What's My Purpose? A Way to get Clear on Why

If you've ever asked yourself, why am I here, did you fail to come up with a meaningful answer?  Are you currently struggling to manifest an experience that lines up with what you know you really want?  If the answer is yes to both questions you may want to read on.

Have you ever read a vision statement and been confused by it.  A high level and long-term vision that's hard to understand doesn't strike me as a good foundation for inspiring myself each day.  But I think a vision is more than simply a pie-in-the-sky paragraph.  For me a vision should clarify why I'm here, how I'm going to go about living my purpose and how I will think, speak and act as I go through life.  In this blog I am going to focus on the first step of building a personal vision by answering the first question, what's my purpose?

In my experience, one of the great challenges to creating a life that really excites us, a life that pulls us out of bed and turns work into pleasure, is knowing what we want. Even if we do get clear on what we want, what happens if our desire turns out to not be quite as satisfying as we originally thought it would be when we get it?  Personally, I want to be inspired about the life I live and the work I do. I want to be clear about what I do and why. I want to have a vision for myself that clarifies all this.

Perhaps the challenge is that on a personal level we need to get clearer about why we are doing things rather than where we are going?  Perhaps this is why visions so often end up clouded and unclear?  A couple of years ago I went through the process I'm about to share with you.  The result was my purpose statement:

My purpose is to inspire and serve the transformation of knowing Love.

How did I get to that?  Well, I started by thinking about what I really wanted to do in life, my self-determined reason for being in the world.  In my case I had begun training to become a Licensed Practitioner (RScP) with the Centres for Spiritual Living and was very clear that I wanted to do two things.  Firstly, I wanted to get my own life in spiritual order.  And secondly, I felt a deep yearning to serve others in doing the same.  I realized that I needed to get clear on an overarching reason for being.  It wouldn't do to have someone else tell me this, or to read about it.  I would have to delve into my experience to get to the heart of it.

The first realization was that with spending so much time focusing on spirituality I needed to define what spirituality meant to me.  After some contemplation I came to the conclusion that spirituality for me is about the transformation of knowing Love (and note the capital L - this refers to unconditional love, the Love of the Divine).  In that moment it became clear; all my work, all the classes on the path to becoming a spiritual coach, were all about transforming my knowing Love in my life. 

As I dug deeper into my own purpose I realized I came back to the yearning I had to serve others.  As you have no doubt already experienced as we deepen in our spiritual awareness we begin to realize that we're all connected.  In turn, this connection reveals compassion and a deep-rooted desire to help others.  For a long time I have been driven by a feeling of compassion as I see the suffering of others and have committed to a lifetime of service in a spiritual capacity.  I arrived at the realization that I would love to help others realize what I've discovered for myself.  And so the idea of inspiring and serving came to mind.  It was a simple step to bring these two ideas together and in turn my purpose statement was born. 

It's been some two years since I developed my purpose statement.  I did make one minor change recently, tweaking the word support to serve. Your purpose may evolve over the years, but if it changes quickly or radically then maybe you've got work to do. 

In closing, get clear on what you really want to do with your life.  Is this something you yearn for?  When you think of this it should make you smile, make your heart leap, or both. Once you're clear then finish the sentence, 'My purpose is to...'  When you're done and you read it you should feel your heart move or a smile appear on your face.  Reading your purpose statement should leave you with a feeling of excitement, of certainty, and a knowing that you are clear on why you are here.  And you'll know you've got it right when you look at it a year or two later and it still moves you.