SENSE OF PURPOSE

There are days when you wake up with a renewed sense of purpose. Of knowing what it is you want to do and how you are going to go about doing it. Then there are those days when you can hardly drag yourself out of bed for the simple reason that you feel trapped in your current situation and see no way out.

Today, I found myself in both groups. Waking up with a sense of purpose whilst seeing no way out of my immediate predicament. It also didn’t help that I am still severely sleep deprived. It happens more as a single parent when there is no other adult around to help with those everyday tasks or to offer some mental enrichment.

Though easier said than done, finding a way to change our mindset is the key to set us free. In whichever way we choose to do that. It could be by envisioning ourselves in a job where we can make a difference by working together with a team of like-minded individuals instead of working alone on something which is absolutely mind draining. Or it can be by our actually going out and searching for that new job whilst at the same time you are learning new skills for it.

Another way to shift out of the mindset is to plan a vacation. Simply the act of planning gets us to change our viewpoint. It gets us excited about new possibilities and being somewhere other than where we are at the moment. We feel alive and hopeful with the newness. We might not take that trip as soon as we would like, but when we do, we will be better prepared.

A sense of purpose is necessary to keep us moving toward our goals. Certainly, getting a paycheck in order to pay bills is a purpose-filled endeavour. And even though I look forward to each paycheck in order to pay the monthly bills, the reality is that there will always be bills to pay. What there will not be is our mental health if we neglect ourselves in the process. Too little focus on what brings us joy will leave us with nothing to be grateful for in our old age.