It's been a minute, huh?
Looking back over this blog, I see a stark absence of posts in 2018 and 2019. Hmm... It's not that I've lost interest in writing or sharing my thoughts (although, to be honest, I write solely to see my thoughts in a linear, focused format), it's that my life has changed in such a dramatic way and it continues to evolve.
"To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all." ~ Oscar Wilde
I've written about changing life before so the idea is nothing new for me to consider. In fact, one of my favorite posts is about adapting to change versus igniting your own change. This last year was about reflecting on what really drives me. It was about looking into my soul to find my purpose again. To be honest, it was an emotional and difficult exploration. I guess I had a lot more shit stored in there than I thought! I found ideas and dreams I had forgotten about, so I applied to law school and, low and behold, I was accepted! It was as if I found remnants of paths I had previously taken that, in hindsight, didn't really line up with where I want to be. I withdrew from law school to be back in Arizona with my wife and that sent me on another journey to find my purpose again. It felt a little like rummaging through the lost and found. Do you remember that box full of forgotten sweatshirts, misplaced water bottles, and the one lonely glove? It's the place where we find the things we had forgotten about. Perhaps I could find my purpose again hiding in there?
Yet, as I got closer to my 49th birthday, I found it impossible not to look back and reflect on my entire journey. I can honestly say that I am happy. That's an understatement. I'm happier than I imagined I could ever be again. I am inexplicably blessed to be married to my best friend, and the most loving and beautiful woman I have ever known. So, in that sense, my love quotient is full. Our hearts, minds and adventurous spirits are synchronous with one another. But happiness is not synonymous with or a substitute for purpose.
Perhaps the confidence I have in our love is what allowed me the opportunity to rummage through my soul without fear of judgment. For my own mental health, I needed to find my purpose and I believed I could find it hidden deep inside. It had to be in my lost and found. I had it once, but I seem to have misplaced it so surely I could find it again. Come to find out, it wasn't in the lost and found at all. My purpose isn't attached to some aspect of my past journey and it's not some nuance of life I need to redo; it's something I get to create today. Just as I got to create it twenty years ago.
"The purpose of life is not to be happy--but to matter, to be productive, to be useful, to have it make some difference that you lived at all." ~ Leo Rosten
If one thing is consistent in my self-reflection it's that failure plays a key role to my identity today. I would like that sentence to have read "failure played a key role" but in reality there are collateral effects that have taken some time to see and even some that continue to show themselves. Failure can be more than a single act from which we learn a specific lesson. It feels like a recurring antagonist to my journey. It's like some persistent hinderance to progress which ultimately becomes an obstacle to my purpose... or, maybe not.
I recently had a conversation with a physician who is experiencing a significant, career-ending failure. He is at the point in this part of the journey where he can't even conceive an image of his future. This is a scary place to be. During our conversation he was essentially calling bullshit on the idea that he could exercise his way to a better mindset because he was losing the one thing that is the root of his purpose: to help people heal. So, after much discussion, and listening to his theory that life will never be the same, it became evident the only thing that will change is the manner in which he helps people heal. If purpose is his paint brush then only the picture will change. He will still create with the same technique and tools.
Maybe purpose isn't really some characteristic that waxes and wanes throughout life. Perhaps it's more an issue of how we see the way our purpose creates the story. It's never absent but it's also not necessarily a trait that just exists without some continual reevaluation. It's like looking at a road map between San Diego and Boston just one time, and then setting out to drive without ever reassessing or tracking your trajectory.
"One of my greatest fears is that my dreams have somehow lost their purpose. That my ability to create a story of value in the world is over. That, to the world, I'm no longer relevant. As if, somehow, I'm already dead but I just don't know it. But here's the thing: I can still feel my heart beating." ~ me
Happiness and purpose share an important and common trait: we have complete control over them. My fears of purposeful relevance are just a construct that I've created based on my perception of age, outside opinion and judgment. It's a defeatist summation based on the forlorn conclusion by comparing my current position in life and some previously conceived idea. It's similar to feeling as if I am a failure as a 50 year old man because I cannot dunk a basketball as I did 35 years ago. My expectation is incongruous with my situation, but in no way does this equate to a failure. Stop searching the lost and found for your idea of purpose, and happiness for the matter. Instead, conceive it in the present. The roadmap to your personal happiness and purpose leads forward from this starting point, not back to a former point in time.
