> This set me up for a series of relationships that - retrospectively - I can only classify as abusive. Passion is great, it is motivating force, a driver to le

> This set me up for a series of relationships that - retrospectively - I can only classify as abusive. Passion is great, it is motivating force, a driver to learn and practice and hopefully eventually to excel at something. But at the same time it is an Achilles heel. It allows the unscrupulous to take advantage of you, it means you will work for compensation well below its actual value and it means that you will do so to your own detriment, up to and including your health. There's a healthier way of looking at this. Here it is: you learned something about yourself in this process and you were adequately compensated. You were compensated by your passion. In consulting there's this school of thought that you put a high price on work you don't want to do and a lower price on the work you do want to do. That way you can target other goals, like experience and passion, and still feel compensated (by money) for the work you aren't as passionate about or won't learn as much from. You can blame the people you struck deals with in the past, but that doesn't help anything. It's better recognize that you learned something about yourself and how you value your work. Once you "own that" you can make better decisions going forward based on your convictions and values regardless of how other people want to deal with you. If they are lucky, everyone has experiences like this. Unlucky people get locked into bad deals that cause them to lose time and money past the learning experience. Music is an area where this happens all the time. Young musicians, because of their passion, often end up in long term deals that are not in their best interest. Key life lesson - don't commit to long term contracts based on hope. Look for opportunities to indulge your passions with minimal long-term complications. That's a healthy learning cycle.