Whether you feel like you’re in a never ending chase after your purpose, or stuck on the sidelines waiting for your purpose to find you, either extreme can leave you feeling left out of actually living your life. I have found myself on both ends of an extreme spectrum and after years of working on it I’m sharing three steps you can take to live with purpose in your present.
You don’t need to waste time looking for one, define-able, lifelong purpose. Instead, you get to decide to stop seeking for the what and live the how. In this episode I share a simple exercise that you can do while you’re listening, to help you connect with yourself and believe that you already matter.
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TRANSCRIPT
When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up? I was honestly a little unnaturally obsessed with knowing this answer. I remember thinking about it constantly and planning my future all the time. And my eight year old daughter is following in her mama’s footsteps, and it’s something she brings up almost every day.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a ballerina or a performer of some kind. I always thought about being a teacher, a writer, an artist. Later on I wanted to be a broadcast journalist, a talk show host, and on and on, and I always knew I wanted to be a mom as well. Now to all of this, my wanderings of thinking about what I wanted, I kind of had this undercurrent of anxiety.
I wanted to know what I was supposed to do, which of these roles was I supposed to take on in addition to what I hoped to be as a mom? And I had an understanding in my mind that there was a greater mission to my life, just like all of us, and I wanted to make sure I was choosing the right path. Now, right now, I am currently not officially any of those specific jobs besides being a mom.
I am actually a collection of them. In my pursuit of maturing and growing, I have also learned that I have matured and growed in my idea of what a purpose and mission is. I have uncovered that it’s not so much about what I do in terms of a purpose or a mission. It’s about who I am. That is why this month we are going to talk about this theme.
Live with purpose. Maybe you’re not sure what this distinction is here in terms of how this is different than finding your purpose, but there is a huge distinction here. I’m going to tell you way more about how you can view living with purpose as different than finding your purpose and how in doing that, you will actually find what you are meant to be doing.
Let’s talk about living a life of purpose. Now, I am talking about this all month long because I want to answer the question I get so often from the women in this community, and it’s this, how do I find my purpose? Now you’re not gonna like my answer. This is my answer. Nobody has one definable, lifelong purpose that they can find just like Bobo Baggins found the ring. Believing this is not only believing a lie, it’s setting yourself up for a whole lot of seeking or waiting and feeling like you’re a failure because you haven’t yet found ” it” in quotation marks. Now let me contrast this with the truth, what I believe is the truth, okay?
We all matter. We are all here to live a life of substance and purpose. Every single one of us. And when you believe that it’s not so much about what you do, it’s who you are. And that is our purpose. To live a life of meaning, of substance, of purpose. Anyone can live with purpose. A janitor, a priest, a mom, a single woman, a teacher, a world leader.
Anyone can live with purpose. Those very same people can live without greater purpose behind what they do too. And we’ve all seen the effects of that. Now, I want you to think about someone who might not have a worldwide position, something that looks super influential, and yet they are living with purpose.
That’s when I think of an amazing cashier at the checkout line whose purpose seems to be living with happiness, with cheerfulness, with gratitude. I feel that I feel the purpose that they are living. I think of the teacher who was never known anywhere beyond the small community that she or he lives in, and the difference that they are making in the lives of the children that they are teaching because they are living with purpose.
These are people who have focused more on who they are, even more than what they do. You can have purposes, how that looks on the exterior of things you actually do more than one thing, things that matter to you, and you can also have a grander purpose behind the things that you do. So I’m not saying you can’t have a purpose, but I’m saying it can’t be only one definable, lifelong purpose, a mission that you are looking to find and discover so that you can then live with purpose? No, the reverse needs to be true.
You live with purpose. You live with meaning. You become the person that lives with purpose regardless of what they do. In 2019, I finally read Victor Frankl’s book, man’s Search for Meaning, he was a psychiatrist and a Holocaust survivor. And in his own experience and with the clientele that he helped throughout his lifelong career, he saw over and over again that what we are searching for is meaning. And when we find meaning in what we do, it changes. Everything about who we are and how we live. Living with purpose will help us be the people we want to be and live the lives we want, regardless of our circumstances.
