Type Till It Hurts

For those of you who are into personal development type stuff, I have found Steve Pavlina's advice to be helpful for directing my thoughts in productive ways, without getting too airy fairy about life. His approach is practical, realistic, and takes into consideration you may not want to sell all your belongings, shave your head, wear burlap, and move to Nepal to fulfill your life's purpose. (I came to this conclusion once - let's just say I was sorely misguided.)

Here's some practical advice for finding your life's purpose that I have used from time to time. You might wonder why one would have to do it more than once if it's so good, right? Well, I do it just to make sure I still want to do that thing, that thing that sits way down deep that I always say I'll get around to? It will change just slightly from time to time, but it's more of a refining than shifting, and yeah, that's still it.

Here's what Steve advises:

1. Take out a blank sheet of paper or open up a word processor where you can type (I prefer the latter because it’s faster).

2. Write at the top, “What is my true purpose in life?”

3. Write an answer (any answer) that pops into your head. It doesn’t have to be a complete sentence. A short phrase is fine.

4. Repeat step 3 until you write the answer that makes you cry. This is your purpose.

That’s it. It doesn’t matter if you’re a counselor or an engineer or a bodybuilder. To some people this exercise will make perfect sense. To others it will seem utterly stupid. Usually it takes 15-20 minutes to clear your head of all the clutter and the social conditioning about what you think your purpose in life is. The false answers will come from your mind and your memories. But when the true answer finally arrives, it will feel like it’s coming to you from a different source entirely.