Archive For The “life purpose” Category
The other day I was thinking about my oldest daughter, who is a senior in high school. She’s applying to colleges and thinking about which school would be the best fit for her.
photo credit: Rob ShenkIt reminded me of my senior year in high school. Within about three months, I went from not even thinking about college to looking at technical schools and finally to applying for a scholarship at a university with the hopes of one day graduating from its law school. It’s not hard to see that my mind was scattered. I was not very focused.
Looking back, I don’t think I’d change anything. Life turned out pretty well for me. However, I strongly believe that you’re better off focusing on where you want to go in life. To get there, I’d like to suggest two rules for living life. Only two.
First, find something that you love to do. Search long and hard for that activity that really gets your motor running. Look until you find what ignites your passion.
Second, find a way to make a living doing it. This may not be simple. In fact, it might be complicated, but keep working at it until you figure out how to make money at it.
This may take some time and effort, but the results will be well worth it.
Steve DeVane
Lately, I’ve been trying to take a long look at life. Seeking to step back and get a wide-angle shot of what I’m doing and where I’m going.
This thinking brought to mind a saying one of my college professors had. He taught a course on how nations related to each other. Every once in a while he’d point out that a country’s leaders had focused too much on details and failed to see the big picture.
“They couldn’t see the forest for the trees,” he’d say.
Sometimes I feel like that. I’ve got all these things going on in life that need attention. And often each of them has multiple facets, each requiring time and effort.
I like all the various areas of my life. I need or want each of them. But I need and want to know how they all connect.
When looking for answers it’s always best to first ask questions. Here’s five that I’m pondering:
• What is the most important thing I want to accomplish with the rest of my life and why? Or as I friend so eloquently put it, “When you look back on your life, what do you want to see?”
• What are the reasons for all the various things I do? In other words, why do I do the things that I do?
• What are my priorities? Among these various things, which do I need to do more than others? Which do I want to do more than others?
• Who benefits and how? When I perform these tasks, what is the result?
• What do I get out of each? How do the various things fit into my life’s purpose, my mission, my reason for being?
I’m still working through all this, but I feel certain that as I consider these, the pieces of my sometimes puzzled life will start fitting together.
Steve DeVane