Healing Technique: Finding Purpose

Finding your purpose seems to be one of the more elusive aspects of healing which is why we will go over some ways to help you find yours. In order to know your purpose, you must first know yourself. I don't mean that you have to have a perfect understanding of yourself, I just mean that you have to understand yourself on the basest of levels, specifically what you care about. What you care about is your best guide to finding your purpose. If you don't know what you love to do currently, keep reading. You can find out.

What I like to do to help my clients find what they care about is something I call the core values assignment. I recommend doing this even if you believe you know what you care about, you may be surprised by what you learn about yourself. Here are the steps in doing the values assignment:

1. Pull up this website. Ignore everything but the list of values, we are doing something entirely different than what the website talks about.

2. Write down the values that you find most meaningful to you in no particular order. Any value you write down should be a 9/10 or 10/10 on a scale of importance to you. All values are worthwhile, but they aren't created equal, not to you anyway. At the end your list should be somewhere around 20-40 values, most likely.

3. Categorize your values into groupings of similar values. For example, if you have the values "care", "compassion", "kindness", and "love", you could group those into an overarching category of "love" or something similar. These cumulative groupings are your core values. I typically aim for around 5 core value categories although you could have more or less. The more values you have under a core category, the more important it is to you.

That's it! What this does is it tells you what you value, quite literally. Your values serve as a roadmap for what you find meaningful and rewarding in life. If you aren't living your life according to your values, the chances of you being happy are pretty slim. I've found that this exercise helps inform me about career choices and how I should spend my time. When I'm feeling stuck or sad, it's typically because I'm not living according to my values. Use your values to align your life with what matters to you.

For additional help finding your purpose, I highly recommend that you watch this video. It's long, but god damn is it meaningful and addresses very important topics extending beyond just finding purpose, which is the only thing I'll be writing about. Watching it is better than reading my summary. If you want to find your purpose it's important to put in the work!

Here are the key points from the video:

1. Purpose is found in steps. Experimenting and having fun with that experimentation is instrumental in finding what speaks to you. Reflect if something works or doesn't work and continue experimenting. Don't stop experimenting! And don't let yourself stop having fun doing so.

2. Don't hold on to the past. Finding purpose is about finding what speaks to you now, not what used to speak to you.

3. Your purpose is about you. Finding your purpose is often met with ridicule or misunderstanding from others, I know that mine definitely has been. I was business minded since I was born and when I told my family that I wanted to be a therapist instead they all said I would suck at it and discouraged me from pursuing it. Well, the joke is on them! Other people don't need to understand. If you want to find your purpose, you have to learn to do what pursue what you want, even if it doesn't make sense to others.

4. Don't put yourself in a box. We are told to identify as something and stick to it throughout our life whether it be a career, a title, an interest, or anything else. You have the right to change your identity whenever you want. It's your identity. If you want to be something different, then do it! Only you choose whether or not you force yourself into a cramped box or a spacious, ever-expanding box.

5. Finding your purpose is like walking in the dark. You don't know where following your passions and interests will lead, nobody does! Finding your purpose consists of taking a lot of small steps in the dark and hoping it leads somewhere great instead of falling into a never ending abyss, which I have definitely felt like at times. What I've found to be helpful when I'm seriously contemplating my life choices and whether or not I regret them is to ask myself if I'm happy with what I'm doing in my life. If you care about the things you spend your time on, you're on the right path for you.

6. Learn from everything. The skills that you gain throughout your life will help you find and fulfill your purpose. You can learn from anything.

7. Purpose is using your passion in the service of others. Do it for others because you love it, because you're passionate about it, not expecting anything in return. You perform your purpose for you, not for others, it's intrinsically motivated. Don't get lost in needing reciprocation from others and negate your purpose as a result. If you love cooking, cook for others. If you love planning, plan for others. Your purpose will follow your passion, find your passion and start doing it for others.

8. Your purpose invigorates and energizes you. If something drains you, it's unlikely that it's aligned with your purpose. If you're not invigorated by what you do, it's time to move on to something else.

9. You're already very successful at something. Find what you excel at but may have stopped valuing just because it comes easy for you. Ask the people closest to you questions about it, they see in you what you don't see in yourself. Here are some examples:

   1. "What is something that I do that you always think of me when you're struggling with something?"

   2. "What's something that I've done in the past for you or others that made you think, 'wow, that's really cool, that's amazing!'?"

   3. "When you're struggling with something, what do I help you do? What do I help you solve?"

   4. "What can I not live without? What would my life be without 'X' thing?"

10. Turn jealousy into study. If you want something that someone has, learn from them. Study them and learn how they did it and start to implement the things you learn that speak to you.

11. Pursue your goal of finding your purpose even when it isn't easy. You've achieved past goals, you can achieve this one as well. We tend to get used to things very quickly and forget what it took to get there but yesterday's goals are today's mundanity. "Where you are today is what you wanted yesterday." Remember your successes and use that as drive to pursue what you will find most meaningful, your current purpose.

12. Your purpose will change over time, so just concentrate on the present. If your purpose has moved on, so should you.

13. Be intentional. Ask yourself why you do the things that you do. If you aren't doing it because you intrinsically love it, then do something else. If you are to find your purpose, you need to be very intentional.

To sum up, finding purpose is an intentional process. Use your passions to clue you into what your purpose is. Do more of what you're passionate about and less of what you aren't. To all you nihilists out there, nihilism isn't good or bad, it just is. Purpose doesn't need to be divinely inspired, it is just a path to happiness while you're alive. What is more meaningful than finding what truly fulfills you, regardless of what death entails? Start living for you and you will find your purpose.