Tag: experience

Finding Your Purpose: The WISP method (STEP III: “S”)

So, I’ve surprised you with 2 untypical ways to find purpose in your life.

Here (Step 1) and Here (Step 2)

Hopefully, by now you’ve done homework and feel like you are progressing in new ways.

(I’d love to hear about it! Send me a note.)

Now we are on STEP 3

“S”

Service

This one may make little sense to you.

You may think,

“Really? That sounds backwards. I don’t know my purpose yet. I’ll try service once I get that figured out, duh.”

It’s not as backwards as you think.

(Creative Commons photo)
(Creative Commons photo)

What will appeal to us in terms of service is often closely tied to our talents, gifts, and greater purpose.

Here’s an example:

When my kids were very little I made a point of helping my friends prepare for a big, yearly program. Instead of being fulfilling, it was frustrating and felt futile. I realized that my skills and passions were better served elsewhere. This eventually lead to many other types of service that tapped into my greater purpose and held greater meaning for me.

In the beginning, what drew me to help out was a sense of friendship, community, and desire to love and minister to others–to be part of something greater than myself. Those were all things I kept seeking. What I left behind were projects that could miss the forrest for the trees. The experience helped me know when projects were too detail-oriented to be optimally useful in a greater way, for my preferences.

Would I have been able to narrow things down for myself without making this (seeming) mistake? No. And it wasn’t a mistake to help, it was a clarifying exercise.

Would I have been able to decipher what types of service aren’t a good fit for me without this experience? Unlikely.

In serving, something else happens. It’s big and you’ll see the pattern once I mention it:

In losing ourselves we are found.

That means by taking ourselves out of the middle, we can see and choose better and more easily.

(It doesn’t mean thinking less of ourselves, but thinking of ourselves less–by design. Thus, we more expertly “stumble” on to bigger insights.)

In a way, you don’t find your purpose at all, it finds you.

From my perspective, finding God works the same way. You are only lost to yourself, not to God. So you don’t so much “find him” nor does he “find” you. Instead you wake up.

The same holds true for finding your purpose.

We tend to assume, just by default, that finding our purpose must start and end with us. Not so.

Just like Worship, service makes finding your purpose far easier because it becomes a revelatory process. Finding your purpose, like finding happiness, comes as a byproduct of doing other things.

So where can you start with meaningful service that will help you find your purpose?

Here are some categories and qualifiers to explore:

If one stands out as more meaningful, or ignites your passions (which is directly connected to your purpose), try that first. Check with your church, your community, your local schools and organizations, local charities, or just asking around to see what available or sounds like a good fit.

What ever it is, do something. The key on this step in ACTION followed by reflection.

If you are already serving, reevaluate it. It is leading you to a greater purpose or holding you back?

(If you are overly involved in service, then it’s time to scale back.)

HOMEWORK – take some field notes on the following questions:

• Do you like Creating? (What do you like and how do you like to do it?)

• Do you like helping and being useful? In what ways?

•Using your body more than your mind to help out?

OR

Using your mind to help more than your body?
(At the end of the day, which feels more satisfying and why?)

• Do you like being the glue that holds people and projects together?

• Does helping behind the scenes feel meaningful?

• Do you like detail-oriented projects…

OR

Being the visionary that comes up with and starts the project?

• Do you like teaching? (If so, what about it appeals to you?)

• Do people in need ignite your passions?

What about your past service appealed to you and why?

(If you don’t have much past service to serve as a gauge, that’s your biggest obstacle. Start right away. You are much too “in the middle” of your world and you need a break from yourself.)

[You guesses it! This is handy-dandy notebook time! Write out your field notes from the questions above.]

Also consider:
What specific population do you feel drawn to serve?

(It’s okay to specialize and then turn away things that fall outside your scope. This refinement is usually helpful. However, once in a while change it up and serve outside your specific domain–it will surprise you by opening new doors or clarifying your purpose further.)

Types of Populations:
• elderly

• children

• poor

• students

• the needy

• peers

• 20-somethings

• new parents

• the forgotten populations (immigrants, incarcerated, homeless, mentally ill, etc.)

• who else?…

Assess how your TALENTS and SKILLS play into your past service decision.

• What sort of technological knowledge, special skill, unique experience, or centering insight makes certain kinds of service easier?

