Make Your Year Joyful and Meaningful

Determine Your Purpose

The first step towards a meaningful life is figuring out your purpose.

A good place to start is to find your “why.” Start with Why author Simon Sinek suggests that finding the “why” for what you do allows you to live your life on purpose and leads toward fulfilment in your life. Your “why” is your personal purpose, cause, or belief that explains why you do what you do and why you get out of bed in the morning.

To identify your “why” and your purpose, think about what you find important and what makes your life meaningful. Ask yourself what is truly important for you. It could be helping others, supporting your family, creating an innovation to reduce climate change, teaching, your faith, or something else.

To get more ideas, Greater Good writer Jeremy Smith suggests reading about the lives of other people and finding out where they found meaning, so you can be inspired by their lives. Another is to spend time on behaviors such as awe, gratitude and altruism that can foster a sense of purpose. You can also find purpose by getting insights from what people thank you for or writing a narrative helps you see your own strengths.

Good to Great author Jim Collins said he uses a “20-10” assignment. “Suppose you woke up tomorrow and received two phone calls. The first phone call tells you that you have inherited $20 million, no strings attached. The second tells you that you have an incurable and terminal disease, and you have no more than 10 years to live. What would you do differently, and, in particular, what would you stop doing? Ask yourself what you are deeply passionate about and what activities you feel "made to do".

You can use these techniques to develop and idea and then create a short, clear and memorable statement of your purpose.

Turn Purpose into Practice

The next step is developing a roadmap to put that purpose into practice.

To do that, Seven Habits author Stephen Covey suggests, develop a personal mission statement that focuses on what you want to be and do. By looking at your talents and imagining how you’ll use them, you can move towards achieving your mission.

Executive coach Rafael Sarandeses suggests working backwards from your mission statement or purpose statement to create a goal and determine milestones on the path to reaching it. You can then put high-impact actions into your daily, weekly and monthly schedule and set up processes around them. To stay on track, set aside time each week to review what you need to do to push forward.

Having a purpose statement can also help you create a roadmap and then make decisions about what to do or not to do. If you’re asked to do something new, see whether it is essential and fits within your purpose statement. If it doesn’t, decline the opportunity so tyou can focus on your purpose and live a more fulfilling life.

To get help along the way, Duke University suggests finding an accountability partner. “Having an accountability partner can be incredibly beneficial for achieving your goal. An accountability partner checks in regularly and offers motivation during tough times, creating a sense of obligation and fostering a powerful motivation to succeed.”

Along with making your life more meaningful, establishing your purpose can add joy to your life. While joy and happiness may seem similar, they are different. Whereas happiness is an emotional reaction to what is happening around you, “joy is more a state of being," Mayo Clinic Austin chief wellness officer Rebekkah Frunzac suggests. Joy is often driven by internal motivations like working toward a goal or a purpose. People find joy in caring for others, spiritual connections, spending time in nature, learning, activities, relationships or personal empowerment. “While building joy,” Frunzac says, focus your time on things you can control, show appreciation for the things and people around you, and help others.”

Rather than just making a resolution that delivers a temporary change and may easily be forgotten, then, figure out your purpose and align your activities with it to make your life meaningful this year and in the years ahead.

This article was first published in Living in Singapore, https://issuu.com/singaporeame..., page 40.