What is your purpose?

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7th April 2017

What is your purpose?  It’s a deep question which you will find either incredibly easy or difficult to answer, depending on how aware you are of yourself. I couldn’t answer this question for years… decades in fact. I only really started to understand my purpose in the past year or two. Before that my identity was tied to distinct roles in my life… Catriona the student, the pharmacist, the mother, the leader, the employee, the writer or the sailor. What got a bit confusing was that were slightly differing versions of me, depending on the role I was fulfilling at any given time. For example, as a pharmacist, I embraced detail and as a writer I preferred to think creatively; as a mother, I set a direction and as a student I took direction.

Which is the real me? The answer is I am all and I am none of the roles I fulfil. None are me in my entirety and I am none entirely. So, who am I? I now realise that there is a “me” which underpins everything. I have values which shape everything I do and there is a purpose to my life which gets expressed slightly differently in each of my roles. At this point in time I believe that my purpose is to be a catalyst for meaningful growth.  Maybe it will change as I do, but for now it is a purpose which threads through everything I do. The word “catalyst” anchors me to my chemistry and pharmacy background and nicely describes my affinity for precipitating or accelerating change. I like making things happen or helping to accelerate change that has already started. Not just any change. Change which results in growth.  More importantly, growth that I believe to be meaningful. I am interested in growth which results in a better world.

Once I am clear on my purpose, all the different manifestations of “me” make sense. Through parenting I am enabling growth of my children. Through my work, I facilitate growth of the team, of individuals and of my wider environment. Through writing, I hope to provide support to others in their growth; thus, the concept of Reflect to Prosper. Knowing my purpose makes it easier for me to decide what I should do. If I’m unsure about what direction to take, I ask myself which path is going to align with my purpose and values. This generally leads me to things that I enjoy because they are meaningful to me.

Once I understand my purpose it also helps me to make sense of the times in the past when I felt disillusioned. When a job feels like it’s draining your enthusiasm, you’ll often find that some aspect of the work or the environment is impinging on your values or is preventing you from aligning with your purpose. Einstein is widely credited with saying “Everybody is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live it’s whole life believing that it is stupid”.  I believe that we all have a unique purpose in life. I also believe that, sadly, many of us never discover what that purpose is which means that, at best, we live lives where we don’t achieve our full potential and, at worst, we spend our lives believing that we’re stupid because we don’t quite fit where we are. Everyone is a genius at something but, too often, we never discover what that something is and we spend our lives feeling like something hasn’t quite clicked for us. To quote Les Brown …

“The graveyard is the richest place on earth, because it is here that you will find all the hopes and dreams that were never fulfilled, the books that were never written, the songs that were never sung, the inventions that were never shared, the cures that were never discovered, all because someone was too afraid to take that first step, keep with the problem, or determined to carry our their dream.” 

Identifying your purpose may seem challenging. It took me quite a while to recognise the patterns and to identify an underlying theme. But it was worth the effort. I discovered a book in my local library called Brand You, by John Purkiss and David Royston Lee, which provides a nice structure which can help you figure it out.

When I gave a copy of the Brand You book to each of my work colleagues as a Christmas gift, I confessed that I had been considering buying a Nespresso coffee machine for the office before deciding that this, individual gift, would be more meaningful. One of my colleagues diplomatically offered to gather up all the copies of the book that I had given to the team as gifts and organise their return so that he could recoup the refund and buy the coffee machine instead. So maybe this approach isn’t everyone’s cup of tea…. or coffee!

Reflection time

Are you open to the idea that we all have a unique purpose? Or do you fundamentally disagree with the concept? Feel free to share your comments if you disagree. I’d be interested to hear your perspective.

If you are open to the idea that you have a unique purpose, do you understand yours? Does it guide you in deciding what is right for you? If so, perhaps you could share what helped you do identify this, through the comments section of this blog-post.

If you aren’t clear on your purpose, reflect on the questions listed below and see if you can identify patterns that might point you in the right direction. The questions raised here aren’t intended to be a comprehensive, step-by-step guide to identifying your purpose. Rather, they are prompts for reflection, designed to stimulate your thinking and to help you gather clues as you try to identify patterns.

• Think back over your life and think about the times when you felt fulfilled. Think about what you were doing and what it was that made you feel that way. As a simple example, if you really enjoyed being involved in a musical performance, what it was specifically that you enjoyed about it. Was it the satisfaction of mastering a difficult piece of music? Or the enjoyment of being part of a bigger group? Or the thrill of performing alone? Or the fact that you were bringing joy to others? Or savouring the culmination of hours of practice and preparation.  The same activity can serve different purposes so try to identify specifically what it was that evoked fulfilment.
• Think about activities that you love, or have loved, doing. A friend of mine asks “What makes your heart sing?” This may provide responses which are similar to those from the first question, but is likely to provide some additional clues. Don’t be afraid to delve deep into your past. Maybe there was something in your childhood that you adored doing but that got pushed to one side as you grew up.  What clues can you find here? Again, for each activity reflect on what it was specifically about that activity that brought you joy. For example, people who enjoy writing might do so for many different. One person may enjoy writing stories for the creative freedom, another for the purpose of creating interesting tales and others, like me, to help them explore particular themes.
• Where does your attention go? Are there things that you daydream about? Things you imagine that one day you might do? Do you have a fantasy about what you’d do if you were free from commitments? Our dreams and fantasies can provide great insight into our secret ambitions.
• Do you find yourself regularly being approached for a particular purpose? Do people seem to recognise a particular talent within you? For example, a calm head in a crises, an ability to rally the troops, your creativity? Sometimes people will approach you simply because you possess a particular skill-set but it may also be an indication of an inherent talent that others can see in you. Thinking about this can provide important clues.
• Are there any areas in your life in which you receive consistent positive feedback? It’s important to listen to the feedback from the world around you. Sometimes other people are the key to helping us identify our purpose. Think about the compliments that you receive. Can you see any patterns?
• In the course of your day-to-day life, can you identify the things that seem to suck your energy and the things that seem to energise you? Reflecting on this can help you gather clues.
• Finally, are there any people with whom you can talk about this topic or your responses to the questions listed above? People you trust who might be able to see the patterns that you can’t? Sometimes the people around us can see our purpose far earlier than we can.

Once you have reflected on these questions, consider if you can identify any patterns? Is anything emerging that can help guide your thinking about your purpose. I would encourage you to mull over these questions over time. Think about them as you go about your day. Observe where your attention and energy goes. Over time its likely that your purpose will become clear. And once it does, my view is that this makes everything else clearer too.