What's your raison d'etre?

Let's start with few simple questions

Are you excited about what you do?

Do you know why you do what you do?

If your answer is NO to any or both of the above, then it's time for self-introspection!

So, what should you do when you realize that your heart is not in the work you are doing and you seem to be just going through the motions?

The easiest thing to do is to start playing the blame game and look for the easy scapegoats, but the question to ask here is - for how long can you keep doing so and where would this lead to, in the long run? Is it going to lead to something better in your life or only lead to more confusion?

The feeling of emptiness that stares at you at the end of every workday and the frustration and irritation you experience in your work is an indication of "motivation" missing from your life and that's exactly what you should be addressing.

This is when you should start to engage in self-probe and discover the "WHY" of your work, the missing "PURPOSE" of your work/ life. What is it that keeps you going? What is it that gets you excited about life? What is it that makes you look forward to the day? 

It's not difficult to sense whether you are living with a purpose. When your head and heart are in sync while doing what you do, then it's an indication that you are living your purpose. When, at the end of the day, you feel you have made a difference with your action/ activities, you can be rest assured that you are living with a purpose.

PURPOSE and PASSION go hand-in-hand. Start by getting your purpose in place and the passion will follow suit. And, when you hit the sweet spot at the intersection of the two, you will be on course to discover your IKIGAI too!

Focus on the value you want to generate and the impact you want to create and you would start on your journey to discovering your purpose. get to understand the difference you want to bring through what you do and therein will lie your purpose.

There's always an impact you are creating with your vocation and all you need to do to realize that is to link your efforts to the big picture!

Summing up concisely, here's what you need to be aware of

Why do you need Purpose in life? As simply as to make your life worthwhile and live with an agenda.

How do you know you are living with Purpose? When you start to feel that you have accomplished something and have made a difference with your work/ vocation.

How do you go about identifying your Purpose? Observing whether what you are doing(actions) is generating the impact that you have identified for your life.

It's time to start living "purposefully"!

Have You Found Yourself Yet ?

It's so easy to lose ourself in the rigmarole of living life in the fast lane. Riding high and fast on the superhighways of information and communication we eventually find ourselves at crossroads. It's only when we get confronted with anxiety, confusion, exhaustion and stress we realize that we stand stranded in this maze of uncertainty and chaos. Every alley in this maze appears a mystery and whatever alley we take leads to hinterland, a place bereft of the ambitions and dreams that we wanted for our lives. We find ourselves participating in this mad rat-race where everyone is trying to outdo others and reaching for goals they never really set out for themselves. 

Sitting in the "nowhere land" and pursuing and engaged in meaningless misdirected pursuits, we appear clueless about our goals and dreams. Lost amidst the inner and outer cacophony, 

we ask ourselves ""How do I Find Myself Now ?" 

This act of asking ourself the above question triggers the process of "finding ourself" facilitated through more self-interrogation and introspection. This leads us to the realization that to find our true self, we firstly need to address the  root system of our lives, i.e. the building blocks that hold the key to our life-long success. These building blocks build shape our personality by providing direction to us and helping us identify a meaningful reason for our existence and survival. These building blocks stand same for all of us and all we need to do it to provide them our context 

So, before we find ourself lost in life, let's try to build clarity in life by strengthening the following key building blocks of our life:

• Passion : This determines our orientation in life in terms of what excites us most, what makes us enthusiastic, what our hearts beat for. The passion is our preferred choice in life. Identifying the passion sets the tone for living a satisfying and happy life. Asking ourself the question "What thing/ task gives me immersed and gives me immense joy and happiness while performing it?"

• Purpose : This refers to the sole reason for our existence and gives a clarity about where would we like to contribute. The purpose ensures we are making a difference in the way we envisaged for our life. The best way to determine Purpose is to ask ourself the following question - "What am i living for ?"

• Mission : This is the most critical of the building blocks as it is the core around which our lives revolve. Mission refers to the guiding principles that we define for living our life. At any point in our life, we adhere to these principles while taking any action or decision. Mission is like the "nucleus" of our life. It's worthwhile to spend a good amount of time in defining the right "mission" for ourself. Our "Personal Mission Statement" acts like a compass in our life and keeps us on track always. Asking ourself "What set of statements/ principles would act as my reference point and guide me at every stage of my life ?" will help us define our personal mission better.

• Goal(s) : These act as milestones in our life and act as key motivation to grow, evolve and achieve more in life. They give shape to our dreams and desires. The following few considerations would help the goals be more effective

• Goals should align with our passion and purpose
• Goals should be specific and shouldn't be too easy or too difficult. If it is too easy then it won't provide us with challenge enough and if it is too difficult, then we may get overwhelmed by it.
• The focus should be on goal-setting and goal-getting both because without taking any action, goals may just remain unfulfilled dreams.

 Remember the below mantra 

Building such a robust life so that we never get lost in life is all about getting the above four building blocks right 

PURPOSE is POWER#AtoZChallenge

P is for PURPOSE

Life is all about living to grow, evolve and achieve and for this to happen, life needs to be in forward movement always. We need to be constantly striving to reach our destination, all excited and enthused. This driving force which pulls us towards our goal/ destination is PURPOSE, the thing that gives meaning to our life.  We can’t live our life like a rudderless boat, going where the wind takes us. We need to be sure about the direction we want to take. To make our existence worthwhile we need on earth, we need to be aware of what we live for, what we seek, what impact we want to make on others through our existence. For making it happen, we need to harness the POWER of PURPOSE and turn it (Purpose) into a catalyst of our progress in life. PURPOSE is also like our underlying philosophy to live our life.

Why PURPOSE is important ?

• It brings clarity in our life as we get to know our expectations
• It provides direction to our life. We get to understand the path we need to tread finish point we need an
• It establishes the philosophy to live our life. This philosophy guides all our actions and moves us closer to our goal
• It gives meaning to our life as we develop intrinsic motivation to keep giving it our best
• It makes us more productive and efficient as all our energies are focused on our identified  purpose
• It makes us an achiever as we keep accomplishing things aligned with our life’s PURPOSE
• It helps us get focused and in control of our life
• It challenges us, push us to our limits and enable us reach our full potential

How to identify PURPOSE ?

• Identify what we are most passionate about and what gives us feeling of satisfaction. The answer to this would be our PURPOSE in life
• Identify our fundamental values in life and the reason/ logic for these would be our PURPOSE
• Define goals that align with our fundamental values. Detailing the goals further in terms of objectives and outcomes will help us arrive at our PURPOSE
• Deep reflection of our interest and passion will unmask our PURPOSE to us
• Identify doing what gives the maximum satisfaction and a sense of achievement
• The act of critically questioning ourself will help boil down to our PURPOSE
•  Be creative and try out new things. This may reveal us our missing PURPOSE
• Engage in activities/ exercise that help connect us with our subconscious. Meditation, Yoga and Visualisation are few such activities

So, Live with PURPOSE and make a real DIFFERENCE !