And is that ringing the bell for you right now? Because right now as I’m recording this, we are in the middle of Covid 19. I’m hoping that people are still listening to this six months to years later when this is long past. But regardless of our circumstances, we can live. With purpose. Otherwise, what happens when those circumstances go out of your control?
Otherwise, what happens when you can no longer live and do your definable lifelong purpose you thought you had? It only amounts to living with fear of never finding your purpose or your purpose being taken away from you because of life’s circumstances. So again, the reverse to this is to live with purpose.
To help this take some shape and form in our minds about why this can’t be the case.
Why we can’t only seek and find one definable purpose for the rest of our lives. Think about people who think they have found that maybe they decide my one purpose in life is to be a basketball coach, and for a while they’re able to do that. But let’s say they get ill, or they get fired or their family needs to move away from where they have a coaching job and suddenly they’re no longer that basketball coach and they feel void of meaning and purpose because they have hinged the ability to live with meaning and purpose on that role on what they were doing.
That is a danger and only seeking for one definable purpose because our circumstances will change, but we can still live with meaning and purpose. What I’m gonna do now is go through three ways you can begin to live with purpose or more purpose if you’re already doing that. Let me go through the overview of them now and then we’ll go through each one.
Number one is to stop seeking for the what and live the how. The second is to believe you matter and live like you matter. The third you get to decide, think deeper. So let’s go through these three ways of how you can begin to live with more purpose. The first, again, is to stop seeking for the what and live the how.
Four years ago, I embarked on debunking the myth of one definable purpose. Now, before that, I would definitely say that I was living that lie where I was thinking, oh, my life doesn’t have much meaning or purpose because I haven’t found the thing I am meant to do, or the mission I am meant to lead. And four years ago, I was really dissatisfied and unhappy with my beautiful, amazing life because I wasn’t living with purpose and meaning.
So I decided to insert more meaning and purpose in what I did. So I actually did all the things in the process of trying to live with more purpose, I wanted to know more about the what, so don’t get, don’t get me wrong there. I did wanna know more about the what I should do, but I focused more on living the how, living with purpose.
Now, part of this I wondered maybe I’ll become a teacher again. Like I was before I had the kids. Maybe I’ll be a baker, perhaps an interior designer. And then it led to so many other things that I wouldn’t have thought of or even had imagined for myself. Not because I was searching for the what, but I was living the, how I was living with purpose.
I was living with meaning behind whatever I did and seeing where it took me. With that, there was room for error. There was room for experimenting. And I had the belief that was the undercurrent to all of it. That what I was doing, all of it added up to something. I could not have predicted where I ended up.
Right now, I’m a podcaster. I coach women. I’m an educator in ways that I would not have started off this path trying to get towards if that was what I had thought was my purpose, then I, I would’ve gone about things differently. There would’ve been a lot more fear at play, a lot of wandering in ways that were fear-based.
But instead, because I had room for error and room for experimenting and living with purpose in the here and now, I think it led me better to where I am now. Now, with this, I’m gonna say something else that might surprise you. I don’t think podcasting is my one definable purpose, or even being a coach for women.
I might not podcast the rest of my life or be a coach or an educator that way, but I know better now how I want to make a difference in the world and how that is more about not what I do, but who I am and how I am living out who I am. So that can take on many different shapes and things that I do.
In fact, I’ve even given myself permission to let life unfold for me. In many ways. I am not able to predict right now and how that might mean I change course and do different things and pivot based off of how I am living, not what I am doing to live a life of purpose. So that’s what you need to anchor into.
Stop seeking for the what and live the how. Meaning, how would someone live a life of purpose and meaning regardless of what they do, and act that part. Live the how instead of constantly seeking for the what. The second way that you can start to live with more purpose is to believe that you matter and live like you matter.
