Passionate Theme of the Day: Purpose

Cruised the blogosphere a bit and found a juicy little nibble to nosh on. Being that my biz is called Passion Meets Purpose, I’m often asked “How do I find my purpose?” Sorry to report there is NO magic bullet. No Life Purpose Protein Shake. No Mega-Ultra-Slim-Fast or Life Purpose Quick Fix pill.

But I did stumble upon Dick Richards; author of Is Your Genius At Work? 4 Key Questions to Ask Before Your Next Career Move. Talk about a guy who is passionate about purpose! Yeowwzzaa! He recently penned a four part series revolving around these two powerful questions at his Ongenius Blog:

“Why does knowledge of purpose arrive for some but not for others? What determines when it will arrive?” What brilliance and wisdom was Dick able to surmise regarding this too hot topic?

Here’s what caught my eye in Part 1:“While I cannot say with any certainty exactly when awareness of purpose will arrive for any one person, I do now believe this statement to be true: knowledge of purpose will arrive only after the demands of ego have been transcended enough to allow that knowledge to enter awareness.”

Which then led him to ponder in Part 2:
“Maybe the entire task is transcending self-centeredness, fear, and other ego-trappings, and then one cannot escape purpose. Maybe then purpose seeks you, or maybe then you are your purpose.”

That led him to toss this morsel into Part 3:
“Every person I have known who held a deep sense of purpose found it through a process that was experiential and spiritual rather than intellectual. In other words, they had some life experience that provided them with a call that they could not refuse.

Finding purpose is neither a quest to pursue nor a puzzle to solve. Purpose will arrive on its own, sometimes subtly and sometimes obviously, dawning slowly or in a bright sudden flash, when the bonds of both ego and intellect have been transcended enough to allow you to heed its call.”

Rounding out the series, Dick closes with this:
“When will I know my purpose?” The answer is simple but not easy: you will find your purpose when you become the kind of person to whom purpose calls.”

WOW! Can I get an Amen!?!! I don’t know about you, but I’ve been chewing on this all weekend. If you’re interested in the rest of the dialogue, head on over to ongenius.com – you won’t be sorry.

I completely relate to Dick’s final words, “You will find your purpose when you become the kind of person to whom purpose calls”.  If you’d met me just about a year and a half ago, you would have stumbled upon someone quite different than the person writing these words today.

Thank God I wasn’t down and out or addicted to drugs, but I did spend a lot of time “working on me”. I was on a diet of hard-core coaching sessions, mixed with spiritual reading, a sprinkle of contemplative journaling, a dash of therapy and a side order of workshops for good measure. Let’s just say Kammie had to get her own house clean before she could run around the blogosphere showing other people how to more efficiently clean their houses. Ya with me? Essentially I had to walk my talk. I had to align myself with the vision of who I wanted to be.

So I get what Dick is saying. Sometimes we’re so focused on getting there, that we completely miss that WE are here and here is where the work is. Each and everyday we are afforded opportunities to show up and BE who we are. Each day is another new beginning to become the person we were born to be. Not to sound “woo woo” about it. It just IS.

Take this weekend for example. My mom and I watched my niece so my sister and her husband could go out of town for their anniversary. My purpose this weekend? To BE the best aunt “ammie” (Alyssa can’t quite say the K in Kammie yet) I could be. When she was feeling funky and hot with a little fever and crying her big ol’ crocodile tears cuz she wasn’t comfortable, my only purpose was to help fix it. When she looked at me and said “pee” my only purpose was to sit on the bathroom floor and read her a book as we waited for the drops to hit the bowl.

Was any of that on my weekend agenda? Nope. Tuning into our purpose means realizing that we are not the biggest factor in the equation. When we can step outside of ourselves and realize that we are a channel for whatever message needs to move through us, in whatever form or fashion that is, that’s when our purpose will reveal itself.

Are you an artist? Do you build homes? Are you in a service industry? Do you make widgets that help make our lives easier? Do you stay home and raise children of character and integrity? Do you make people laugh?  How can we live ON purpose each day? When we are authentic, living in integrity, doing what we say we’ll do, we move one step closer to fulfilling that purpose. Our purpose can change from day to day.

Today my purpose was to hold a hand. Wipe a snotty nose. Kiss a boo-boo. Read a book on the bathroom floor.  Tomorrow it will be something else. Maybe to share a smile with a stranger. Perhaps a student will need a shoulder to lean on, or a faculty member a chair to sit in and an ear to bend. Whatever the case, I am here to serve something beyond me. Beyond my wants and wishes and desires. The more I surrender myself to that power, that energy, that creative source and let it guide me– the more goodness and peace and happiness and light continue to flow my way.

Take a moment and think about how you can become the kind of person that purpose calls. What little steps can you take each day to walk more in alignment with your bigger vision. How does that person talk? How does that person walk? How does that person treat their neighbors? How does that person speak to customers on the phone? Interact with co-workers? Connect with the clerk at the grocery store? Treat their subordinates?

How does a person of purpose show up in this world? How might YOU show up today so that your purpose can find you tomorrow?

Diggin’ my passion & purpose,
Kam

Ps…shout out to Phil G. who blog tipped the PMP over at Make it Great! Thanks Phil for living passionately and on purpose each day…you are truly an inspiration!