How having a worthy purpose can become an inner force that can keep us moving in life

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Every one of us has some purpose behind whatever we do.
When we go home and buy food or cook food and eat it, the purpose is to satisfy our hunger. When we feel tired, we sleep. The purpose is to rejuvenate ourselves.
So, at one level, for us, short-term bodily purposes are something which we inevitably pursue. But we human beings need some higher purpose. In fact, purpose is as deep a need for the human beings as is, say, food or water or even air.
The lack of purpose may not kill a person physically, but it kills a person’s morale and eventually it kills people. So, one of the most well-known psychology books probably in the last century was Man’s Search for Meaning by Dr. Viktor Frankl. He was a Jewish psychiatrist who was caught in the Nazi death camps and he himself suffered as well as saw others suffer unbearable sufferings, atrocities, tortures.
Dehumanizing indignities were imposed on people. And over the period of years when he was there, he observed his psychiatric brain, psychiatrist’s vision, which is trained, he saw that the people who survived were not necessarily the people who were the strongest or the fittest. The idea at that time was the evolution theory was being applied to all walks of life.
And there was a now outdated idea called Social Darwinism which held that among the human races also, there are some races are fitter than others. In fact, Hitler had that idea that Jews are the most unfit race and nature is going to eliminate them, but we will help nature along the way. That was his perverted idea.
But anyway, among those people who were in the Holocaust, he found that those who survived were not necessarily the strongest or the fittest, but those who had a purpose for living. That purpose may be there was one person who was a scientist and he had written some paper which is a cure for a disease. And that paper was taken away from him, but before it was taken away, he memorized the whole thing.
And then he lived on because he felt I have to live and I want to publicize this knowledge. So, there based on the observation he said that, he had concluded that we need a purpose as much as we need the physical needs of life. And when we lack purpose, it is not that we can ever live without purpose.
It is just that when we lack purpose, we fall for or we slave for petty purposes that our mind creates. So, for example, people may spend hours and hours, say kids, they may live in comfortable homes where their parents have provided for them financially. They may have no worry about their career or their future financial security.
Spend hours and hours, days and weeks and months just surfing the net and playing video games. And that becomes their purpose. It’s a trivial purpose, but that’s the purpose.
So, all of us need a purpose, but the key is to find a purpose that is bigger than our problems. All of us have purpose in life, but then that purpose is, when that purpose is challenged by problems, at that time we may give up that purpose. So, if our problems appear to be bigger than our purpose, then we will become purposeless.
The student wants to say, get a degree and that’s the purpose when they come to the uni. But then they feel, studies are so difficult, I can’t do it. Just quit.
Now, in general, one of the surest ways for people to deal with depression, depression can be a clinical disorder where medication may be required, but more often than not, depression is caused when we are too caught inside ourselves. So, one of the easiest ways to deal with depression, it’s not easy for the person who is depressed, but it’s to just get out of oneself. Get out and do something for someone.
In India, there was a depression center and these people are so depressed constantly. So, they arranged for all the subjects, all the patients being treated in the depression center to go to the slums and feed, offer free food to the people over there. Initially, none of them was ready to go.
But once they went there, hey, I can do something. I can bring a smile on someone’s face. And that itself helped them to come out of depression.
So, we all need a purpose in our life. I’ll give another example, simple example of purpose and getting out of our past, getting past our past. Suppose we are driving and we get lost.
Somehow we take one wrong turn, two wrong turns and we get lost. Now, actually it’s annoying to be lost. But if we were driving for fun, then, okay, I’m lost, it doesn’t matter so much.
We’ll just explore, I’ll find a way later. But, so, I made a past mistake in taking a wrong turn. But if I have a purpose, oh, I have to get for this meeting in time.
Sometimes we may take a wrong turn. Why did I take that wrong turn? Why did I take that wrong turn? Long turn is already taken. But if I have to get for a meeting in time, okay, I’ll find out what is the right turn I can take.
And then we’ll take the right turn and move on. So, a purpose is what helps us to move on no matter what the past has given us. And most often when we start feeling that the past has wronged us, that we have been treated unfairly by life, what happens at that time is not just the magnitude of what unfair thing has happened.
It is that we have lost the purpose for our life. We become expert at justifying how life has treated us unfairly. Expert at blaming our situations, blaming our past.
And this disempowers us. So, one of the defining characteristics of a purpose is that it is a driving force within us. It is not dependent on our situation.
And I’ll talk about what is a worthwhile purpose for life in a later acronym. But purpose is something which comes from within us. And in that sense, purpose is different from a goal.
A goal is, okay, I want to achieve this. I want to achieve that. I want to buy a new car.
I want to explore a new relationship. I want to get this degree. I want to earn more money.
These are all goals. But purpose is something much deeper. A goal is like a destination.
A purpose is like a direction. A purpose is a direction. So, if I’m going in the north, the north is always going to be ahead of me.
It’s not going to end. So, the purpose which is deep within us, that is like a direction. This is the direction which I want to go.
So, that purpose may be, suppose, somebody has some artistic talent. And they decide that I want to do art. Somebody has a writing talent.
They want to write. Now, to become a published author, to become a popular author, to become a best-selling author, to earn a lot of money, these are all goals. These goals, sometimes you may achieve, sometimes you may not achieve.
But the purpose is, I want to write. So, goal is not in our hands. We may or may not achieve it.
But purpose is in our hands. Now, here the question may come, okay, if the goal is not achieved, then what is the purpose of purpose? Isn’t it? Yeah, if I study, if I write, and nobody reads my books. If I write and I don’t earn any money, what is the purpose of purpose? Yeah, it’s not that the goals are unimportant.
The goals are important in life. But they are not all important. When we are goal-driven, we are dependent on externals, which are not in our control.
When we are purpose-driven, we are driven from within. And if, based on our understanding of our talents, our interests, our resources, when we come up with a purpose that is important for us, then that purpose is what drives us. And we might get to certain goals, might not get to certain goals.
So, if I decide, I am going to be a more loving person. If I decide, I want to be, I want to be in a loving relationship with someone. I want to have a partner.
I want to have someone. Now, a loving relationship is a goal. But to become a loving person is a purpose.
So, whether the other person loves me or not, whether the other person reciprocates or not, that is not in my control. But if I act true to my values, if I live according to my purpose, my life will be richer. Of course, if the other person reciprocates, it will be richer still.
But living according to purpose gives us a sense of control over our life. It gives us something which can keep us moving in life.