I know. It’s a Monday morning and I’m dropping this kind of a reflection on you when realistically we’ve both got things to get done, places to be, and the last thing we have time for is a long deep conversation about life.
So why do I bother you this morning with a question that we could spend hours around a fire in the woods discussing?
Because I honestly believe that your time is valuable, and the longer you spend without a purpose in your life, the more you are wasting it.
I’ve found myself really trying to go deeper over the last 2 weeks, trying to become more ‘organic’ in my soul. This weekend my sweet wife and I got away to our favorite ‘hideout’ in the mountains. There’s a hotel we love, with a room that we have stayed in so many times that it feels like coming home whenever we get there.
The room has become ‘ours’, and there’s a sense of peace and calm in it that we rarely find elsewhere.
Usually when we get away for the weekend I have a plan of what to think about, what to write about and how to ‘use’ the time most effectively, and yet this weekend was different. I came with no specific purpose or target, other than to allow my mind the space to go where it wanted, to let it wander and see where it ended up… which actually looks like this:
Right now it’s 8:15am on Saturday April 23, 2022, and I’m pondering the reason for existence, and how to find a deep sense of meaning for my life.
Maybe you’ve already got this figured out, and if so, congratulations. Maybe your answer has to do with a belief in some form of higher order consciousness (deity), or maybe you’ve arrived at a conclusion that life is to be experienced and enjoyed as loudly and as extremely as possible.
Maybe, just maybe, your answer has less to do with trying to ‘figure things out’ and more to do with just keeping yourself busy so you don’t have to think about these things.
Or maybe you ask yourself the same questions.
I’m sure some of you reading this will immediately want to share your answers, and while I appreciate the sentiment behind your intention, I am fast becoming of the opinion that answers from others will never replace the deep sense of congruency that answers from within ourselves will produce.
The longer I live, the more I believe that the only answers that really matter are the ones that you have pulled out of your soul, not those which have been fed to you by others.
Which is why I try to focus on the currency of questions rather than the payment of answers.
I think it’s a rather fascinating form of self indulgence to believe that any answer that I have will be right for you. There’s no greater feeding of the ego to imagine a world full of people believing and behaving just how you think that they should. I know because in my younger days I felt that, believed that, and found that it leaves no space for anyone to be themselves. I shudder to think of how I was back then.
I think there’s no greater respect that I can pay you than to give you the space to find out who you are and what works for you, and to trust that you can find those answers for yourself. My role is to offer questions and queries along the way, left in such a manner that you can either engage with me or not.
Because we’re all on our own journey, and if I am to respect you, then I have to respect your freedom to choose for yourself what your purpose is.
If you have found your purpose and it brings you peace, I am happy for you. If you are searching for your purpose, I hope that you find it. If I may be of any assistance, I hope I can help you.
May you find peace and purpose, today and always.
— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings