Seeking purpose or creating purpose, which is a goal necessary for survival?
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Before I start this article, let me preface it with: I am not a psychologist. I am not a guru. I’m just a guy who has dealt with the search for purpose more times than I can actually count.
That said, I’ve always believed we seek purpose because it’s human nature, because we’re just naturally attuned to wanting to find something greater in this world.
I remember thinking I was going to be a firefighter. My choice made perfect sense to me. My uncle, an FDNY veteran, had always told me glory stories. One close family friend, also a Firefighter, took me under his wing and served as a second father to me.
I loved everything about firefighting: the adrenaline, the brotherhood, the fact I would be doing something worthwhile. Except I forgot to factor in a pretty big component: I was born with a rare lung disease that essentially makes my lungs function at a fraction of those of a non-disease bearing person.
The diagnosis nearly broke me. I was without purpose.
As my young heart mended after this realization, my views evolved. I stopped seeing purpose as a sort of goal but, rather, as a survival stratagem. Purpose was necessary.
Why was purpose necessary? Because we seek comfort. Not knowing what we’re supposed to be doing is uncomfortable. Imagine it like this: We’re all at a party. Some people naturally know what to do – get drinks, dance, talk with others; but some of us (correction: a lot of us), can’t really figure out what to do.
Some of us may have too many options, others might have none. Life becomes uncomfortable when we’re forced to just kind of stand in the corner doing some variation of the robot.
I drifted from one gig to another. But as time progressed, I never felt these gigs were my calling or purpose. They were something I love to do, but not something I’d consider spending the rest of my life doing.
Fast-forward to right now and I’m a nearly 20-year-old college kid who is trying to figure out his major. Still. It only seems natural that I go with something involving emergency response. I was about 98% certain I was going to be an Athletic Trainer.
But guess what? Life happened. Again. And life told me, in a pretty direct way, I should maybe reconsider that notion. How?
I found myself involved with politics.
As that world started to open up to me, I saw the first glimpse of a life that could lay in front of me. I know that it’s a sketchy-at-times profession. I also understand that making a career out of it would almost certainly force everyone around me to forge opinions about me and the ideals I would represent by working for a given candidate.
But there’s adrenaline, there are bonds formed and I would be doing something I, personally, deemed worthwhile.
This is where everything became gray again. But instead of having the option ripped out from underneath my feet, I was simply given more rope. I don’t know which I’d rather have happen to me.
When I felt like I was about to snap, I did something I don’t do all that often: I asked a friend of mine how her pray game was (yes, it’s tacky and no, I’m not overly religious, but I am relatively spiritual and willing to take all the extra help I can get) and instead of saying what I thought she would, she opened up and confessed that she just had a yelling match with God.
I asked, “Why?”
Her response was simple: “I’m tired of living without direction and feeling useless.”
And being the guy that I am, I had two thoughts pop into my head but only said one.
What I wanted to say:
“Oh my goodness, someone who finally understands! It’s like I’m stuck in this immense pit of self-doubt and utter meaningless. Wanna talk about it?”
What I actually said:
“Well, that’s weird timing on my part. Wanna talk about it?”
I don’t know why I said what I did but the words came out. I was so relieved to see someone else was experiencing what I was going through, and suffering on the same level…and I didn’t want her to know I, too, was facing these issues at the same time.
We discussed her difficulties at length, and I suddenly felt a reassurance that I’m not entirely alone in this world. Did she too? I may never know, but I hope I at least made a minor difference in her trajectory. At this point I knew I had to do something for myself.
What kind of hypocrite helps someone else, acts like they know and then goes and asks the same questions?
I was tired of living without any given purpose. That was when I realized:
I shouldn’t live to seek purpose, I should live to create purpose.
It takes so much time, energy and heart to go around and look for the spectacular in the mundane. But it takes vision, creativity and passion to create your own self-purpose. While I try to figure out where I’m going, I’ll end this with a more than fitting quote. And typically, in my regular gig, I hate to end articles and stories with quotes but this feels so fitting.
It was John Steinbeck who once said
“A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find that after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us”
We seek purpose but little do we realize, the purpose may already be inside of us—just waiting to get out.
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Photo: Flickr/Gerlos
