Harry Anderson was found dead at his home in Asheville, North Carolina on Monday, April 16, 2018, but that is not what this tale is about. It is about how he followed his passion and how, because he did, great things came to him. It is how that can be an inspiration to all of us that come in his shadow.

Most people know Harry Anderson as Judge Harry Stone from Night Court, the practical jokester and magic trickster of a judge that handed out justice in his courtroom in a heartfelt comedy of a show. The show itself was inspiring, but what no one outside of the business knew was that Harry Anderson had never aspired to be an actor.

His passion had always been magic, a passion he kept long after his role of Judge Harry Stone was over. He still made guest appearances and did cameos, but after Night Court, he basically went right back to magic, even opening up a shop in New Orleans, which was open until 2006. It makes one ask themselves if all that can happen to him because he followed his passion, what will happen to me if I follow mine.

I don’t have the exact answer to that question, but I do have some answers to it. For one, we would be happier in what we do for work. We would enjoy what we produce in our work as well. In general, we will have more enjoyable conversations about work since we will be doing what we are passionate about.

That translates to our downtime as well, even though some of us–like myself–are workaholics. We still find that our downtime is not as taken over by our passion since we are doing it for work. This allows us to have other interests in our downtime, which expands our minds even more, as well as allowing us to help others more and enabling more opportunities to come our way.

It also gives us a sense of purpose, as I am sure Harry Anderson felt all through his life. You’ll probably have to read interviews with him or a forthcoming book about him to know what magic truly meant to him as far as purpose goes. But, for me for instance, writing is a way of helping, inspiring, and motivating people. It’s like reading for bookworms. For us writers, it helps us show the world a part of ourselves that is hard to show any other way. For Harry Anderson, his method was magic, if you ask me. That is the funny thing about passion: it shows a piece of whoever is sharing it with the world. Look, even, at Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and you will see part of him since it was his passion.

People leave echoes everywhere they go, but where they leave the strongest echoes are where they were sharing their passions with people. It is also often how we remember people most. When one thinks of Harry Anderson one often thinks of Judge Harry Stone, who was a magician of a judge in multiple respects. I am sure there are many people in your life that you can look back on and see their passions in the strongest memories you have of them as well.

*Tips his hat and walks out the door with a wave of his quilled wand*