I consider myself to be quite experiential, by this I mean if I have a thought or believe something to be true I like to try it out and live with it for a while to prove conclusively that it is what I think it is. I think the only way to really benefit from something it to live it. Things always look different when your living it. This obviously has some downsides, for instance, its hard to live your life trying a new belief system whilst you carry around the permanent creations created from the previous belief system. This also means you have to have the courage to try things that you believe to be untrue to prove that they actually are untrue. During this life long quest I have been introduced to some interesting ideas. The one I am talking about now is one that I didn’t believe and it wasn’t until I tried it, with the purpose of discounting it that I found, no matter how hard I tried, it was in fact true in my reality. Now I’m not saying that this is the same in anyone else’s reality, but I do suggest you try it on for size and see if it is true for you as well.
It was during a search for a better understand of my reality that I was asked if my life had a purpose. My answer straight of was “sure of course” but then when I was asked what it was that I was stumped…. I didn’t have a purpose. So I shrugged it off and continued on justifying to myself and anyone who asked that I didn’t need one and that I believed in fate or a pre destined plan. I was pretty comfortable with this because it didn’t require much thought and I didn’t really need to take responsibility for anything. I was always able to blame it on something else.
So then I after having this thought running around in my brain for too long popping its head out when I least expected it I thought it best to sit down with a pencil and try to work out some kind of way to determine which was best. Is it better to live my life With… or Without… a Purpose….
My first obstacle was how do you work it out. Now I found that pretty easy to do. I just asked myself do I have a purpose. I went through a number of different thought processes and came to the fact that I didn’t. Now I am for the most part pretty happy with my life and the way it has unfolded. But could it be better and if so could the point of having a purpose make it better. So obviously the only way I could find out was to find a purpose and live my life with that purpose firmly implanted for some undefined period of time and compare the results. Obviously there are variables that need to be considered and some points that needed to be defined so I had a firm point to measure on.
This left me with a few problems…
Firstly… If you don’t have a purpose how do you go about getting one. Secondly… if I do define a purpose and implement it how do I know that it is not simply a worse choice, their for giving more negative results than living a life without….
The only way this could be done was to work out a way to define ones purpose.
I found some other peoples ideas and my first thought was to model mine off there’s but I did see a lot of problems doing this so I set out to find a way to define my own purpose. Surprisingly it turned out to be relatively easy.
I decided to basically ask myself what it was. Sounds simple but really who better to ask than myself. So I grabbed my trusty note pad and pencil and began to write. Now I was pretty familiar with this process as I have used it many times before to solve many other problems I have been faced with and I have always found it a great way to find the truth about things reasonably quickly. So I titled the page “What it my life’s purpose?
The first things that came out was just a list of jobs I have had. Then things like a Father, Mentor, Teacher, etc. But it wasn’t until after about 10-12 mins of writing that I started to get honest with myself. I wrote “To Create”. Now when I wrote these two words down I felt something that I hadn’t felt before. It was a very strong attachment to it. I felt it in my chest in a way that was totally unexpected. To be honest it felt like I was going to cry. This felt right but it didn’t feel complete. Next I wrote “To help others to Create” I turned to a new page and wrote…. “To Create and Help Others Create”. I tore out the page and got up from my chair and walked around looking at the page. I think I had found a purpose. A purpose that felt right, that felt true. I went back to my desk and started to ready back through my other writing and in the 3 pages of words these were the only ones that felt write. Now I wasn’t at that time the type of person the acted on instinct but this was the first time I felt I should. So I had it… A purpose. I still wasn’t sure if it was my purpose but it was a purpose and it was a purpose that seemed to fit with most things I had been striving for throughout my life. So why not. I figured this was at least a start.
So now I had a purpose. The next problem was how am I meant to live my life by this statement?!?!?! I left this for a few days and allowed it to all just sink in and decided to come back to it with a fresh thought process. After a few days I sat back down with the intention to work out how I could live my life with this purpose and record results and compare if my life was “Better” with or without a/this Purpose. Again I wrote page after page of ideas and came up with soooo many. To my surprise this was amazingly easy. I had hundreds of ways of using my strengths, I could create and help other people create. To my surprise again Every single one of these had potential to first make money and second were awesome projects that just seemed FUN.
So at this point I was sold. I had to throw myself in head first and start living my life with a purpose. So I decided that I wouldn’t take on any work unless it first and foremost contained this purpose or I could apply it to it.
Taking the list I had, I wasn’t short on ideas. More so what was amazing, was the people I started to meet once I took this on. An amazing amount of creative people. The thing that affected me most was my point of view. Basically I could have continued my life almost the same as it was but with a renewed sense of purpose. It meant every project I took on in my business and personal life was a driven one. It meant that each piece of work I took on contained that drive, that passion. The quality of my work improved immeasurably. I was no longer working for someone else under their regulations. I was working under my own, for my own reasons. New work I took on became fun, it became my passion, it became my purpose for being here.
The improvement caused a shift in my mental state and it was more than I ever could have imagined. I find myself even now years on from this change passionate and powerful. Not for any other reason than everything I do I do for one main reason, because its my purpose. The fulfillment I feel from completing tasks is more than I could ever have imagined.
So my conclusion is very simple. In my reality it is better to live my life with a purpose. I would encourage everyone one to try this and see if it works for you.
First… spend some honest time with yourself working out what your purpose is. Its not hard but it does take some relaxed, honest time. Just write until you feel it. Trust that you will know when its right. Don’t be afraid that you wont find it. Just start it and your already succeeding.
Second… make it your focus and start your thinking always from that newly installed purpose.
Third… Enjoy the fruits of your purpose. Always be grateful for finding it and find ways to share what you achieve with everyone with out expectation of it being returned.
Try this and let me know if you find the same types of results as I have. Let me know if you are currently on this same type of journey and what your outcomes have been. And if you find it works share this with someone else you think might enjoy it.