Finding a purpose in life means finding a calling or a passion. Something that you excel at, that you love doing and that fills you with pride and satisfaction. This means knowing precisely who and what you are and you can use it to guide yourself and inform countless decisions going forward.
The only problem is that discovering this calling can be very difficult. How do you go about discovering who you are or developing your calling when you don’t have any obvious passion or talent?
There is plenty of advice out there to help you stumble upon this answer. But sometimes it’s not about what we do, so much as what we don’t do.
Here are some of the things that might be holding you back from your true purpose – and what you can do to fix those:
Doing What is Expected of Us
Sometimes we might get a feeling for what we want to be in life or what we want to do, but we are afraid because it is not what is expected of us. Worse, it might seem to completely fail to conform to societal norms, or your parents’ hopes and dreams for you.
Maybe the thing you feel passionately about is just weird or completely obscure!
Maybe you absolutely love a kids TV show and your purpose is to deliver news on that show. Maybe you want to join the circus. Or maybe you have no interest in getting married and you just want to travel the world on a boat.
But, if you live life in the way that others want you to, then it ceases to be your life. You can’t be expected to be as happy or successful going through the motions. There is no right or wrong way to live – there are only arbitrary habits.
So brush them aside, be you, and shine.
Doing What We Always Said We Would Do
This one is less obvious but just as restrictive.
You see, sometimes we have a passion or a goal that we believe in strongly. But then after a time, we lose interest in that goal and we decide we want something different from life.
However, the problem is that we always told everyone we were going to do X. We always told ourselves we were going to do X. Changing our course now feels like flaking or giving up.
But if that’s your attitude – if your heart is no longer in it – then you are no less trapped than before. Be true to yourself as you are now.
