At its core, the idea of purpose is the idea that what we do matters to people other than ourselves. … In my “grit lexicon,” therefore, purpose means to contribute to the well-being of others.*
Angela Duckworth

I found that my purpose began
with an irritating question:
What do I do well and should focus on?

It’s a question I have asked in a refining
way over many years, and
it has led me to focus on helping others
find their purpose.

*Angela Duckworth’s Grit.

Explorers were always lost because they had never been to places before.  They never expected to know where they were.*
Aaron Sachs

*Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost.

Always have the courage
To change, welcoming those voices
That call you beyond your self.*
John O’Donohue

Living things must change on order to stay the same. Or more precisely, living things must change to remain themselves. … Life is the ongoing process of self-making. It is that which continuously changes itself in order to continue being itself.**
David Rome

We change to remain ourselves because
within each of us lie many possibilities,
Many futures:
In a word:
one ought to turn the most extreme
possibility inside oneself into
the measure for one’s life,
for our life is vast and
can accommodate as much
future as we are
able to carry.^

Where to begin?

How about identifying that
most extreme possibility
within you,
And imagining its smallest iteration so that you can
do it.

*John O’Donohue’s Benedictus: At the Threshold of Manhood;
**David Rome’s Your Body Knows the Answer;
^Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters on Life.

This is how it works. Each morning I take a running leap and I dive into words. I hunt under the surface for the right ones and emerge with the catch. … A daily practice. My meditation.*
Lemn Sissay

We live our lives so poorly because we arrive in the present always unprepared, incapable and too distracted for everything.**
Rainer Maria Rilke

How might we awaken to the infinite
at the beginning of the day?:
how to contain the serious within the playful;
that is,
to keep all our finite games in infinite play.^

Together with my porridge,
I dive into ideas,
Like the BFG gathering dreams:
Every morning I is going out
and snitching new dreams
to put in my bottles.^^

Some write their morning pages
to connect with what they love,
Their infinite,
Others use the time between home and work
to reconnect with what matters most to them.

It’s not about the time spent,
Or the method used,
But providing ourselves with
the gift of preparation.

*Lemn Sissay’s let the light pour in;
**Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters on Life:
^James Carse’s Finite and Infinite Games;
^^Roald Dahl’s The BFG.

Awe is the emotion we experience when we encounter vast mysteries that we don’t understand.**
Dacher Keltner

Thus, awe’s ability to increase compassion and altruism appears to be one of the core reasons for its prominent place in our emotional repertoire.^
Jonah Paquette

I love questions,
And the adventures they open before me,
But I am appreciating more
the important part that
mystery
has to play within my life,
As Lao Tzu pens so well:
From wonder into wonder,
existence opens.*

Joseph Campbell would tell us that
this relates to the metaphysical function of myths,
A connecting with the ground of our being –
The other three functions being the
cosmological, sociological, and pedagogical;
Indeed, we might connect awe as
a benefit to each of these:
At the universe science is opening up to us,
In the exploration of human connectedness, and,
By inspiring and guiding us through the stages,
Or non-linearity, of our lives.

*Len Sweet’s Out of the Question … Into the Mystery;
**Dacher Keltner’s Awe;
^Jonah Paquette’s Awestruck.

There are a million different things that bug billions of different people … so the bugs that stick out to you might be worth listening to. They’re your bugs. They just might be guiding you toward your proper path.*
Gabe Anderson

When a musician, a playwright or an entrepreneur takes a risk, they’re betting someone will care enough to hear them and engage with them. They do the work because they care, not because someone handed them a manual.**
Seth Godin

Are you waiting for someone else to
come along and
do something
about that thing you can’t help but
notice?

Whether it’s something that
really gets on your nerves, or
you’ve always wanted to do,
Don’t wait, find
the smallest way for doing something about it
today.

It’s how I got into
dreamwhispering, and today
I will be with a small crowd of people
in the university I’m about to retire from, who are
wanting to see whether they can
connect it with their work
in some way or other.

How will you go about finding that thing
the nature of which is totally unknown to you?^

*Gabe Anderson’s blog: Things That Bug You;
**Seth Godin’s blog: But it matters a lot to them …;
^Meno, from Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost.

Going through a ritual every day keeps you on the line.*
Joseph Campbell

The world has become too fast, too loud, too much.**
Jenn Granneman and Andre Sólo

When I say find your story,
I don’t so much mean that it’s lost,
More that it’s covered up;
And it’s not difficult to uncover,
It will just need you to
slow down so that you can notice
some things.

These things will show you
your story, and within it,
Plenty of rites and rituals
to shape the day
towards you
rather than away from you.

*Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers’ The Power of Myth;
**Jenn Granneman and Andre Sólo’s Sensitive.

If we overemphasise talent, we underemphasise everything else.*
Angela Duckworth

Getting hit by lightening, finding the perfect job, having a djuini grant three wishes – these are all lotteries. … The problem with lottery thinking is that it takes us away from thinking about the chronic stuff instead. The pervasive, consistent challenge that will respond to committed effort.**
Seth Godin

We can be wowed by a person’s talents, but
faithfulness is bigger, requiring talent and
a good heart and
effort over time and distance.

It’s not perfect,
And that’s okay because
it want to keep going and going,
One small expression of humility and
gratitude after another.

Every little action toward your Future Self
is you more fully being your Future Self
now.^

*Angela Duckworth’s Grit;
**Seth Godin’s blog: Lottery thinking;
^Ben Hardy’s Be Your Future Self Now.

That as we enjoy great Advantages from the Inventions of Others, we should be glad of an Opportunity to serve others by any Invention of ours, and this we should do freely and generously.*
Benjamin Franklin

We were living the process as we were creating it.*
Joseph Jaworski

It’s likely that any great Ideas
we have are
based on those of others,
And when we share our ideas and
move them into action, they become
bigger, better –
It’s a win/win.

Lift is created by the onwards rush of life
over the curved wing of the soul.^

*Lewis Hyde’s Common As Air;
**Joseph Jaworski’s Source;
^Robert Macfarlane’s The Old Ways.

The dream of convenience is premised on the nightmare of physical work.  But is physical work always a nightmare? […] Perhaps our humanity is sometimes expressed in inconvenient actions and time-consuming pursuits.*
Seth Godin

There are lots of people in the world who stand to benefit
from convenience;
Not only those who want to sell a product that
makes life easier,
But also those who want us to buy into
an idea that gains them followers and power –
Be it political, commercial, entertainment, sporting, or
that baffling category of fame in being a celebrity.

Literacy is not so convenient,
A human superpower long fought for,
So that the world might be a commonwealth
rather than hegemony;
Reflection is also inconvenient,
As are its siblings Silence and Solitude,
And yet,
Here is born goodness.

Here Are three inconvenient books
whose authors I feel are writing off similar things,
And which I came upon again in my
reading, reflecting and journaling this morning:
Lewis Hyde’s Trickster Makes This World,
Clarissa Pinkola Estés’ Women Who Run With the Wolves,
James Carse’s Finite and Infinite Games.

My sacred space became
the rolling fire of imagination.**

*Seth Godin’s The Carbon Almanac;
**Nick Cave’s blog: The Red Hand Files #192.