Now in my Rediscover You workshop, we did this exercise that I thought of the night before, the one that I did in September of 2018, and I really feel like. Honestly, I feel like God just planted this idea, the exercise in me, because at the time I was trying to think of other ways we could make what they were learning feel deep in, in women’s hearts and bones.
And this idea came to mind and I was shocked by how women. Literally we’re bawling when we did this exercise. So what I’m gonna do is actually help you walk through this yourself. Okay? So hopefully you’re not driving, but if you’re not, is you can just take a minute here and close your eyes and imagine yourself as a four year old child and you see four year old you in front of you.
And you can imagine what four year old looks like. What are the clothes she’s wearing? What is she doing? What is her disposition, her face, her features, how she’s looking around the world around her and go up to four year old or you and, and put your hand on her little heart and say to her, this, you matter.
You are important.
Now I want you to imagine 14 year old. You picture her in your mind what she looks like, her hair, her clothes, her shoes, her disposition,
and go up to 14 year old. You. Put your hand on her heart. Look her in the eyes and tell her you matter. You are important.
Now I want you to imagine four year old you and 14 year old. You seeing the current day you.
What do you look like to them? Your hair, your clothes, your shoes, what you’re doing, your disposition, and have four year old you and 14 year old, you come up to you now and feel their hands on your heart. And put your hand on your heart right now if you can and hear them say this, you matter. You are important.
And then what we did in these workshops is we then had the women put their hands on their hearts and say this out loud, the same thing. So try it with me if you can. Here I matter. I am important.
When you live this way with this belief, it lends purpose and meaning to whatever you do, from changing diapers to changing laws. When you believe that you matter, when you believe that you are important, it will change everything. So start with that. If anything, start with the belief that no matter what you do, you are living a life of purpose and substance and meaning that will change everything.
The third way I’m going to help you live with more purpose is this permission here. You get to decide. Now, if you’ve been listening to all of this, but you still want a purpose, let me tell you something. You can have one. And the beauty about that is that you get to decide what that purpose is. This is so freeing and empowering because you get to let your interests and your experiments along the way be your guide and inform you.
But ultimately, you still get to decide what that purpose is. So I’ve told you all along that I don’t have one definable purpose in mind. That is my lifelong mission, what I will always be doing forever. But I do have right now a purpose that is guiding the things that I do and how I’m living. But again, it’s allowed to take different shapes and meaning.
It takes different shapes in what I’m actually doing and a grander purpose to what I am doing with my life. And what is matters to me is that I want to empower women. Now again, the how to empowering women changes and even the specifics of what I and of how I want to empower women will change. But I am trying to live with my purpose because of the inspiration I get from knowing that I am living with meaning and purpose and what I’m doing by helping women be empowered.
Again, your circumstances will change, but you can still live with meaning and purpose. So maybe I decide tomorrow, I’m not gonna be a podcaster anymore. I’m not gonna coach women anymore, but I can still empower women in what I do. I have this kind of daydream. Of moving to some kind of wilderness and have big fields and animals and probably not that much honestly, but I have this dream of basically being a homesteader and having more children and homeschooling and living life.
So differently than we do right now, but I still believe that I can have grander purpose and meaning to what I’m doing. I still believe I can empower women in different ways that way. And honestly, I also believe that I can take on a different purpose, that I can decide. My purpose now is to empower my children, or my purpose now is to learn how to do sourdough bread and how to live a life from the earth or whatever it might be.
So even if you still want to live with like a more literal purpose, you can and you get to decide. Again, you don’t have to be Frodo Baggins who was searching the world over to find your one purpose. If you wanna live a purpose, you get to decide what that is. And also, I would still urge you to make sure that you are giving yourself license to have meaning and purpose to whatever you are doing.
Again, To not focus so much on the what you are doing. but how Now I wanna share with you a final note here. You matter. You are important and you can live with purpose.
