Three Questions for Defining Your Purpose

First published on June 16, 2021

It has always jarred with me, somewhat, to hear people talking about 'purpose'. Those who work with 'purpose-driven' leaders, those who want to 'find their purpose'. Something never landed for me. 'Purpose', as a word, didn't carry enough meaning. Everything has a purpose, after all, including the automatic rifle and the atomic bomb and the gas chamber and the rack. Hitler had purpose. Stalin had purpose. Pol Pot had purpose.

And, I realised through my work with clients that questions of purpose would arise... always. Or at least they would if we were doing it right. 'Why are you doing this?' and 'Why is this important to you?' almost have to be a part of any successful transformational experience, and, perhaps, they have to be a part of any successful venture, too.

Recently, psychologist and author Robert Holden shared with me and some of my peers three questions about purpose which opened something new for me around that over-used and often-meaningless word. The three questions were these:

What is the shared purpose of humanity? Now, in this era, your era, my era, what is the shared purpose for us?

What is the story that I want to be a part of? What part will you play in expressing the shared purpose of humanity? What will you be a part of creating?

What is your soul-gift? What contribution can you make that no one else can make? What will be your contribution to the story?

And something about this series of questions shifted things for me around purpose. I'm not ready, yet, to share my answers to those questions (although I will when I am, and they are already opening doors for me as I consider the next phase of my work). But for those like me who have perhaps struggled with never having felt particularly called to a 'purpose', who have maybe even come to distrust the word, consider these three questions.

Don't think about them too much. Consider them. See what emerges if you sit with them. See, even, if you get a message or an intuition. Listen for the highest thoughts you can think, the voice of your higher self.

For me, there's something about the three levels of these questions that makes them surprisingly complete. They are incredibly high level, grandiose and all-emcompassing. They are also structured to provide answers that are specific and unique to you or me. And they hold, within them, choice. Because, of course, you can choose your purpose. You can choose the story you will be a part of. You can choose the contribution you will make, however large or small.

What is important, then, is to choose wisely.