When you were a child, could you ever answer the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”
I tried to; however, my answer constantly changed. There were times when I wanted to be an attorney, a printer, a teacher, a florist, a geologist/gemologist, a dancer, a beautician, an archeologist (I still want to!), a petroleum engineer (I don’t recall why), a small business owner, and a writer. And those are just the ones I remember.
When I went to college at 25, I started as a business major because I worked in Corporate America. I took my first accounting class, and let’s just say that’s what made me change majors.
I studied biology for my associate’s degree because I wanted to be a physical therapist. In my bachelor’s program, I started with biology for the same reason and ended with psychology because physical therapy didn’t light me up.
For the graduate level, I pursued creative writing, and later, I was accepted into (but did not attend) a psychology research program.
If I had my druthers, I would be a permanent university student.
But that isn’t the point of this post. Today I want to talk about our life purpose and following our dreams.
“If your life purpose calls, don’t let it go to voicemail.” ~ Corrie Ann Gray
Molded Into Good Worker Bees
When we were young, we dreamt of doing some fantastic things with our life. Somewhere along the way, those dreams were crushed by parents and other people who thought they knew what was best for us (read: school counselors). We are told to go to college, get a job, make a good living, and life will be grand.
In school, we were never encouraged to explore, experiment, or start businesses. At least I wasn’t. The only person who gave me the idea to run my own business was my dad.
My parents owned a printing and publishing company, and it was understood that I would someday take over that business. But, for reasons I won’t discuss here, that never happened.
But I did get the entrepreneurial bug early in life, as I’ve started and operated about six different businesses over the past 30 years. None of them were due to my university pursuits.
If you remember our ancestors, you’ll realize they didn’t grow up to “get jobs.” Instead, in most cases, they learned skills to barter and sell their wares and services to others.
The cobbler kept shoes on the villagers' feet. The farmer filled the larders and tables with food. The blacksmith supplied nails, armor, horseshoes, and more. And herbalists shared their knowledge of plants to keep their neighbors well.
This is how people took care of their families for centuries.
The industrial revolution changed work into what it is now. The development of factories created a need for laborers and managers to oversee the work. We are taught this: to find a job working for someone else and let your passion(s) be your hobby.
Your Life Purpose Is So Much More
I don’t believe that the idea of a life purpose is only related to work. Your life purpose can and should encompass your health, finances, spirituality, emotional well-being, and more.
As a life and career coach for over 20 years, I have experienced how individuals are curious to figure out what they are meant to do in this life, and yet they hesitate, second guess, and find all the reasons they must stay in their current lane. They won’t deviate, and they keep getting a paycheck so that they can retire, and only then will they enjoy life to the fullest.
In my last post, I talked about intuition, which I feel plays into today's conversation. We all have an intuitive side, yet most don’t listen to it. When that gut feeling hits us, we think it is fear. When we have a nugget of an idea for a business, we scare ourselves into thinking we can’t possibly leave the safety of our job.
Or we get a strange feeling about a person, yet we enter into a relationship with them and soon discover our warning signals were correct.
What if we did listen to the whispers, the gut feelings, the intuitive flashes that speak to us with honesty and love?
What if we trusted our feelings to pursue something outside our comfort zones in all areas of our life?
What if we experimented with life to discover what lights us up and sparks the natural energy inside of us to keep going, growing, and being our true selves?
Those are the questions I want to help others answers in this newsletter. I initially thought I would start a separate newsletter to tackle these questions, but I think this one is the best choice.
So, keep your arms and head inside the train at all times. This will be a wild ride in discovering who we truly are and how to share this authentically with the world.