Your Purpose

In this week's post where I reflect on finding the balance between full time work and staying consistent with your creative endeavors, I wanted to talk about purpose.

I've done a lot of research on archetypes for my writing and it's interesting that when examining these archetypes, finding purpose is a core aspect in what drives us as humans.

In a post-modern liberal society, the idea of finding your purpose can feel a little trite or even oppressive, depending on the context. But at our core, every single one of us wants to make an impact, to be remembered, or feel like we're being true to ourselves.

Our species also tends toward the grandiose, which is why so many of our superheroes are saving the world and not just their neighborhood (thanks Spiderman). But our purpose doesn't need to be something grand and heroic for it to be valid. Your purpose might be writing music, or being a good spouse, or being the best Scrabble player in the tri-county area.

Your purpose can be whatever you want it to be and it doesn't have to matter to anyone else. You should know though, you may have long ago chosen your purpose and you don't even realize it.

Now if you're a creative person who loves working on your art, you probably already know what your purpose is. I know mine is to write silly stories that make people feel good.

If you don't know what your purpose is, and you're reading this post and your heart is making the Pikachu face, let me give you a few tips:

- Your purpose is usually related to what you're afraid of. It's something you feel resistance about doing because you know deep down you don't want to fail.
- Don't get caught up in hustle culture, it took me a long time to stop defining my success with my purpose with the financial success my writing was bringing.
- Think about things you used to do when you were younger that you don't do now. Take a weekend and pick it up again, if you feel nervous or stupid before you try it, but then feel good afterwards, those are some strong hints.

Why is this important? Well, my therapist told me that he has a lot of clients of people in their forties or fifties who on paper have successful looking lives. A family that loves them, a great job, but suddenly they're having panic attacks and don't know why.

Now obviously there are likely more factors than any one thing, but he told me that it always comes out after a few sessions that they gave up guitar twenty years ago, or they stopped volunteering, or whatever. But when they started bringing these things back into their life, it usually made a difference.

Don't let your purpose go by the wayside in pursuit of the other things we're supposed to do.

If you'd like to know a bit more about some of the archetypal energy that drives you, I made a fun little "choose your own adventure" style personality quiz that will help you explore some of those drivers.

Feel free to check it out here: https://lnkd.in/g-Ei5tY8