It’s not always easy to align yourself with your purpose. Doing it means living the life and doing the things that all work toward your purpose. If you have a limited amount of time to pursue your passion, you don’t want to take up that time with things that don’t help you. If you want to be a writer, you shouldn’t be distracted by taking courses on jewelry making. If you want to be a marathon runner, you shouldn’t skip your workouts to watch TV. Those things are not necessarily bad, but they don’t keep you aligned with your purpose.
Sometimes your purpose is clearly marked, other times you may have to look for it.
There will always be detours when trying to accomplish your purpose. Aligning yourself takes constant effort. It’s about staying present and aware of what you’re doing and feeling. Also, persisting in moving forward while staying present will help you align yourself with your purpose. Any time you have a new opportunity or new task, ask yourself, “does this align with my purpose? Will taking this jewelry class help me become a better writer?” If it doesn’t, say no. If it does, jump in with both feet.
Detours will happen. We are all human beings and go through though times. When you do take a detour or miss the mark on your path of your true purpose, then take time to heal, just like I recently did. I had to take a break from my blog and my practice because of some events in my life that required me to focus on myself. I became my own purpose for a while. (More on that in my next post.)
I had to stop and think about where I was and where I wanted to be — listening to my feelings, listening to my body, and being aware and present. I took this time to really see what I wanted do in life and what brought me satisfaction, essentially reassessing my purpose. Taking time to search yourself will help you stay aligned with your purpose, whether it stays the same or changes.
A great way to think about is like using a compass for navigation on trip. You’re not always going to be going in the right direction, so sometimes you have to stop and read the compass to get back on the right course. But you can’t stare at your compass the entire time either. Otherwise, you don’t actually move toward your destination, or you’ll miss some interesting sights.
Remember this when you’ve left your path. Stop, take some time to read your compass, and make sure you still want to go there. Get rid of the things that are distracting you from it, like extra baggage, or the little “side trips” that turn into an entirely different journey.
Aligning with your purpose is about keeping present and remembering what makes you happy, so when you lose track of your purpose it will make it easy to get back to where you are going. It happens to everyone, but it doesn’t mean you’re failing. It means you’re normal, just like the rest of us, including life coaches.
