redefining purpose
Your purpose isn’t your job title. Your life is your purpose.
Your purpose isn’t something to find. It’s something to accept that you’re already living.
Finding your purpose is not about what you do. It’s about how and why you do it. It’s about making art of every inch of your life. It’s about living as a prayer for the world you dream of. It’s about devoting yourself to love in every moment.
At the most macro level, there’s only one problem: separation from love.
So there’s only one objective: return to love.
And how we do the work is the work, so, no matter what we’re doing, the “purpose” is still to embody love, to be the change we seek, to live as if the work is already done.
Of course, separation and reunion show up in myriad nuanced forms.
And we’re all encoded to play a very specific role.
But we’re often pressuring and limiting ourselves by viewing purpose through a capitalist lens where we’re reduced to a singular function serving an external objective. We try to simplify ourselves to create a feeling of safety through clarity, rather than embracing the multidimensional nuance of it all.
We’re not cogs in a machine. We’re human beings living gorgeously complex lives. We don’t have to fit ourselves into a single title like “relationship coach” or “carpenter” or “sculptor” or “doctor.” Even if you did that “job” your whole life and you loved it, that still wouldn’t be your whole purpose.
This perspective has allowed me to flow from role to role over the years – from activist to teacher to farmer to artist to consultant to coach to writer to inventor and beyond – while feeling like my mission has remained the same.
When I’m getting to know people, they often are surprised at how many different “jobs” I’ve had. I’ve designed curriculum, led activist campaigns, built regenerative water systems, taught sex ed, consulted on diversity & inclusion, unionized workers, and much more.
From the outside, it might look like many disparate parts, but to me, it’s one totally cohesive journey in which I’ve been living the same purpose.
I serve God, I devote myself to love, I am committed to building a better world, and the “what” evolves depending on what’s needed for that perfect sweet spot where my personal highest good overlaps with the collective’s highest good.