How to Find Your Life Purpose Without Trying
“How am I ever going to figure out my life purpose when I’m so scatterbrained?”
A client emailed me this question recently. She was very frustrated with herself because she never finished what she started. She started writing a book, then lost interest, then moved on to a painting she began a few weeks before. She got bored with that, so she decided she really needed to focus on learning a new healing modality.
She is passionate about all of these things when she starts them, but she never enjoys doing them because she spends most of her time struggling with trying to figure out which thing is her “life purpose.” When she can’t decide which one she should stick with, she just gives up on all of them and goes back to being a mother.
She wrote in her email “I feel certain that I’m here for a reason, but I can’t decide what that is. Am I supposed to be a healer, an artist, or a writer? Maybe I’m just supposed to raise my kids well and that’s it. I don’t want to waste time on one thing if I’m supposed to be spending it on another. Help!”
I don’t think that my client’s problem is not knowing what her life purpose is; the problem is the way that she’s going about it.
The best thing that we can do for ourselves is to let go of the notion that there is only one reason that we are here on this planet. We are complex creatures, and this idea is incredibly limiting and can keep us from a fulfilling life.
I’m a great example of this; I am a healer, coach, writer, artist, intuitive, student, and mentor. If I had decided to stick with only one of those things, I would have missed out on so much. Without all of them, I really wouldn’t be good at any of them.
None of them are my life’s purpose, but I am passionate about all of them. I wouldn’t feel fulfilled if I put myself into a box with just the label “healer” or “writer” or “jewelry designer” on it.
Many of us feel like something is missing in our lives. We think that the perfect job, or relationship, or religion can fill that hole. We think that if we just find the “one thing” that we are supposed to be doing, then we can finally be happy.
The only thing that we are actually missing is the ability to be truly present and in the moment. We haven’t learned how to immerse ourselves into our passion.
If my client decided to fully engage in the experience of writing her book, she might not have lost interest so quickly. Because she was frustrated and worried about the fact that she might be wasting time doing something that wasn’t her calling, writing probably started to feel like a chore.
Maybe living on purpose is the only purpose of life.
Barbara Buck is a Foundational Reconnective Healing Practitioner, writer, and teacher. For more information about her, please visit her website at www.theomancollective.com. Check her out on the Happy Empaths Twitter feed @the_empath.