Unmotivated to pursue your passion

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Hi everyone. I'm posting today to ask if any other autists have had this experience as it seems to me like every autist with a special interest never seems to grow tired of it however I've found music being my special interest since I was a child which I now study my degree in and have extracurricular lessons in is something I find hard to do in my free time for fun now. The reason I study music is because I truly love it and love learning about it but after years of consuming endless books on it and studying it for 3 years in college and private lessons and endlessly dreaming about making a music album of original material (most of which is written at this stage) I just find the thought of working on music lately to be difficult to get up and act on. Does anyone else have this experience with their passion? because I've thought on many things I'd like to do in my life and there is many but none come close to music so I am confident it is still what I wish to pursue but I feel in pursuing it full-time in education and spending all my days on it maybe I'm burned out from it now and I do get the spark now and then but it's seemingly rarer now. Does anyone else have this experience with their special interest?

I would like to get my drivers licence back and take my CB radio out mobile up the local hill but my drinking is stopping me for now.

things to find out more about regarding this subject "fear of failure" "learned helplessness" and struggles with time management. All can be helped with therapy, the first 2 come from anxiety and trauma and are learned at a very early age, the last is sometimes due to neurology but many tools can be used to manage time and effort in better ways to overcome the dysfunction (see an occupational therapist)

I can relate. I've always considered music my special interest, too. Specifically woodwind instruments and music history. I went to college for years (long story) for it, too. However, I feel defeated. I have never been the best musician, I've always struggled no matter how much I practice. It was a reality that starkly set in at my last year of university. I'm not fit out to be a musician.

Nevertheless, my passion to try again refired up in 2022 after I got some health issues cleared up. I started taking private lessons, practicing regularly again and joined community ensembles. The end result was largely the same. I have been deep in thought with what neurologically is going on that prevents me from reaching competent levels no matter how much I practice...

I could certainly go and look into it, but IDK right now my interest has just kinda fizzled. Or at least partially. The fire for performance has fizzled, at least. I still have passion for music history and woodwind instruments... Just not playing them. I was going to college for Musicology in the end, which still meets my special interest, but then I think "What university wants a music history professor who wouldn't do staff recitals?" Honestly. I love listening to early music, I still have every bit as much passion as I did back when I went to college for that... But am I even competent at music history, honestly? Enough to be a scholar? Or is my interest too shallow?

I have gone a long ways off into specific reasons here, but I do think my passion for trying to become a better musician has been lost and the reasons behind which are not even as simple as above. It's like my passion for performing was cut short in 2022 before I even felt like I hit the wall. Personal family issues began happening and that seemed to be when I caved under the pressure and let up my practicing, and then that's when it happened - my 1st oboe part was taken from me in orchestra and I couldn't bear it. I got so depressed.

I have contacted a community band here in my new state, but should I even bother...? If it's all just going to end the same again, I mean.

So... I kinda understand where you're going. Sorry for going off into my own specific experience. I just think it's neat that we both have had the wind taken out of our music special interests in ways.

For me it was when ambition got in the way of passion. My special interest as a kid was chess. The opposition to it from authority figures ('it's a waste of your brains', 'don't end up like Bobby Fischer') didn't put me off. But I got to a certain point and realised I wasn't going to 'make it'. (I never rated higher than about 1800, which chess players will know isn't even expert level, never mind master.) Basically I'd lost sight of why I liked it in the first place.

I gave it up for years. I'm playing again now - just for the sheer joy of it.

What's the point of pursuing anything when the world is doomed and humans are utter morons and everything they say and do fills me with anxiety, depression, and feral rage?