Hello Fabulous Women!
Busy busy busy — running, creating, building your business, your family, your home, your life? Feels like a hamster wheel sometimes, doesn’t it?
As human beings, especially in our culture, we are so focused on doing doing doing all the time that we sometimes lose track of Why we are doing all this! And without that sense of why – our sense of purpose – all the doing in the world just never seems to get us where we want to go, does it?
I’ve been on the hamster wheel of doing doing doing without much sense of purpose myself lately. Yes, me, the On Track and On Purpose woman, the women’s business coach, the one who says, “You could wake me up from a sound sleep at 3AM and ask me what my purpose is, and I could tell you without missing a beat.” Well, that’s true, I could, but the fact is I haven’t exactly been feeling it lately all day long. What’s the point of being able to speak my purpose at 3AM (like that’s ever going to happen!) if I’m not connecting to it at 3PM, or most of the rest of the day either?
My purpose is to inspire and empower people to discover and fulfill their purpose in life, and to do it with passion, ease and joy.
For the past couple of days, I have to admit I have not been much connected to that purpose. I’ve been running around doing this, that and the other thing – and instead of feeling purposeful and effective and happy, instead I’ve been feeling overwhelmed, disconnected and, well, unhappy.
Any of you relating to this?
You’d think I’d know better, wouldn’t you?
Well, I do know better, and enough of this! Everything I’ve been doing these past couple of days could have been done with a sense of purpose, so why wasn’t it? I was caring for my children, dealing with tenants (I’m a landlord, too), coaching current and prospective clients, taking care of my house, etc. These are all important and valuable things that are totally consistent with my purpose. And to give myself credit, all of the time I was coaching clients and at least some of the time I spent with my kids was filled with a sense of purpose and therefore was inspiring and fulfilling for me.
But that’s just not enough.
Today, I have plenty of things to do, believe me. Business coaching clients, marketing, yardwork and housework, a couple of tenant issues to deal with, calls to make – and so on. I’ve been relating to all of them as simply things to do, without stopping to think Why I am doing them. So today that stops, and I’m taking the time to connect to the Why.
I can do yardwork because it needs to get done – or I can do it because I enjoy creating beauty and order, and because connecting with green and growing things allows me to feel connected to everything around me.
I can work on marketing my business coaching practice because I have to – or because I love talking with people about what matters most to them, creating clarity and connections and knowing I’ve helped someone move forward in their lives.
I can talk to that troublesome tenant because it’s my responsibility – or because I care about what’s going on in her life, and because I take pride in providing people with a safe and pleasant place to live.
The more I start looking at it from Why instead of What, the easier – and the more fun! – it all sounds. Amazing what a little sense of purpose will do to a busy day!
I invite you to do the same – take a look at that list of things to do and ask yourself Why you are doing them. What purpose could be behind everything you do today? You get to say.
Have a purposeful and inspiring and fun day today.
–Ann