• What is your “backstory”? Your backstory tends to shift you toward you purpose.

The next step is “P”…come back soon.

Do you know anyone who’s struggling finding purpose, or feels “off-track”? Pass this along!

Finding Your Purpose: Using the WISP method (part II)

Here we are at PART II.

If you didn’t read the first post in the series,
it’s the important first step.

You don’t want the ISP method. That would be weird. :)

 

Read about the “W” by clicking HERE.

journal

As I’ve studied transformation and purpose I’ve noticed there seems to be something slippery about it. Sometimes we can feel derailed or question our purpose. It’s rather ordinary, in fact.

The famous people in the Bible went though times of doubt and I’m glad those ancient accounts are included because it helps to know that the human condition is rife with slumps, bumps, murky waters, aimless wilderness periods, and questions about what we should be doing on this “Big Blue Marble”.

 

We tend to see these periods of purposelessness or doubt as problems instead of as part of the journey.

The WISP technique is something I came up with to keep me on track.

I find that keeping a notebook of the process makes it much simpler.

 

Did you do your homework?
Make sure you do it before you encounter the next step, okay?

 

STEP 2

“I”

Inquiry

 

General inquiry is not what the “I” in WISP is about.

This step of the process helps to loosen our firm grip on seeing and directing our lives as usual.

This type of inquiry:

  • is one of faith
  • leaves some open-end questions up in the air, for now
  • digs down deeper into underlying blocks and fears
  • taps into a greater understanding of human purpose and how to get there

For this step, you get your handy-dandy notebook out and start by making a list of all the questions you have on your mind right now. What’s bothering you?

Write. It. Down.

There may be many questions. Just get started. Write as much as you can for about 10 minutes.

As you write them out you will find that categories or patterns emerge. If you don’t, let the questions sit and add more in a day or so. Then, look again. If you still don’t see patterns, ask for help from someone you trust.

Examples of possible inquiry/question patterns:

  • What can I do that I love that will provide enough money right now?
  • What have I enjoyed doing the most and what happened during those times?
  • What will it take to get prepared for the next leg and how will I pay for it?
  • What caused my last failure and how could I have prepared better?
  • What is bothering me about Mr [So & so]’s success?

 

Do you see the pattern that started to emerge here?

It’s Money.
Fear of failure and jealousy are cropping up too. All good to see.

When we put down our burning questions our fears will be revealed.

 

Our fears cloud the way to finding our purpose, but…

“The remarkable thing is that our fears themselves are not the obstacles but the vehicles that lead to finding and fulfilling our purpose.” -LD

Example:

Josie finds it hard to find her purpose. She’s been unhappy at her job and wants to make a bigger difference in the world. 

Through inquiry she locates the root of her fears, and realizes that her compassion for the intellectually disabled is because of her own story.

She always felt stupid in school. A learning disability made it hard for her to read in first grade. Eventually, she did well in school, but the fear of not being smart enough still distracts her and clouds the pursuits of her greater purpose.

Josie’s purpose lies in working closely with this population.

Upon realizing this, Josie sets out with new verve to get experience and the additional skills needed to find other more meaningful work and accomplish her greater purpose. She creates goals to get there.

Goals are measurable. Wishes are not.

During a period of inquiry we may inquire of God and others we trust, too, but we have to do our hard work ourselves, and not cop out.

If we ask questions of them, we have to be prepared to both listen without judgment and superimposing our wishes and agenda (for the time being), but also we need remove the weeds from all that we are hearing get to the best and most useful parts for the next step. No ACTION is required, just honest inquiry, awareness, and digging around.

In this stage, answering all the questions isn’t as important as having the guts to ask them honestly.

The next step is “S”.

(scroll down)

 

Sometimes just doing the first two steps will create a breakthrough. You may have found your purpose already. If that happened, I encourage you to see the whole method through regardless. If you find yourself closer to understanding your purpose right now, that’s great, but you’ll be surprised by the next two Steps, and you shouldn’t miss out on them.

 

HOMEWORK:

Make your inquiry list.

You don’t have to answers the questions yet, just put them out there.

Let them percolate for a few days and then return to them. 

Note what patterns emerge. Add new questions.

See what new perspective you come up with.

Click for the next post here.

 

Finding your PURPOSE: 4 Surprising Ways

Creative Commons photo
Creative Commons photo

Today, I’m sharing with you my thoughts and draft notes as I prepare a talk.

