Doing what you love, and doing well

Doing what you love and getting paid for it sounds like a dream. Yet for some individuals, that dream has become reality through hard work, creativity, and the courage to turn passion into purpose. 

Across industries, from art and fashion to technology and media, these people prove that passion and persistence can turn a dream into a career. One such example is Jaime Dorfman, who transformed a simple love for knitting into a thriving creative business. 

Dorfman, whose mother was born in South Africa and who now lives in Melbourne, first picked up knitting needles as a way to keep her hands busy during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. What began as a simple, practical hobby soon evolved into something much bigger when she started sharing her work on Instagram and gained traction in late 2020 and early 2021. 

Encouraged by the growing response, Dorfman began designing her own knitting patterns despite having no formal training or a clear career path at the time. While studying an arts degree and uncertain about her future, she decided to explore the opportunity and see where it would lead. That experimentation has since grown into a thriving knitting business where she sells her creations, designs patterns, and has even authored a book, Fast and Fabulous Knits. 

“At first, it was a coping mechanism. I didn’t have a diagnosis at the time, but I have ADHD [Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder] and it was just a way for me to keep my hands busy and therefore my mind less busy,” she said. 

“When you release knitting patterns, you can’t rely only on pattern sales to make a living because the income is unpredictable,” she said. “It often depends on social media, which is fickle; some posts perform well, others don’t. There are definitely moments when I feel tempted to follow trends or do what everyone else is doing, but I also have things I can look back on that reassure me and remind me why I keep going.” 

Ruby Lee Prager always loved taking care of animals, so when she needed to make some extra money as a student, she started pet-sitting, looking after people’s animals while they were away. After being inundated with requests, she started Guilt-Free Getaways, a pet-sitting agency that connects pet-sitters and pet owners. 

“I loved the animals, and people could see that. So I started to build a team, which helped me foster another passion – connecting people and connecting with people – which is where the recruitment side of it came in. I started building a team in which people I trusted and could rely on would look after my clients’ animals too,” she said. 

From a young age, Lea Moscou du Toit, otherwise known as Lady Lea, one of South Africa’s top female DJs, was in love with music and discovering how different sounds work together. 

“I started with a small pink radio with a tape deck, and the next year, I wanted one with a CD, and the next year, I wanted a bigger and a bigger one,” she said, “I started to go out to events. Back in the 90s, there were big raves. It just blew me away how the DJ was able to manipulate the audience and make them happy.” 

Combined with her love for music, that made her want to explore the career further, she and her brother would go out and look for places to perform. Over time, she became well known and was able to create a steady living from it. 

“I was hopeful. I’m quite persistent with the stuff I want. So I reached out to all the promoters and venues to get booked consistently,” she said, “and from a young age, I started to make money and be featured in the media, so it felt like it was growing quickly.” 

After finishing school, Shalya Katzeff began doing nails from home and quickly discovered a passion for the craft. Six years later, she now runs successful salon Shalicious Nails. 

“It happened organically,” she said. “What started as something I simply enjoyed grew as more people began asking me to do their nails. Before I knew it, the hobby had become a full business with a loyal client base and a team of 11 nail technicians. That’s when I realised it was more than just a passion, it was something I could build a future around.” 

Dani Abrams, a qualified maths teacher, had always loved mystery solving. So, in 2023, when she saw that kids were struggling to connect with maths, she created Maths Detectives, a programme that mixes maths with mystery stories at her maths centre. 

“I love seeing my students run inside the classroom for their weekly lessons. Most, after completing a course, want to begin another one. How to get kids feeling positive about science, technology, engineering, and maths [STEM], is a mystery I’m loving solving!” she said. 

Sigalle Rosenberg, who lives in Israel, said that after graduating in 2022 and starting her first full-time job in internship placement, she realised that though she enjoyed the role, she wanted to achieve greater freedom and fulfilment by building her own business. Living in Israel, she was also eager to create a lifestyle that allowed her to travel and explore the country with her husband, a landscape photographer. 

“When the war started at the end of 2023, I became a milluim [Israel Defense Forces reservist’s] wife, being newly married and living in the Gush [Gush Etzion], with my parents in South Africa. This was especially challenging, and I needed a project to focus on and, at the same time, to be able to do things at my own pace. So, after a year of juggling milluim and a full-time job, I decided at the end of 2024 to start my own business.” 

She has since started a business in which she helps small “Anglo” businesses in Israel grow a strong online and offline presence through strategic branding and effective visual communication. 

Dorfman points out that things get difficult when passion evaporates. For her, it’s important that she still knits as a hobby and not for anything else. 

“I’ve heard so many stories of people who monetise their hobby and then hate it because it becomes work. It becomes stressful and just isn’t enjoyable,” she said. “I’ve put a lot of things in place to make sure that it stays a ‘hobby’. I still do plenty of knitting that literally makes zero money.”