Life Purpose: Use with Caution
Something I find simultaneously limiting and poignant is how history will find a trend and give it a name. Limiting in that generalizing into one umbrella could create a reductionist view. Poignant in that distilling a happening into a phrase recognizes its significance.
I can’t help but notice “The Great Resignation.” July’s data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics was that 4 million Americans quit their jobs that month. Reading through articles on the topic, keywords like fulfillment and purpose bubble up as motivators for upping and leaving jobs.
As a coach, I spend a lot of my time with clients in curious inquiry around fulfillment and what it means to them. While the feeling of fulfillment is a key indicator of life satisfaction, the one thing that gives me pause personally and in my work with others is the search for a single life purpose.
Humans are not meant to have a life purpose tied to anything external.
It’s far too fragile.
Let’s say one’s purpose was to be a wonderful spouse. To be an excellent athlete. To build an impactful company.
What happens when life gets in the way? When injury puts our athletic performance in jeopardy? When market forces beyond our control take the reins?
Although I still use the term fulfillment and purpose in my work and in my own life, it’s important to remember that fulfillment can still be experienced even in a state of extreme adversity or in a side-tracked state. Instead of looking for purpose or fulfillment outside of ourselves, these are simply attitudes or beliefs we can cultivate as perspectives on our lives. We can feel purposeful and fulfilled regardless of our physical reality.
That leaves us with a question: If purpose and fulfillment are mindsets, how can we measure our own personal progress?
Years ago, whilst on a climb, I observed a small plant growing in a small crack high up on a wall. I imagine the wind had blown its seed into this inhospitable locale. It put roots down in whatever soil was there, absorbed what sun it could and grew. In a similar way, trees inexorably thrust their roots down into the earth and their tops toward the sky. In this way, we can look to nature, a force infinitely wise, for an answer to the age old question of purpose: growth.
Instead of looking to environmental metrics, I suggest we ask the questions: “Who do I want to be? Am I growing towards that?”
It may take some time to clarify what the truest, most resonant version of yourself looks like. Take the time. With that north star established, everything else falls into place. You realize that every choice in life is essentially binary: Does it align me with my greatest good or does it take me off track?
With a general direction established, the perspective of growth gives us latitude to be diverse in our interests. It gives us space to fail. To have mis-fires and mis-adventures. To pursue one direction and ultimately realize we’ve plateaued and need to find new venues for growth.
Once we create a direction of growth, towards something bigger than self, possession or accomplishment, we can have multiple “purposes” throughout life.
I’ve searched for a life purpose defined by what I can see and touch before and come up short. I’ve been that athlete facing existential distress when injury derailed my goals. I’ve looked at my worth as tied to work. They’re dead end roads.
We are meant to grow. Only you know what growth means to you. Resign or stay. Forge a new path or continue to reap the learnings of your current trajectory. Disrupt yourself or nourish yourself with rest.
Life doesn’t have to be complicated. Identify the pinnacle of your own unique human expression. Then, simply keep growing.