Ask what you’d still do if no one paid you and no one noticed. Then find a job that’s close to it.

Stripping out money and attention leaves whatever you were doing for its own sake, which is a short list for most people. Plenty of ambitions survive only because somebody is watching, and that is no crime, it is just useful to know which ones they are. What remains when nobody claps is the part that holds up on a bad week. Work built near it is easier to keep doing.

Name one thing that passes both tests, however small. Then look at the work you are aiming for and see how close it sits. Spend an hour this week on the thing itself, with nobody told.