Being yourself: find out who you are and do it on purpose

Find Out Who You Are and Then Do It On Purpose

When I first read those words from the one and only Dolly Parton, they hit me deep.

My immediate thought: Have I truly found who I am? And if I have, am I living it on purpose? In that moment, I realized how much of what I did was driven by a need to earn others’ love. I wasn’t being the greatest expression of myself at all—let alone doing it on purpose.

In The Great Work of Your Life, Stephen Cope talks about how Robert Frost became the most celebrated poet of his century, with a record four Pulitzer Prizes and the distinction of single-handedly remaking American poetry.

What’s interesting is that Frost’s life mission wasn’t clear from the beginning, like it was for Mozart or Picasso. Rather, he became Robert Frost because of a series of small decisions that aligned him with his voice. As Cope puts it, “he had a gift, of course. But his power came into focus through his commitment to his gift, and through a series of decisive actions taken in support of it.”

Looking back, Frost considered the simple decision to move to a farm in his twenties as the reason for all of his success. Although it didn’t seem to ‘make sense’ at the time, and there wasn’t anything monumental about that decision in the moment, it created the right conditions for him to cultivate his gift. And that made all the difference.

When you look at his most famous poem, Frost himself said that “The Road Not Taken” was written partially as a joke about a friend who often regretted not taking different paths on their walks. With that in mind, the poem is less about which path you take, but rather that you take a path—and you do it on purpose.

Take a long, slow, deep breath in…

Who am I?

Who am I when I am at my best?

What would I do today if I wasn’t trying to earn other people’s love or approval?

Who would I be in my life if I wasn’t trying to earn other people’s love or approval?

How can I be who I am this week, on purpose?

Exhale…