated me.

Did it elevate the experience or quietly diminish it?

In 2010, when Christina announced she was building the Private Client function for Burberry and needed someone to grow it alongside her in Asia, I was so thrilled.

I knew I didn’t yet have the experience to build something like this from scratch.
But the opportunity to learn from the best – someone who had worked with the British Royal Family and practised clienteling in the most sophisticated and genuine way excited me deeply.

That conversation marked the beginning of my journey to understand luxury clients, decode loyalty, and develop ways to train talent (myself included) to build meaningful, lasting relationships.

Pursuing my own business of clienteling excellence is not easy.

It means letting go of the status of associating with big companies, stable incomes, fancy trips, and corporate perks.

What keeps me going is passion.

Because I genuinely believe I’m working on something bigger than myself – something that creates impact on a subject I care deeply about, and that, in its own way, makes the world a little better every day.

So, as we approach the end of January (how quickly time flies), I’d like to invite you to pause(Your work can wait a little, really.) and ask yourself:

What am I passionate about, looking back on my own journey?
Am I doing what truly matter to me – at least most of the time?
If money weren’t the only object, what would I do differently?

To borrow Dan’s words:

Even if it takes years, try everything until you find your thing.

Don’t stop pursuing your passion.

Whenever you are ready, here are the ways we can support you (or your business) to thrive in your industry:

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