Finding My Way to Why

Have you ever felt upside down but not sure if you are going down or up? Felt like you have been striving for the top to only find out you were going in the wrong direction? If you don't have a "definite purpose of being" as described by Napoleon Hill, sometimes it takes a longer time to correct your course. I can attest to that personally and my goal today is to help others with their why as I continue to understand and fully embrace my purpose or "why". I say mold and embrace because, at least for me, my understanding grows daily with what I learn and who I surround myself with. My why started small with my children. My 2 boys push me daily because I don't want them to have the same hardships I have had in life (like most parents I know) and I want to best prepare them for what they might not be ready for.

Now, I still haven’t shared my why, because there is more to it than just my children, but they were the catalyst on my way to why. ?My journey continued in a self-awareness path, reading, listening, and learning how to find my why. And almost all of those teachers/methods pointed me to first better understand and “know thyself”.?This was extremely uncomfortable because I had to face some unsavory truths about how I processed different scenarios and/or (too often than I’d like to admit) shut down in the face of adversity.?See, I have faced (what I considered) a multitude of failures in life, from losing my college scholarship to being fired from jobs to getting a divorce. What I didn’t realize is how I let them influence my decision making.?I wasn’t learning from my experiences. When I would face something new and different (and because everything I most recently experienced seemed to be absolute failures) I would start to fall back on those bad memories and shy away from the new and different. Even though I wasn’t succeeding, hiding away and moping about my situation seemed to be the easier solution (and it got to be very easy).?

Now, I am still growing and working to be more aware of myself and my actions, but once I started to realize what I was doing in the face of change, I understood I had to start doing something different, but how? I thought I knew my why earlier in life. I was a sales leader everywhere I went and often found myself moving up the management ladder. But the only “why” I had was to enjoy as much as I could in my free time.?Without directions I squanders some opportunities and wasted my money.?Well, it’s hard to stay motivated daily without a strong “why”, or, as Simon Sinek put it, “the compelling higher purpose that inspires us and acts as the source of all we do.”?Again, it wasn’t overnight, but as I learned more about myself and what lead me to my actions, I started to understand that I had to break that cycle not only for my children, but for my own well-being.?

And from there my why started to emerge. I started seeking out more knowledge and information to better understand myself. John Maxwell, in his book, Intentional Living: Choosing a Life That Matters, asks us to answer 3 question to help find our why: 1) What makes me cry? 2) What makes me sing? 3)What do I dream about? For everyone that is different because we all are different. For me, after looking back and realizing those things in my life, I realized my why, to offer what I can for others, through my work, my actions, and my words so that I can give them the knowledge and ability to be better and do more than they realized.?