On Purpose
Where to find meaning
A Black Hole
Potential is wonderful, exciting, and necessary, but it is also limitless, intimidating, and overwhelming. We wake up every morning and confront the potential of the day. It’s ubiquitous. According to UNC-TV, the average adult makes 35,000 decisions per day (Graff, 2018).
35,000!
Think about it. What should I have for breakfast? What should I wear? Should I call my grandma today? Should I talk to the girl at the café? It’s dizzying.
And to say, “I’m living up to my potential”, doesn’t mean anything. It’s as if you’re floating around in an abyss. It’s tantamount to visiting an art museum with gorgeous world-class pieces of work from a variety of artists, and a friend asks you, “Which one is the Picasso?”, to which you quizzically respond by pointing to every single piece. Sure, you’ll eventually point to a Picasso, but it doesn’t mean you know which masterpiece is the Picasso. Similarly, if you use potential as your motivational driver, then you’ll likely end up meaninglessly flailing around.
Now I’m not insinuating that I’m anti-potential, whatever that could even mean. Potential is paramount to our existence. We operate within the vastness of potential all the time, but potential is limitless, which runs contrary to our limited self.
We’re Finite
We’re obviously finite. Quantum mechanics aside, we can’t be in two or more places at once. We incessantly suffer from the misguided threat of missing out, regardless of our decisions.
We eventually die; life ends.
Oof.
So it’s overwhelming to approach something infinite given our finite selves. That said, being finite is useful. With too many options or too much time, we face a “paradox of choice”. It’s easy to perceive an abundance of options as a luxury; however, it can become crippling and can lead to inactivity. Biblically, the prayer “The Our Father” has us request, “Give us this day our daily bread.” Not a month’s worth or a week’s worth.
Only a day’s worth. Only what you need today.
So use this framework as a strength, and salvage the opportunities before you. All the while, ensure you choose your own aim; not what society dictates.
Your Purpose
It’s effortless to get lost in the vastness of life; it might even be the default. Society has established ambiguous norms that you feel compelled to closely follow. We constantly size ourselves up to our peers. It’s a boring and rigid game….
Your work is stiff regardless of the industry; you roughly do the same thing every day, and it becomes monotonous. Your relationships can become stagnant (this includes family, friendships, and dating). You take things for granted; it’s human nature. Pandemics happen….
You can lose it all in the blink of an eye.
Poof.
Similar to the HBO series The Leftovers (highly recommended), which is uncomfortably close to reality. And when the things that we believe are the interwoven fabrics that make us who we are suddenly disappear into thin air, we lose ourselves. Our life becomes disarrayed and is suddenly unrecognizable. We are headfirst thrown into a state of chaos that puts us within striking distance of the siphoning black hole.
You’ll find yourself asking, “What should I do?”, for which the answer is anything you want. “Who should I be?”, for which the answer is anyone you want. “Where should I go?”, for which the answer is anywhere you want.
While at first thrilling, it’s not helpful. Potential on its own results in inertia, and you’ll end up doing nothing because now you’re overwhelmed. How could you not be? Society tells you to do this and that while cultivating parameters with no regard for who you are and who you want to become. Then those parameters disappear, you lose your identity, and you start questioning the integrity of life.
Insert purpose.
Things that are purposeful should also be robust and approachable. Ideally, they’re low cost and have a low barrier to entry. Don’t burden yourself with your purpose being expensive passions (as in time and money; and obviously, have whatever passions you want — expensive or not, but I wouldn’t extract my purpose from something unapproachable).
Anecdotally, I love reading. Anything and everything of interest. I try to read every day. Reading blossomed into writing, and journaling has become a beautiful past time. It allows me to keep track of all my ideas that are worth recording. By writing them down, I’m taking the first step in manifesting the ideas into reality.
Furthermore, I love being outdoors (the Mediterranean in me loves some sunshine). Biking, running, walking, grilling.
Cooking! I love making something with my bare hands after a long workday on the laptop. I even started grinding my own coffee beans, and I find it a relaxing and therapeutic way to start a morning (French Press, of course).
As you can perhaps tell, I love good stories. Fittingly, I talk with anyone open to chat. Listen and share. Give and take. It’s the little things.
I fundamentally believe that if you can manage to make even one person smile every day (by intently listening, or simply smiling and addressing their presence), then you save all of humanity.
All of it.
Bold, right? Well, yes. Because you bettered another person, and that saves the entity and integrity of humanity itself. That’s certainly purposeful. Think about the compounding effect (Fibonacci Sequence).
These are a few of the things that give me purpose. I focus on them and pour my heart and soul into them. They make me Tim, maybe more so than anything else. Occupations come and go, careers are mercurial, relationships are tumultuous, but these independent activities make you You. They deserve your focus because they give you purpose.
If any of this seems daunting, start by taking it five minutes at a time. Only five minutes. This was a mentality shared by author Tim Ferriss in Tribe of Mentors (highly recommended) (Ferriss, 2017). Because if you can have enough chunks of five good minutes, then you will have a good day. Enough good days will give you a good week. Weeks to months. Months to years. Years to a lifetime.
So, focus on five minutes at a time. As “The Our Father” recommends, focus only on today. Therefore, concentrate on today while you orient toward the ideal. This grounds you in the present and encourages mindfulness (which I don’t think anyone in the history of existence has ever disagreed with), while also guaranteeing you a good future, because everything you do within that day is oriented toward your perception of what’s best. It’s literally the best you could do.
The Intersection
The culmination of understanding the vastness of potential, your finite self, and the importance of a focused purpose is to find the intersection between potential (big circle) and purpose (small circle). Potential is all the things you can do and all the experiences you can have. It’s anything.
You need to intersect potential with your purpose because the alternative amounts to nothing. You’ll end up wasting away denying yourself a beautiful life. You’ll end up precipitously falling deeper and deeper into the abyss.
You’ll never end up doing anything because you’ll never end up finding purpose and taking aim. Without aim, you’ll live in a state of instability, which doesn’t materially mean anything because it can be anything. Since it’s anything then you shrug at everything and do nothing.
Then we’re all fluxed! That’s frightening.
Orient yourself. Within the vast array of things that you can do, find what stirs your soul. Start small. Maybe read a good book. Maybe watch a good show. Maybe go for a jog after work. Focus on it. Become good at it.
Start by asking, “What gets me going?”. As mentioned, for me, it’s socializing, reading, writing, and spending time outdoors. These are all simple, approachable, robust, and, for the most part, independent activities. Within the vastness of infinite potential, find your specific purpose(s). Break this down into individual interests you find enjoyable and pour your soul into these activities. Your interests make you interesting, and they fulfil you while bringing you joy. Your purpose justifies your existence. That’s something.
And little by little, this allows you to become a better version of yourself. You’ll contribute to becoming all that you can be. That’s good for you, and what’s good for you is good for your community, and what’s good for your community is good for society, and what’s good for society is good for the world, and what’s good for the world is good for eternity.
When you find the intersection of potential (the infinite black hole; all that you are and all that you can be) with your purpose (your finite self; what you decide to do and who you decide to be), then you find the meaning of life. And that, as far as I’m concerned, is everything.
References
Ferriss, Timothy. Tribe of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (2017).
Graff, Frank. “How Many Daily Decisions Do We Make?”. http://science.unctv.org/content/reportersblog/choices#:~:text=We%20make%20thousands%20of%20choices%20every%20day&text=It's%20estimated%20that%20the%20average,are%20both%20good%20and%20bad. Web.