 

If you’re getting stuck and feeling like you can’t find your purpose, or if you thought you knew your purpose and now you don’t really–don’t worry.

Although your basic human purpose changes very little, the details can change at different stages in life or in different circumstances. You are normal.

If you don’t know this bit about the shifts of purpose, you can go through dark periods needlessly and have longer slumps. Well, enough of that!

The WISP technique is something I came up with to keep me on track.

Not that there could be a “technique” per se.

Think of it as a rule of thumb or guide, if that helps.

Do you have a notebook?

Grab one.

Purpose – the finding and keeping of it – can be slippery. So, field notes help.

Keep track of your progress. It gives you a structure and a history to check on.

 

STEP 1

W

Worship

Does this sound a bit odd? Worship.
The more odd it sounds to you as a starting point, the more you need to do it to get properly orientated straight-away.

Worship is other focused, by nature. Yes?

That new perspective alone can help you make a break-through. But, really it’s much more than that at work.

“As we worship a fundamental shift happens because we remember who we really are.” -LD

At first blush it seems like worship is for God, because he is owed our worship. True?

That’s really only part of it. Let’s dig deeper:

1. God doesn’t need ANYTHING from us. He’s not insecure.

2. This means that Worship is to him (or toward him), but for OUR benefit.

To put it simply, God commands us to worship him because he wants it to be well with us.

[He knows we need it. Sure it’s his due, but he’s not an egomaniac. He’s always been taking care of us, even through the vehicle of worshipping him.]

When we fail to worship God, we start to worship lesser gods, like…ourselves, other mortals, our ambitions, the gods of the secular, dying world, and countless vanities.

Astray is where we go without properly directed worship.

Few things can create more clarity than a rightly worshipful heart.

• Clarity is a byproduct of worship and so are many other positive things I won’t get into this time.

 

Remember what Worshiping God helps us remember:

  • Who we are
  • Who we love (and who loves us)
  • And to whom we belong

 

 

Don’t feel like worshiping?…well you have to start somewhere.

Loosen your grip on your desires and expectations until you finish this stage. Shift your posture and you will find a new take on your life and on your purpose.

Back to that Handy-dandy Notebook!

(Shout out to Dora the Explorer)

Note feelings, changes, attitudes in your field notes now and during worship.  

 

So where or how should you start in worship?

You can start with something that tends to speak to you and get through to you. What worked before? Start there and keep pushing through. Maybe you’ll find something new or maybe something familiar will help.

OPTIONS:

For some this may mean getting a true break from others and a return and appreciation of the created world. (A walk, a camping trip, a hike, a solo picnic.)

For some it’s music and song. (Just listen, create some, or sing along.)

For some it’s just praying for a while. (It’s talking to God, so it’s a great place to start, if possible.)

For some it’s a with the help of a spiritual exercise like… “Praying the Names of God”

Here’s a quick “course” on how it works:
“Praying the names of God” is to first, come up with 10, 20, or 100 names of God. There are plenty: Savior, Redeemer, Creator, Father, Shepherd, Mother Hen, Majestic…you get the idea. As you say, write, and pray the names, roll them over in your mind. What do they mean? Let them affect you, be thankful and rejoice, and (of course) express your thanks and gratitude to God in prayer…which would be the actual worshiping part.

Example: “God you are my Provider. You have taken care of me and continue to. I thank you for providing for me, even in ways I don’t now about. God you are my Rock…”

Reading the Bible might help trigger true worship. Reading the psalms or the great Bible stories like the one of Joseph can inspire a true attitude of worship. You can read using the practice of Lectio Divina for some extra punch too. As you read thorough a portion, note the works or wonders of God, and pray about them, giving glory to God. Worship.

 

Maybe you have other ways to get the worship started. So, just get started!

 

HOMEWORK!

You thought this was just some quick reading or some mental exercise, huh?

Nope. I’m asking more of you.

Assignment:

Use a notebook to record your mode of worship and your attitude at the start, during the time of worship, and afterwards. Then, continue to enter into times of short (5-15 minutes) and uninterrupted worship experience for a few days, or until the next post (which ever is longer).

Next post we will continue and with I in WISP

Click Here 

Essay on Youth

Some of my thoughts on youth, now that it’s in the rear view mirror.

