Last week, I wrote about taking inventory and pinpointing what's out of balance instead of making hard and fast resolutions. But, after a conversation this week, I realized this might be impossible for some people, particularly those who are struggling with deep grief or other hardship. How can we take inventory when we can't even find a purpose?
We've all felt this at some point in our lives: Why? Why are we here? Why bother? And unfortunately, we're too often told to look to others to answer these questions. When we're feeling low, we're encouraged to shift our focus on to our loved ones and think about them instead. But is that truly what works?
I actually propose something very different. When people are at their lowest, they often feel that their headspace or even their very existence is a burden to others. I'm going to draw from a big ol' cliché here but think of the film "It's a Wonderful Life." At his worst moment, George Bailey believed he was worth more dead than alive because of his life insurance policy. But the true turning point of the movie wasn't about guilting or shaming George into finding purpose. Instead, it was about helping him find the value in his own life and his reasons for being. The truly noteworthy points of the film, to me, weren't about seeing his kids singing happily at the end - it was seeing George's face when he realized just how much his friendship meant to Violet and what her life would have been without someone as compassionate as him.
Now, if you haven't seen that film this might not make any sense but finding purpose and really understanding our value is doable for us all, though admittedly difficult at times. When I work with clients, one of the first things I ask is what they love about their lives. To date, no one has included themselves in their replies. And that may seem obvious - after all, I didn't ask what they love about themselves - but what people tend to miss is that THEY are the lynchpin holding it all together. Think about it for a moment: if you rattle off what you love about your life, what is the one common denominator? YOU.
Take that deep understanding and sit with it for a moment. All of those things you love wouldn't be the extraordinarily lovable things if you weren't a part of them. From there, draw the lens out just a little more and ask why. What unique talents, perspectives, or understandings do you have already that enable you to appreciate and love everything you listed?
This may seem like a very small exercise, but it's the small things that help us find purpose and value.
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