Aligning to Your Purpose
Honoring Your Calling, Letting Go of Doubt, and Leaning Into the Flow
As we settle into the early years of the 2020s, we find that many women, who have become highly skilled in their professions, are searching for more aligned and lucrative ways to bring their talents to the marketplace. Either their current organizations have failed to create environments where they feel their contributions are valued, or these women simply are ready to bet on their own knowledge, skills, and abilities and have decided to create their own workplaces where they can bring forth their gifts into the world. For those who see this as unchartered territory, they find themselves puzzled by the questions, what are my gifts and purpose? How will I know when I’ve found it, and what do I do with it from there? Let’s dive into each of these, unwrap what’s keeping these women in limbo, then outline a path forward filled with clarity and ease.
Uncovering & Honoring Your Calling
So how do you know what your purpose is? In truth, getting clarity on your purpose doesn’t need to take much time, nor does it require a lot of external analysis. The journey is more of an internal exploration and requires the seeker to answer a critical question, what do I do so effortlessly that it feels like breathing? What comes so naturally that you would have to force yourself not to do it? Look back over your life and think about what other people have come to you for help with. What obstacles, issues, and challenges have you been a reliable source for?
In knowing your purpose, you have accepted that there is a unique gift you have to offer others, one that, when offered freely, their life and yours are enriched as a result. For the thing you found to be a constant thread as you asked yourself these questions, that’s your purpose, your very unique gift to this world. Honoring it means that you accept it and offer appreciation for it. It’s authentically you, and you can allow it to become a guide on your path forward. You commit to being a student of it. It is your craft, and your duty is to master it for your benefit and that of others.
The Truth About Why We Doubt and How to Release It
Now, if you’re like many people who have spent years telling themselves that they don’t know their purpose, you quite likely haven’t allowed yourself to believe any answers you came up with to the questions above. You’ve chosen to keep doing what you’ve been doing, over believing that you can uncover what your purpose truly is. After all, you don’t know what “it” is anyway, right? But what happens when not following your purpose becomes more unbearable than you imagined it would be?
Over the years, we have dedicated a lot of time to make the argument, albeit against ourselves, that when it comes to that thing we are meant to be doing in our lives, we don’t have clarity. Through our self-talk, we’ve set the expectation for ourselves that no matter how hard we try, we just can’t figure it out. As a result, when thoughts, feelings, and our intuition show us glimpses of what our purpose is, our brain’s automatic response is to filter it out and reaffirm what we have been telling it all along. But why do we do this, and why haven’t we been able to accept that uncovering our purpose can be easy and that if we really think about it, we already know what it is? We can understand this dynamic better by taking a brief look into how our mind works against and for us. It’s up to us to make certain it’s for the latter.
An article in the American Journal of Sciences and Engineering Research on autosuggestion highlights this phenomenon by explaining how this act of imposing an idea on one’s brain can allow the person to influence their mind, body, and their will. By repeatedly subjecting your subconscious mind to the same thought pattern, you create a program, much like that in a computer, where your conscious mind works to take action on what the program is telling it to. This same article highlights how the deepest layers of the subconscious mind are hypersensitive to suggestions, much like self-hypnosis, and they can direct the conscious mind to take action on these suggestions. If you want to let go of your doubt and step into the work you are meant to be doing, start by practicing positive autosuggestion and reaffirm what you want to become your reality. Instead of saying that you don’t know your purpose, make the conscious choice to get in touch with and verbalize it. Allow yourself to believe that this is truly your gift to others. Trust that your inner self knows and decide not to doubt it again. This can allow you to start bringing those gifts to those who need them most.
Leaning In
Now that we have dealt with our doubt and we are clear on our purpose, we are ready to take intentional action in pursuit of bringing it to those who need it. The best way to approach this is to find opportunities for expanding our knowledge and skill level. This is where it’s time to lean in and deepen our practice. We can be of the highest service to others when we become masterful in the way in which we offer what we’ve become skilled at. Taking time to learn more ways to do what we do well, even better, means that we can offer that much more to those we share it with. By showing up and approaching each day as a learning opportunity, working to continuously improve on our craft, and being creative in how we share our gifts, we become a supportive resource and guiding light on the path of others. We are nourished by being of service to others, and through that service, we offer nourishment to those we serve in return.
Letting it Flow
Over the course of time, we can find ease and a flow to our work. According to the article, Neuroscience of the Flow State, flow is the state of full task engagement with low levels of worrying and self-reflection; it is associated with being fully task-absorbed in order to achieve peak performance and experiencing it is accompanied by a sense of accomplishment, meaningfulness, and positive mood states. So what does all of this mean, and how does it relate to finding our purpose and sharing it with others? It means that it is possible to work in a way that yields feelings of accomplishment and deep meaning without the added stress and worry. This comes when you embody the thing you are called to do and you offer it freely in service to others.
If you are feeling out of alignment with the work you are meant to be doing, or you doubt that you even know what that work is, your next steps should be to
Re-evaluate what story you are telling yourself about your ability to figure it out.
Decide to trust in what your inner self is showing you about your gifts and affirm it regularly.
Take time to become a student of your craft, mastering your skill to benefit yourself and others.
Show up and be intentional about bringing your light to those who need it.
Kenya Lewis, MSN, RN