Youth: a chronic condition that ends in time.

CC file found here
teen star (CC file found here)

The stage of Youth: A time characterized by excitement, worry, hope, fear, misplaced confidence, and options (plenty of which are set to expire).

Nothing breathes fresh air into a situation like an eager youth ready to learn, try, fail, and keep trying. It inspires the younger ones and rallies the older ones.

Nothing is more endearing than a youth who prizes earlier generations and lacks the blinding hubris typical to the stage of the development.

and to the god of our age….Youth, Oh the beauty of it. Personified, Venus, her name. (Youthful Beauty…or what nearly every commercial directed at females is about.)

Like a baby unblemished and without scars, youth displays itself on the young like a pillar of potential, a stack of dreams and promises, shinning and magnificent, and frozen for just that moment in time. Though what youth feels this truly? Youth is a self-deluding time: The stage seems expansive when you are in it, and experience can’t bear this out differently because of the great lack of it.

Sustaining this impossibility of sustained youth, this age of supposed perfection becomes the futile and bitter plight for too many. And the fight for it is nonsensical.

Youth is a stage to be enjoyed and then left behind like outgrown clothes, once pristine, but all-too-soon ill-fitting and inappropriate for the rest of the voyage. Ballet slippers are shed for work boots.

How true that Youthful beauty is but one kind. Though who knows this?

By being convinced that beauty has a pinnacle (age 21?) too may rue the loss of this exterior sort of it–never realizing the false conception is not based on much more than societal conventions and symmetry…but it sells a lot of face cream, doesn’t it?

Yes, the flower of spring is glorious (youth indeed), but the whole plant, or tree, is the greater thing. An oak, a tower in homage to resilience, humanity in the full, of which youthful can never assail, let alone master.

The joy and glory of youth is the promise of accomplishment. Like graduation ceremonies and semi-finals matches.

Though what youth sees it this way?

And what about the resentment of youth by the no longer young?
Maybe it stems from the regret of the energy and options lost. The verve the youths possess can seem enviable. Though they (youth) don’t know it, their blatant inexperience and lack of wisdom, from the outside, seems pitiful, just like the weakness and lethargy of advanced years seem like that to the youth.

“What a young fool,” says the man.

“What a tired and bitter old man,” says the youth.

Both under-estimated.

And back to confidence.

Youthful confidence rests in that accomplishments are assured with effort and willingness. (Though it seems different to them sometimes. For them, confidence may rest mainly in feeling the power of mind and body so fully.)

This confidence is often shattered or dismantled within a decade because of the slings and arrows of life. But occasionally not, and never for the narcissist.

Sickness, financial strain, mishaps, circumstances, failure, and the most debilitating – early success – strip out the potency of youthful confidence. With persistence and determination this is replaced by the better things:

  • stability of character
  • the resolution of will 
  • fortitude of spirit

But, best of all: the of acquisition compassion necessary for the species to survive, or even–sometimes– thrive.

(Oh, that it is empathic compassion, not pity, is the impetus for acts of goodness.)

And what of maturity of the youth? 

A mature youth is only mature compared to his peers or the fools of older generations.

And for good reason. Maturity is a gift, not a certainty. It comes through time, but also by Grace, just as youth and health come. Though who knows this?

A “mature youth” is usually an oxymoronic attribute, as genuine maturity involves accumulating wisdom.

Maturity and wisdom come through testing and testing by the passage of time well-lived and the battles of life well-tested.

Youthful maturity is then only the bud of it which, if it is there at all, is necessarily nestled in humility (knowing well, or in some good manner, the terrible disadvantage of inexperience).

In the end, the unknown exists for all, but the degrees and varieties of it change as time passes and aging happens. Both exciting and terrifying–needing courage and inner strength.

It goes in stages from

“What will I become?”

to

“What will become of me, and us all?”

 

On Camping and “The Chatter of the Mind”

boating

For the last 10 years in a row, we’ve gone to Camp Swatara to…almost rough it as a family.

We just got back yesterday afternoon and began the de-camping process. 6 loads of laundry and putting things away for 3 hours. It’s more tiring than camping, and camping includes foraging for firewood to sustain your life.

For the first time, I didn’t take a single picture of our time away. (The photo above is from the camp website. It’s nondescript enough to resemble us.) It seems strange that I didn’t take any now that it’s done.

