5 Signs you are NOT living in your Life Purpose
As we all travel along this journey that we call life, we are all on our personal journey to find and live out our Life Purpose. During adolescence, we fight to understand ourself, separate from our family. As we grow into young adulthood, we often get lost in what others and society expect of us. And as we grow into adulthood, we begin our journey back to ourself. Throughout this entire journey, we are continuously searching for our Authentic Self and Life Purpose. These concepts can be overwhelming at times. There are so many questions and possible answers. So many concepts and need for clarification. And along this journey, we often endure emotional suffering, which in turn, can lead to hurting others-unintentionally of course-as they had only been innocent by-standards, just as we have played this role in others struggles to find their way back to themself.
In my personal life, I have taken this journey, and am happy to still be on it, with more understanding, kindness, and compassion for myself and others. My journey was filled with emotional suffering and confusion. It was filled with various ways of self soothing that often hurt myself and others. It was a journey filled with spiritual disconnect and internally fighting to reconnect. It is now a journey of excitement, self reflection, stretching my 'limits' and expanding into my most Authentic Self and Life Purpose.
In my professional career, I have connected with so many women who endured a similar struggled. They discuss their confusion in their professional and personal endeavors. They identify lack of self confidence holding them back from their passions and ideal life vision. They describe feelings of overwhelm with trying to 'do it all' and losing career/life balance, which creates burnout in their professional life and frustrations in their personal life.
As the University of Minnesota states "Your life purpose consists of the central motivating aims of your life—the reasons you get up in the morning. Purpose can guide life decisions, influence behavior, shape goals, offer a sense of direction, and create meaning. For some people, purpose is connected to vocation—meaningful, satisfying work." UMN article
To better understand the concept of Life Purpose, let's look at 5 signs that let you know you are living out of alignment with your Life Purpose.
- Confusion. Lack of clarity and confusion can present itself in several forms. In my experience, as I began climbing the corporate ladder, which is what I thought was my Life Purpose, I noticed that I began getting restless about a year to a year and a half into the new gigs. This restlessness created a LOT of confusion, not only for me, but for my husband. As I advanced, I would become excited about the new challenges and opportunities. We picked up and moved our life for my career advancement, only to find myself restless and confused yet again. I would get frustrated with myself, not understanding why I couldn't just be happy, as I had a great career making 6 figures and a healthy and happy family. It was maddening...until I learned that I was not meant to live in the corporate world and working for a company other than my own. Once I gained this clarity, it was like the weight of the world was lifted from my shoulders.
- Exhaustion/Burnout. When we are living out of alignment from our Life Purpose, we tend to be in a constant state of exhaustion. There is never enough time in the day. What your body and mind is trying to tell you through this exhaustion is that you are not in alignment. You are doing too much of what is expected of you and too little of what ignites passion in your life. When we are able to remove the "shoulds" from our life, we are able to live in our purpose. There is a motto I work hard to live by, which is "Let go of the ego and follow the energy". This is a statement that came up during one of my women's groups. When we allow ourself to let go of ego-what others and society will think of us if we simply do what sparks a fire in our soul-and we allow ourself to follow the energy of the universe and our soul, then we find ourself more ignited and alive. We find that when we do what our soul desires, we have more time to do the less enticing things that still need to get done in adulthood. When we live in our Life Purpose, we have more energy because we are filling our soul.
- Depression. This was a biggie for me. I was SO down on myself for not being happy and feeling ungrateful for all I had in my life. I felt like there was something wrong with me because I thought I was fulfilling my life's purpose, and I was still feeling unfulfilled. I felt like I was letting my family down. I felt like I was letting myself down. This led to more confusion and more exhaustion. The more I felt this way, the more I worked to prove my worth. It was a vicious cycle that I am overjoyed to be out of...and my family is highly benefiting from me breaking this cycle as well!
- Overwhelm/Anxiety: This can present itself in many different ways. You may wake up in a state of overwhelm, or it may build throughout the day. Just like the exhaustion, it feels like there are never enough hours in the day to fill every single bucket/dimension in your life. It may show up as an ever present daily anxiety. This often happens when you are focused on external validation, which leads to a constant state of doing what others expect of you, worried about how they will judge you, and never feeling like you are enough. You may feel scatter brained, which leads right into confusion and lack of clarity. However this shows up for you, pay attention to it...it is trying to get your attention for a reason.
- Procrastination. I struggled hard with this one and to be honest...I still struggle with this. This aspect is all about fear. Fear of putting your all into your Life Purpose. I procrastinated jumping full force into my own business due to fear of failure. I procrastinate getting to the details of my work for fear that if I put my all into a project and it 'fails', I will be judged as a failure and let my family and myself down. I currently know I am living in my Life Purpose with my business, but since I still, at times, allow my fear to creep in through procrastination, I know I am not living to my fullest capabilities and full Life Purpose.
If you can related to any of the above, there is a way to align with your Life Purpose!
Join the FREE workshop below and start living in your Life Purpose and most Authentic Life!