Wondering how to find your purpose or path in life?
I’ve mentioned before that your own personal happiness has ripple effects that extend outward and make not only your friends happier, but their friends and their friends’ friends, too. But did you know that, beyond increasing the global happy quotient, following your own happiness will also lead you straight to finding your life purpose?
What does happiness have to do with finding your life purpose?
The first thing to understand is that the reason happiness is so important to finding your life purpose is that deep down, at our core, that’s all any of us every really wants – to be happy. I’d even go so far as to say it’s a basic instinct and a basic necessity of life; we need to be happy like we need air to breathe. And if you doubt this statement, just think about how much goes wrong when we are starved of happiness: our stress levels increase, we become lethargic, we become mired in depression and anxiety, and even our physical health suffers. Likewise, in those times when we’ve been at our happiest, have we not all noticed that we had more energy, more enthusiasm and better overall health? (Think about the early days of a new relationship, for instance – how did your happiness affect other areas of your life?)
To put it bluntly: happiness is good for you, while lack of happiness is bad for you. Plain and simple, and yet so often overlooked in the “should”s, “ought”s and “have to”s that we tend to constantly subject ourselves to. For some reason, we allow the opinions of pretty much everyone else around us dictate the terms of our lives, at the expense of following our own instincts and inner wisdom. The problem is, even when we are able to ignore that whisper within us that tells us what we really want, even when we stamp it down in favour of what the world tells us we should or shouldn’t want, it doesn’t change the fact that we want what makes us happy, and that little voice is what leads us towards it. And when we ignore it, we suffer.
We need to be happy. All of us. And that little voice inside that only we can hear, the voice that is unique to each of us, is what tells us whether something is right for us or not out of all the kaleidoscope of possibilities and avenues that are available to us. Listening to that little voice is the only way we have of navigating through that chaos of life choices to find the path that is right for us. It is the only way we have of finding our life purpose.
Your life purpose is to be happy
Figuring out what makes you happy is the only way of finding your life purpose; the two are inseparably tied to one another. That which makes you happy is what will lead you to what you are meant to do with your life. Discovering what makes you happy and then living it is why you are here. It’s why we are all here.
And the beautiful thing is that what makes one person happy is not necessarily what makes another person happy, so when we say to focus on what makes you happy, we mean exactly that. Your happiness is your own personal key to unlocking your destiny and figuring out what your passion, your path and your purpose in life are meant to be, and these will be different from anyone else’s; your purpose is as unique as you are. Which is why it would be such a shame to just give up on it; there is no one else on this planet who has your unique talents, your unique perspective, your unique approach to things, and your unique ability to shine your light in this world. No one can make a difference like you can. But you have to be working from your passion, because that is where your heart and soul are, and where you are free to be the best version of you that you can possibly be. And all of that is found in what makes you happy.
So many of us are caught up in the idea of seeking our “purpose” in life that we become overwhelmed trying to figure it all out and give up in defeat, settling instead for mediocrity, when really, it’s quite simple: your purpose in life is to be happy. Finding your life purpose is as easy as paying attention to the things that make you happy and then doing them because the things that make you happy are the Universe’s way of showing you your purpose; they are your guideposts, and a sure sign that you are on the right path.
Beautiful! Was thinking exactly this the past few days.
I have another LOA story to share. A friend hated his job and always complained about it. After talking back to the boss one day, he was fired. A good thing, since he did not belong there anyway, it was so obvious. He then found another job 6 months later, at which he was also let go, this time for displaying the company’s logo on his personal website; even if he designed it, it was against company policy. Well, after two years, his dream job of owning a bike shop fell into his lap! Biking is his passion and it is right in his neighborhood and since he can also fix things and do graphics, it will be an A to Z operation. I think this was great! He had to leave the place where he was unhappy, the universe took care of that. And it led him to his dream gig, which is also his passion, at which he can even make a good living. You can’t get any better than that!
Yep. Sometimes it’s hard to see the path we’re on because we can’t see the bigger picture from where we are. Mike Dooley says that if we were going on a journey to somewhere we’ve never been before, we wouldn’t know if we’d gone the right way until we actually arrived at our destination. I think it’s kind of like that with our lives sometimes… we can’t see how all the sidetracks and bumps long the way actually gave us the skills and experiences we needed to end up doing exactly what was right for us and what we’d wanted to do all along.