Purpose is over-rated…
It might surprise you, given the ego emanating from these pages but occasionally I am stumped. Not stumped in a I don’t understand but there is an answer I can research way. Stumped in this is not something I can fully grasp…in part because as I follow the logic, it would require me to change. That’s quite an uncomfortable feeling for an over zealous Type A….
What is it that sets me adrift? It’s the question of how I navigate through life. It’s the questions of why? Outside of fulfilling basic necessity, why I do what I do; why does what I do have to have a direction; why does it entail striving; why do I want more; why do I need to make a difference…..and what happens if I just….don’t.
Humans are generally wired in needing a purpose to underly our existence. I deliberately don’t suggest purpose is the basis of our existence. That feels different. We exist because we have to: eat, drink, sleep. But what drives the rest? The why? Ikigai. In Japanese this means a reason for being or waking up in the morning. Purpose is a fascinating term in its broadness and reflects the uniqueness of each of us in spanning the extremes of selfishness to the altruistic. For some it is completely obvious to our inner self but for others it resides at the tip of finger tips shrouded in vagueness. And this obscurity can arise at any time. We are able to pass through life fully confident in our why only for these questions to insinuate and turn against us, melting and de-stabilising the solid ground we thought we were covering.
When my father passed away, it was truly dis-orientating for my mother. My parents lives were fully intertwined as you would expect after 54 years of marriage. With one departing it uprooted the other to sway uncontrollably in the stiff breeze of daily life. On more than once occasion since, my mother has said to me she has no reason to exist, seeming not to find rhyme or reason with life. Lack of purpose can lead to listless despair. But relentless purpose can also lead to a manic type of despair. My ambitious friends seem almost as unmoored. Chasing the next big opportunity or chasing full stop. Wanting to sate what is at the end of their fingertips. Their present never declared enough, they themselves not being enough.
My most content friends are those who seemingly have mastered preserving the ‘p’ of purpose as a small p. Taking joy in the single, perhaps simple moments of the day whether planned or otherwise. Safeguarding by ensuring purpose is close by, but at bay. Living for the here and now; living within their control. I’m not sure they would explicitly observe this is their practice but it is what I discern about their demeanours as I enviously dissect these untroubled states. Research indicates having a reason for being is good for our health. But we need to learn to flex our energies and direction by taking stock of the present and understand how to subjugate purpose. Because purpose and the why can become dominant and all consuming in dictating the tides of our life. This may be the appropriate state for us at particular times in our lives, but unless we can at will evolve this path into a small p or another large P, the capacity to be unfulfilled is high. And that way aimlessness and despair lie.
I enjoyed this section of a piece by George Monibot from The Guardian which puts endeavouring into perspective.
‘Darwinian evolution tells us that we are incipient compost: assemblages of complex molecules that — for no greater purpose than to secure sources of energy against competing claims — have developed the ability to speculate. After a few score years, the molecules disaggregate and return whence they came. Period.
As a gardener and ecologist, I find this oddly comforting. I like the idea of literal reincarnation: that the molecules of which I am composed will, once I have rotted, be incorporated into other organisms. Bits of me will be pushing through the growing tips of trees, will creep over them as caterpillars, will hunt those caterpillars as birds. When I die, I’d like to be buried in a fashion which ensures that no part of me is wasted. Then I can claim to have been of some use after all’.
Over zealous over and out.
