Do you remember being a kid and having someone ask you what you wanted to be when you grew up? These well-meaning adults would usually use a sing-song tone and wait expectantly for you to wow them with a noble (and expected) answer like a teacher or a firefighter. Right? Ugh. I hated that question for lots of reasons. Mostly because my choices made people react in an awkward way. Being a priest or a truck driver are uncommon choices for a 6 year old girl. “Oh, well, isn’t that interesting.” Or if you’re from the Midwest, “Well… that’s different.”
I truly just wanted to climb trees and play outside while I ate popsicles. Lay off Gary, I’m a kid. I’ll get to work later.
The “heavy” questions don’t stop there. They only shift. And often make us squirm. Here are some status quo questions I was asked that just seem to ooze with veiled guidance about how I should live my life:
“You’re not going to date him, are you?” (I guess I better date him! 🙂 )
“Where are you going to college?” (I guess I’m going, I better pick.)
“What are you majoring in?” (I’m 18 and have no idea.)
“When are you getting married?” (I will do that. Hey Mike, let’s do that.)
“When are you having kids?” (I have been married for 45 minutes. Just wait. And I guess we should do that?)
“Are you going to try for a girl?” (You know, after 2 sons, that’s what you should do.)
“What is your purpose?” (Um… in college I learned a lot but I didn’t declare my purpose.)
Holy hell.
Okay, let’s just pause for a hot second and take a deep breath. No seriously. Inhale… hold… exhale…
Ahh… okay.
If you’ve been in the BodyMind space for any amount of time, you know that questions are the tools we use to discover the answers that you already have. I personally call it Leading From Within. I’ve learned over time that asking better questions allows for that inner leadership to truly root and blossom.
So let’s begin answering the purpose question with a better question. Cool? Okay, here goes: What is purpose NOT? I know, I know. Don’t worry about the word “not.” It’s only the first step.
Here’s what purpose is NOT:
* A calling that you have to prove/chase for the rest of your life
* A fixed point that you have to find
* What your parents told you you had to be when you grew up
* What society expects from you
* To get a job, pay the bills, resent the taxes and die
* To over-give and over-function so you don’t remember who you are anymore
* To make others happy
* To be happy
All of these definitions make purpose the destination and perpetually out of reach because you must base it on what is outside of you. And most of that list ain’t about you! It’s pure dysfunction!
Oh friend, as you get more and more comfortable living BodyMind aligned, you’ll remember that it’s how you BEGIN that will determine where you end up. And so, let’s begin where purpose actually belongs… at the very, very, very beginning.
Here is my definition of Soul Purpose: The awareness of where your humanity and divinity intersect.
Your gloriously complex, intricate and limited humanity along with your ever-expansive and fully connected and dripping with love DIVINITY. The communion of them. The space in between them. The alchemy of them. Sweetheart, you ARE in fact purpose ITSELF living out an expression of the Ultimate Creativity. God herself. God himself.
This is where we begin.
You ARE purpose. Isn’t that a relief!!!? Breathe…
And so it becomes more about the awareness and the DISCOVERY of our hybrid nature and how we interact with our animation of it that really becomes the true definition of purpose. You are the EXPRESSION of purpose.
Your purpose is to be who you are as you. Your likes. Your dislikes. Your talents and challenges. Your taste in furniture and comic books. Your preferences for dogs and seafood. Your inability to carry a tune.
In the quiet recesses of your heart and gut, you as you is purpose-filled because you DO know so much about the one and only you!
You know what:
Breaks your heart
Pisses you off
Grates on your nerves
Sings to you
Calls to you in dreams
Reveals itself in your journal
Annoys you about other people
Comes through in messages in music and books
You ARE purpose.
The challenge is that what is obvious to us about ourselves is often thought to be lackluster. Boring. Normal. Sometimes even wrong. We forget that we are a part of this incredibly unique and creative unfolding and so we get busy. And disconnected. And we look everywhere for our purpose when it is in fact coursing through our very veins.
Purpose is also having reverence for your holy nature. For real! You are so sacred. You are so unique. Your gift, your message, your voice IS purpose.
Your purpose is not meant to be found. It’s meant to be unwrapped. Discovered. It’s not outside of you. You can’t Google it. You can’t drive to it.
And you’ll likely go through a few phases. I call it the “Cover Series.”
First you’ll UNCOVER a whole bunch of shit that you’re NOT. You’ll begin the journey within with a whole lotta contrast. What you don’t like. What doesn’t work. What pisses you off. What scares the shit out of you. What breaks you into pieces.
Then you’ll DISCOVER who you are. At your core. The secret spaces of you. A one-of-a-kind original that was MEANT to be here. You’ll make choices out of preference and direction. You’ll still go through cycles, but you won’t feel so lost all the time.
And of course during this time you’ll RECOVER who you were before the world told you who you “should” be. You’ll grant yourself more leeway. You’ll have boundaries. And uphold them. You’ll replenish the stores of energy that you gave away. You’ll care for that gorgeous small/child self and love him/her wholly, thus engaging in a truly beautiful gift to all of us: Self-love.
So please dear, when someone asks you what your purpose is, you say,
“I am purpose.”