It’s an interruption to take photos sometimes, so honestly, I didn’t even think about it. My mind was chattering and I was more “in the moment”.

Later, off course, the photos come in handy to help you remember what happened. Right now, I think I remember something about killing 30 flies with the swatter and the surge of gratification that gave me–and something about S’mores.

 

My least favorite things about camping:

1. Too much humidity (Towels dry outside on the clothesline….never.)

2. Feeling covered in dirt and sweat 95% of the time

3. Feeling covered in sunscreen and bug spray over the layers of dirt and sweat

4. Bugs and all sort of biting and buzzing insects

5. Walking outdoors to use the indoor bathroom facilities

6. Thin mattresses that cause aches and pains

7. The hyper-vilgilengce about poison ivy and occasionally getting it.

(It all sounds like a dream-come-true, right?)

 

(some of) My most favorite things about camp

1. Having friends visit

2. The hospitality inherent in the camping community (sharing, chatting by the fire, friendly greetings as you walk around)

3. Family togetherness. Yes, it’s forced on you, but you can really start to enjoy it, usually.

4. The way things smell when the dew evaporates off the leaves in the morning.

5. How the day eases into the night and the darkness that comes to ease you into sleeping

6. Overcoming crisis together. Yes, it’s pretty awful at the time, but great memories and bonding come later.

7. Making fire and cooking with it, or using the firepit as a homing device. It’s hypnotic and primal and warm.

8. The refinement that happens when you realize what you truly need, compare to what you think you need. It turns out that you want things you don’t need.

What you really need: water, food, dry shelter and clothing, each other. What you think you need: a faster laptop.

 

In the end, you have kids that look forward very happily to the time away, and two parents (me and Tim, obviously) who are happy it’s part of our summertime, even though the whole process is challenging.

It’s actually the challenge that creates the satisfaction later, but you don’t know that unless you try it the whole way through.

If you aren’t psychologically ready to endure, you can get bitter or regretful (…um…so I’ve heard). Plus, it’s a dry camp, so there’s no wine to easy you into it.

 

The other thing is that intact families tend to camp together. I didn’t have this growing up and it’s a gift I give my children and myself now.

Yes, sometimes “split-up” families camp, too. But, mine didn’t.

Usually broken up families have a lot more scheduling issues and conflicts. Camping as an activity gets pushed to the side, unless you are very dedicated about it and keep it up.

 

And then there’s the Chatter of the Mind

And sometimes, though not this time, I get to hear less from the planning and inner monologue part of my “chattering mind”.

In general, this chatter may be telling you that you forgot ziplock bags at home or that, or that despite your efforts, you really aren’t worth much in the world, or that you should have cleaned out the vacuum filter more thoroughly, or that you made a mistake in explaining something, or that the people you were just talking to think poorly of you, or that you have to cook something that requires 14 steps… and how will be working out anyway, or the plans for the afternoon and where and how to apply sunscreen properly for it, or any number of things.

There isn’t much quiet in and about our minds, and not for very long. 

It’s called thinking. It can be incessant. It’s not just me, right?

If you finally reach that place in time and space where the chatter dies down, it’s almost deafening, actually. At first.

It tends to happen, not on family camping trips, but when I retreat away from home and I go alone. After 2-3 hours of intensional quietness–dialing down everything things improve. But that’s only when I’m being disciplined about getting away and pushing every nuisance thought back, or submitting it to paper, each time one surfaces. If not, it can take days, and too often never happens at all.

And after you tamp down or divert each thought pelting your brain you realize you’ve been breathing all wrong for much too long. You haven’t been able to separate the planning from the enjoying and looking around. You’ve forgotten the things you love or you have not noticed the things you should.

It doesn’t happen all at once that the chatter starts bullying you, but it happens.

(To come to my next retreat trip, click here.)

The chatter is an adversary that comes in pretending to be helpful and careful, as if it has your best interests in mind. But really, it’s just making you weary by using up too much valuable “mental RAM”, like (foolishly) running windows on top of a Mac Operating System.

How’s your mental RAM these days, anyway? Up to snuff?

Can you remember the last time you didn’t experience “the chatter of your mind” for some length of time?

(If you’re thinking about that now, or much of anything, then now is not one of those times.)

And if settling it all down sounds too close to death, then it’s been too long.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on it.