Your Purpose isn't to Heal: Uncovering Genius Part 2
An Invitation to Stop Martyring your Life on the Altar of "Personal Growth"
Your purpose is not to heal.
Your purpose is not to optimize.
It is not to endlessly seek the next “level-up.”
Your purpose is not to have a perfect body. Or to have a perfect diet and morning routine.
Your purpose is not to spend your days searching out every aspect of yourself that you have decided is unloveable, unwanted, and failing you (that are in truth the parts of you that not only make you human but make you YOU) because you have some off-base notion or belief that you need to be rid of yourself.
I’ll go so far as to say you get to thrive not in spite of yourself but because of yourself. In fact you are perfectly designed to fulfill your path. That’s part of the beauty and the magic of it all.
Great Nature (God, Universe…you pick the language) is so generous.
Your purpose is not to become some idealized, non-existent, perfect human that eats all the right things, ages perfectly, never gets angry, has a thriving business and perfect family, and is always “happy.”
I know you know this at least intellectually, but how often are you comparing yourself to the “perfect person” in your mind that is making all the right choices and their hair looks great to boot?
How often are you engaged with the voice of your inner critic asking “what is wrong with me?” And demon hunting for the next piece of yourself that needs to be improved before you get to enjoy your life, feel good about who you are, and put your efforts into something other than measuring up?
Stay with me because what I’m not saying is that you should stop seeking to improve or to grow, or to become a better person.
I am saying that personal growth has to come from a place of love not for it and I am saying that maybe you’re doing great and you can let your foot off the gas and coast a while.
I’m saying that you can make your desires your disciplines, rather than disciplining yourself for having desires; and that you can not only embrace your human faults, and relax a little bit, but you can love yourself just as you are all the while becoming who you want to be.
We are a culture OBSESSED with personal development and growth, with optimizing, life hacks, up-leveling, endless improvement, staying forever young, accumulating excessive wealth, and it can start to feel like our only directive is BE BETTER, DO MORE, HEAL MORE because you are fundamentally faulty, broken, and the real reason you don’t have what you want and you’re not living your dreams is because of something that is very wrong with you.
I’m here to tell you that is a lie.
You are made for way more than that. You are a precious human soul and it’s our first time here, under these conditions, living this life, learning these lessons.
Your life is not only about self improvement and endless “growth” and “expansion.”
Your life is also about joy and pleasure. Your life is also about love and being a great a friend, it’s also about accepting the fullness of your humanity, a really good meal, standing in your convictions, and major self-acceptance.
This isn’t just some journey out of suffering where you pick yourself apart for the whole of your life trying to “fix” yourself.
You’re not a project to be completed nor a problem to be solved. Full stop.
I am a major advocate of therapy, working with coaches, yoga, breathwork, all of these thing that are allies of change, but too many of us are sitting around mourning over who we are, over excavating the past, focused on “blocks” and bad ideas, obsessing over what else we need to correct and robbing ourselves of our most authentic, fully expressed, genius self. And when we are not showing up in the world in the way we were gifted to be, we rob the world in kind because we are not in our fullest service.
Your fullest service happens when you are in your fullest expression. Your genius is there.
Your purpose is also not your vocation, it will exist whether you lost your ability to do your job or not. And thinking you are failing at your purpose because you work in a corporate job, or you’re not a shaman ignores all the ways your gifts and genius is expressed, probably also in your vocation even if it isn’t so explicit.
Your purpose is the path and the path is your purpose
.
There is no plan B. Universe, God, Great Nature has never produced the same living being twice, the same leaf, or even the same stone and EVERY piece contains unique genius that is fulfilling something within the greater matrix of creation.
You are designed PERFECTLY for your purpose.
Your desires, gifts, proclivities, and most natural ways of being are in complete alignment with your purpose on this earth. You are divinely designed for it.
The more self actualized you are, the more authentically and naturally you’re able to show up in the world the more satisfied you will be, the less external validation you will need, the more fulfilled you will be, and the more in service you will be.
I am here to tell you to stop spending so much time navel gazing and to go out and live. Live well and fully. Love big. Do things you’ve always loved to do. Take up old habits you had as a child like drawing or painting or singing at the top of your lungs and fall into a more natural expression of yourself.
Practice UNDOING instead of doing so you can become.
Know that your purpose is also self satisfaction.
Your purpose is also pleasure
Your purpose is also joy.
You get to delight in this life and do things that feel good. I’m not saying every day will be a party and you’ll never feel pain but that is all the more reason to find ways to be delighted and to give that your energy too.
Enjoying food, loving people, having a d*mn good time is also purpose. Most especially when you allow your truest self, your genius to shine in all of those circumstances.
The thing is, there are times we need to get quiet and turn in and take a good hard look at what’s happening in our inner world and our actions. And I have found again and again I don’t have to chase demons, I can trust that as things need to be harmonized they will rise in time as life asks something different of me.
In the perfect time.
When it’s ready. When I’m uncomfortable with how things are and I see something bubbling up that is asking for my tenderness. That’s how I know. And then I get to integrate it, work with it, get outside help if I need the support.
No need to chase down tomorrow’s problems with today’s grace. Instead I just ask myself every night “did I love well today?” I forgive myself and I’m quick to make amends.
Of course self awareness and personal work is important but we’ve been misled and misguided and pushed to purpose and joy paralysis by the “wellness world” and pop psychology. We think we have to become some other version of ourselves and THEN we get to do the thing, have what we want, find a vision.
No! Set your heart on your vision now, dance with your genius now, and watch how life rises to meet you.
You don’t have to martyr your life and your joy and your pleasure to “grow.”
You’re a genius. You’re noble by birthright. You received all the permission you needed the day you were born.
Get freakier, Get weirder, Get more “unhinged”, Get way more joyful.
No need to martyr yourself and your life on the altar of self improvement.
In fact, sometimes, this endless pursuit of “healing” and “self improvement” is a huge distraction from you doing what you’re meant to do and showing up how you’re meant to show up.
Just be willing. Practice pleasure. Practice play. Practice awe. Practice beauty and participation. Practice connecting with your dreams and desires.
Your purpose is already here and happening and we get to spend our lives gleefully uncovering new aspects of our personal genius.
Less self correction
Less purging
More joy
More welcoming
More self honoring.
My newest offering Sanctuary: Uncovering Personal Genius beings end of May. A 6 month group and 1:1 coaching experience for 9 women. 9 because 9 is the stellar of the stellar. We’ll embrace a monthly oral story, somatic work, coaching, and so much more. Details coming soon and applications will open.