2016
Human society has created a system: “you go into nursery school, preparing for kindergarten; you go into kindergarten in preparation for first grade; then you go up the grades until you get to high school; and then comes a time where you get fascinated with the system, you go to college; and then when you go onto college, if you’re smart, you get into graduate school and stay a perpetual student…then “they” want you to go out into the World. So now you’re trained for this, and now you’ve arrived. 45 years later you become senior vice president, and it suddenly dawns on you, that you’ve arrived…you’re conditioned to be in desperate need of a future…” - Alan Watts (Playing the Game of Life: YouTube)
This for me is a perfect example of how I felt: follow those steps and you will succeed! My brother was told that he wasn’t smart "enough" and put him in small classrooms. He is smart, but in certain areas, like most of us. He was told he was too “wild” (being a young, youthful boy) and the teachers recommended him to a doctor: he got prescribed to Ritalin. Suddenly he didn’t eat and was very tame. His self-esteem dropped to an all time low; he dropped out of high school.
Wanting so bad to just graduate and “please” everyone; to show “them” that he is actually smart, he moved away to “try again”. Not “passing the test of life”, he feels that he isn’t smart enough to be “apart of it all”, you know, like having a “good job” and participate. He is actually very intelligent and I believe he was ahead of my thought process: he didn’t believe in following the rules, so therefore he “wasn’t smart”. I just followed “it” and so therefore I was “accepted”.
All of it sunk in for me after college when I lost who I really was: fun, outgoing, spontaneous, up for adventures. Now I had to be “tamed” and get a real job and act like a “mature, smart, adult”. Now don’t take this the wrong way, if you like the job you worked hard at to achieve and you’re happy; you feel like your life has meaning and purpose; you’re fulfilled, thats what I’m talking about!
This system our society has created isn’t meant for everyone. I was feeling depressed; sad; lost; lonely; a failure; unsuccessful- I wanted more than anything to just be happy and “figure it out”.
Spoiler alert: nobody will have ‘it’ figured out or has ‘it’ figured out. Having a purpose with the time that you exist is the whole point. We need to work to eat, but make sure you have a purpose aside from income, to make you feel ALIVE.
You could win the Olympic gold medal and then end up in rehab, because even after you reach your end goal, you may not have found a sense of purpose.
You could have a lot of money, but rely on drugs and alcohol for ‘happiness’ because you haven’t found your true purpose for being alive.
Living with a purpose has nothing to do with money (if you find a way to make money with your sole purpose, amazing, do that!). After you get off work, you can’t wait to go tend to your garden. You can’t wait to see the progress and what you have to do to next to keep your garden beautiful. Whatever makes you feel happy and ready to do it all over again…that’s what I’m talking about!
For me my purpose is to let everyone know it’s possible to be happy, healthy, and live with meaning (even if you feel like you have nothing left to live for). The bizarre thing about knowing or finding my purpose is that, I knew deep down I wanted it all along. I resisted because I fought the feeling of intuition vs. realism- telling myself “I should probably pursue ‘this’ instead, it’s more realistic…” It felt safe following “the rules”, and not comfortable “living my own life” and doing what I actually wanted to do.
“Most of us have two lives. The life we live, and the unloved life within us. Between the two stands resistance…Resistance is the most toxic force on the planet. It is the root of more unhappiness than poverty, disease, and erectile dysfunction. To yield to Resistance deforms our spirit. It stunts us and makes us less than we are and were born to be.” - The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
“You know Hitler wanted to be an artist. At eighteen he took his inheritance, seven hundred kroner, and moved to Vienna to live and study. He applied to the Academy of Fine Arts and later to the School of Architecture. Ever see one of his paintings: Neither have I. Resistance beat him. Call it overstatement but I’ll say it anyway: it was easier for Hitler to start World War II than it was for him to face a blank square of canvas." -SP
I’m writing posts for my blog because it makes me feel so uplifted, like I’m on an all time high. I feel so incredible. I don’t really know what I’m doing (talking loosely) or where this is all going to go, but I do know that this gives me purpose and fulfillment. I will reach another goal that I do have, but it's not over, I'll always have this purpose and meaning in my life to live for.
“The most dangerous risk of all: the risk of spending your life not doing what you want, on the bet you can buy yourself the freedom to do it later.” - Tony Robbins
More from “Awaken the Giant Within” by Tony Robbins:
Ethnocentricity- we begin to believe that the rules, values, and beliefs of our culture are the only ones that are valid.
Write this down and ask yourself:
Who am I?
How do I define myself?
What is the essence of who you are?
So often people are so busy pursuing means value that they don’t achieve their desires: their ends value = the ends you’re after that will fulfill you and make your life rich and rewarding.
One of the biggest challenges I see is that people keep setting goals without knowing what they truly value in life, and therefore they end up achieving their goals and saying, “Is this all there is?”