It's the day after Christmas and I'm lazing on the couch. Bailey and I have spent the day together at home, unwrapping presents (he still had more left to do today), going through presents, watching DVD's (Bailey watched Goonies for the first time today), lying around and swimming in the pool, eating pancakes, and napping. But as ever, my head keeps coming back to the question that has been going around and around in my head for quite some time. "What is my purpose?" I don't think I've had a hold on this one for a long while.
After I had Bailey and went through everything that came after, I had a very clear sense of what my purpose was. Everything about myself - who I was, what I believed in, my values, what I felt was important in life, what made my heart sing... all became crystal clear. And now, 3 years later, I feel as though I couldn't be further from knowing those things. Some people may think who cares, why do you need to have a 'purpose'? And I don't even know whether that is the right word to describe what I'm searching for. But I do know that I am a spiritual and emotional person and I need to feel as though I understand myself, know what fills my tank and need to feel as though I am contributing meaningfully to the world and am connected to it.
I've been trying a mixture of methods to do this and I'm very torn at the moment between the various ideas and methods out there. I flit between telling myself to just drop all the expectations, live in the moment and just 'be' and diving in head first and going with a method of practical steps to help me find some answers to these questions (books, writings, goal setting, courses etc). I think sometimes I find myself being frustrated by the fact that the things that brought me great joy and clarity and motivation 3 years ago, don't do the trick anymore. I used be so energised by art and being creative and those things just don't do it for me now (although I can see that the art was always about the meaning or the message and gift for the person the art was created for, rather than the art itself. So what I feel is missing is the connection to others). I can't seem to find that spark or heart swell that I used to get from every day things either. To feel as though I have no idea where my spark is or how I can fill my cup is quite disheartening - and feels almost as if I don't know who I am.
A decision is definitely going to be made in the imminent future (ie this week) but I came across an idea today that shifted my perspective on the idea, especially the one where I am trying to recapture a feeling by doing things that I had been doing or enjoying three years ago. In her blog, Unicorns For Socialism, Alexandra Franzen posits that the question "What is the key ingredient to living an inspired, purpose driven life" is a trick question for which you get a trick answer. The key ingredient is embracing the fact that nothing in life is static and that your key ingredient will evolve. My mind automatically reads that and wants to respond with 'well duh, of course it does' but in my heart I know this is not so easy to accept. In the big scheme of things, if it took me 31 years to find a way to have myself living what felt like an inspiring purpose driven life, its not so easy to let that go. Because I had only really felt like this at one time in my life (and I'm talking about the big "aha" moment where all aspects of the universe align and you've never felt better in your life), I hung onto the idea or belief that it was those things that I enjoyed or were focused on at the time that were the 'answer'. I would keep going back to them time and time again to try to re-capture that feeling because they were the only things or ingredients that had ever made me feel that way.
The other thing to note here too is that the alternative ie dropping what I had known and starting with a blank slate again is very daunting. I already feel as though I'm floating around in the world, not really having a clue about who I am or where I'm going or what is ahead for me and I'm not doing well with that generally. Perhaps a little piece of me thought that if I just kept clinging to those pieces of Bel from 3 years ago, that one day they'd all click together again and the "aha" feeling would return. That I'm not going to have to start from scratch all over again or acknowledge the fear I have that I'll never feel like that again about life - so excited and genuinely alive and happy and inspired. That I'll never have that feeling again where I truly, truly, like myself and accept all that I have been and done and all that I will do completely, with no judgement. (Whoa, that one just came from deep down......).
However, reading Alexandra's ideas gave me a tiny bit of breathing space and for the first time has made me think fully of freeing myself of everything I think or thought was 'me'. This idea of me that I have been so desperate to get back and who I must believe deep down has only ever been amazing in that one version or in that one period of time. I know that what I need to do is give myself the freedom to become a new version of myself or should I say to evolve into whoever I am to become (rather than constricting myself to fit into some other mould that quite frankly no longer fits) and trust that I will love this version of me too. I need to have the faith in myself that my light will shine again and that I can see the light in there (even if on the whole the light has been a little dim for a while due to working through life's twists and turns over the past two years). I should also not forget that the greatest time of light in my life stemmed from the greatest ever period of darkness. That all phases do not work in the same time frames and to not be frustrated when it seems the light is taking a long time to come back to full strength.
What I love most about Alexandra's ideas is that its ok to be inspired by something new every day, week, or year and to go with that. Today I may be inspired by beautiful songs of lost love, tomorrow by people dedicating their lives to helping at risk children, or in 30 years time by my grand-children. But the key is to:
Follow your ever evolving bolts of fascination, infatuation and inspiration without over thinking. Without any thinking.
Follow. Even if the bolts of inspiration make no sense (there is rarely any tangible order in the Divine). Follow. Even if they've got 'nothing to do' with the PhD thesis you've bled over for years. Follow. Even if it means leaving (what you thought was) your Work by the way side.
Follow. Your life purpose loves a good road trip.
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