How to Know You’ve Found Your Purpose in Life

Is There a Purpose to Life?

Flickr.com user Mia Coffee Snow, CC Attribution License

What is the meaning and purpose of life? Is there a purpose, or do we just randomly exist in the experiences of birth, life, and ultimate death?

Whether you believe in God, a divine higher being guiding your life, or that your life consists only of what your five senses recognize, the question of purpose is an important one to your life and happiness.

Positive psychology researchers are confirming what philosophers, spiritual leaders, and poets have long espoused: life is good when it is lived with purpose. The specific purpose is irrelevant—there is no single purpose that fits all of us. Research and personal experience show that when life is meaningful, people are happier, healthier, and actually live longer.

What Does it Mean to Have a Purpose in Life?

Though some would have you believe that their purpose is your purpose, your purpose in life is unique to you. Whether it is divinely inspired or simply a result of your unique combination of upbringing, experiences, and personality, you have a purpose in your life—and it’s not your job, nor is it an important role you serve. For more background on life purpose, what it is and the important difference between what you do and who you are, see Take the Mystery Out of Finding Your Life Purpose .

The One True Indicator of a Meaningful Life

How do you know if you’re aligned with a meaningful life of purpose? Don’t be afraid that you will build your life on a false premise. There’s one true indicator—a fail-safe indicator—that you’re on target. The indicator is your emotion—how you feel about who you are being at any point in time.

When you’re well aligned with a meaningful life, you’ll feel positive emotions. The stronger your alignment, the more positive your emotions. Feeling joyous? You’re right on target using the qualities of being that are the real you. Feeling generally positive? You’re using some qualities of the real you, somewhat aligned, but not completely.

Feeling negative? You’re not aligned; the more negative your feelings, the greater your misalignment.

What About that Great Job?

Are there activities in your life that you genuinely enjoy? Do certain roles and responsibilities bring you satisfaction and fulfillment? These are not your purpose, but they’re giving you the opportunity to express the qualities and characteristics that are your purpose.

How to Separate Who You Are From What You Do

Reflect on an activity that you really enjoy. This will likely be something that you choose to do as often as you can. If you’re fortunate, this may be your job or one of your primary roles in life, but maybe it’s a hobby or something that you used to do, but no longer have the time.

Think about doing this activity and mentally experience the positive emotions you usually feel when doing it. Are these strongly positive emotions? If not, search your memory for another activity that does carry the memory of strong positive emotion.

Once you have an appropriate activity in mind, mentally re-live the activity and emotions. Think about the qualities and characteristics you’re using while involved in the activity. These qualities and characteristics will be something like the following: helpfulness, courage, loving, creative, insightful, adventurous, etc. That is, they describe qualities about you, rather than about what you’re doing.

Let’s say one of the qualities you’ve uncovered is that of being adventurous. When you’re adventurous you feel happy and energized, and you feel authentic, like you’re being the real you. If being adventurous describes your purpose, then think of all the things you can do while being adventurous. Recognizing that this quality is at least a part of your purpose provides you with a wide array of potential activities, all of which will be satisfying, enjoyable, and bring you a life of fulfillment.

There are two additional bonuses to living your life aligned with purpose: The breadth of available activities will encompass your entire life and you will excel while doing these activities. Think of the advantages of being able to align your entire life with your life purpose qualities!

Image Courtesy Life on Purpose Institute

Separate What You Do From Who You Are

Finding your life purpose depends on understanding the distinction between what you do and the qualities of who you are. The second component necessary to finding these qualities is that your emotions are continuously providing clues; positive emotion means you’re well aligned, negative emotion means you’re off-target.

It’s really that straight-forward. Be aware of how you’re feeling when you go through your daily routines and when you encounter special, demanding situations. The qualities of your behavior present when your emotions are positive are your clues to a meaningful, fulfilling life.

Subsequent articles will introduce a wide array of processes that build on using these two concepts to uncover and clarify your true life purpose.

If you’re having difficulty separating qualities and characteristics of being from activities of doing, refer to Take the Mystery Out of Finding Your Life Purpose .

For more on Finding Your Life Purpose read the following:

Find the Purpose of your Life

Bad Experiences Offer Clues to Life Purpose

Is Fear Keeping You From Your Life Purpose?

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