Flikr user pmschlenker, CC Attr. Lisc.
What if you won the lottery and then found the meaning of life? That’s kind of the best of all worlds, right? Financial independence and finding your life purpose! You’d be set for life.
Though you don’t have to win the lottery to find your life purpose, imagining winning is the theme of this article’s process for finding life purpose.
This article continues the series on procedures and processes for finding your true life purpose. Earlier articles described the importance of differentiating who you are being from what you are doing. Life purpose is about who you are being, not what you are doing. It’s critical to understand this distinction to uncover your true purpose. For a refresher on being vs. doing, read Take the Mystery Out of Finding Your Life Purpose.
Recent articles described processes based on awareness of the activities which bring you strong positive emotions—a fail-safe indicator of life purpose. This article takes a different tack, reducing limited thinking by opening up your imagination to possibilities.
If I Won the Lottery
What would you do if money was no object? How would you live? How would you occupy your days? Humph, you might be saying—that’s a no-brainer. I’d be sitting on a beach drinking frozen concoctions topped with a tiny umbrella. Or traveling the world, all in first class. Most people react this way to the initial idea of limitless money, but it’s really not that easy. Let’s start this way.
Congratulations! You won the lottery!
Wouldn’t you love to hear those words? Wouldn’t it solve all your problems? A new car to replace your twelve-year old junker. Fix up the house. Pay off your debt. Get the braces for your son that you’ve been putting off. Send your daughter to the college she’s yearning to attend. Move your elderly aunt to a nicer facility, and much, much more. Winning the lottery seems a dream come true. So let’s live it.
You did win the lottery—a huge lottery! One of those mega-millions lotteries everyone dreams of.
That was one year ago today—one year since that magic day when you received congratulations and a big check from the lottery commissioner. In this past year you’ve done all the things you thought you’d do with millions of dollars: new home, new cars, travel, college funds, quit your job, and did most of these things for your close family too.
Now you’re looking over your financial reports and you realize that you’ve spent millions, but you still have so much you’ll never be able to spend it all. You and your descendents are fixed for life.
Financial Independence—Now What?
Now what do you decide to do with your life? How will you spend your days? Doing nothing? Visualize yourself with all the toys you could ever want, all the material trappings you could ever imagine, and more money than you and your loved ones can ever spend.
Spend some time mentally living within this reality of extreme wealth. With no constraints on your resources, what will you do with your life?
Write a description of your life under these conditions. How are your days occupied? What captures your interest and energy?
Can you see yourself living this way? Is it fun, energizing, and fulfilling? Think about what you do that brings you pleasure in this future of unlimited funds and resources. Go beneath what you do and identify the qualities, values, and characteristics of this version of you. These are the beingness aspects of what you do. And if you’ve visualized this future reality and can see yourself living a fulfilling, enjoyable life in it, then these qualities and characteristics are aspects of your life purpose.
Image Courtesy Life on Purpose Institute
These are the characteristics of who you are when you’re not restricted by lack of money, fifty-hours at your job each week, and constant exhaustion trying to keep up with all of your responsibilities. With no financial limits and no restraining job responsibilities, you’re free to live your life every day being the real you. Can you see it?
If You Won the Lottery
This process of imagining you won the lottery as a means of discovering your true life purpose works by freeing your mind of the many restrictions of daily life. Without constant conscious attention to the problems always present in our lives, we are free to live in alignment with our true selves.
I hope this process has helped bring you insight into who you are, for that is your true purpose in this lifetime. But if you’re still lacking the clarity you want, don’t despair as I have many more processes to share. And one or more of these will be just perfect for the clarity you need.
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Jerry Lopper – Personal Growth Resources
Build your life on a foundation of purpose
it is a very nice educative article. keep it up for your hard work.
Good points Marie. We need to feel of value in the world. We need to make a difference. Envisioning a lottery won helps us see through the mist of every-day responsibilities and uncover what’s truly important to us. That’s a purposeful life.
Once the vision of this purposeful life is clear, we realize we can live it even without the luxury of lottery millions. Contributing time and energy to a cause that makes a difference is available without being financially independent.
Thanks for your comments.
Jerry
“I’d be sitting on a beach drinking frozen concoctions topped with a tiny umbrella. Or traveling the world, all in first class.”
I honestly can’t think of anything worse than that. Well, not the travelling, there’d be plenty of that if I won the Lottery, but five star hotels, first class, luxury cruises? That doesn’t appeal to me now, I don’t see why it should appeal to me after a big win.
There’d be plenty of the kind of travel I enjoy. I’d find a B&B that I liked the look of, throw a few things into a bag, grab my camera and go. And gaming. There’d be no more waiting for PS3 games to come down in price.
But I know that I couldn’t possibly fill my time with travel and gaming alone. I know that I’d have to have some kind of commitment in my life, responsibilities. I would still have to work. Probably not full time but if I had nothing at all, I’d be crawling up the walls. That said, it wouldn’t have to be paid work; I’d love to be able to actually volunteer for a charity. Throwing coins in a bucket just isn’t the same thing. You do that, trusting that your money is helping but you never actually see where it goes and what it does. I’d like to see the difference that a charity makes for myself, if that makes sense.