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More useful than LIFE PURPOSE

People often wonder about and search for their life purpose.  Why am I here?  What am I supposed to do?  What is my niche?  Where do I really fit in?

I believe that there is something that is both much easier to find and much more useful – your Personal Mission Statement .

The people that I have talked to about this, people who were looking for their life purpose, were easily able to identify their personal mission statement.

A life purpose defines you in a certain niche, a certain area.  If my life purpose is to be a teacher then what am I supposed to do in those times when I’m not teaching?  I’m kind of lost and have lost my foundation.

Your personal mission statement crosses all contexts and is with you always.

My personal mission statement is:  My job here is to make people’s lives better.  "Here" is wherever I’m at.  If I’m talking to a group, my job is to make their lives better.  If I’m in line at the grocery store, my job is to make people’s lives better.  Writing this post, my job is to make people’s lives better.

The personal mission statement gives me a solid foundation on which to stand.  It gives meaning and purpose to whatever it is that I am doing.  It makes me more resourceful and stronger.

Recently I was playing doubles sand volleyball. On the court next to us were 4 young 20-something studs.  I have more body fat then all 4 of these guys combined and they were also really good players.

For whatever reasons, I started feeling insecure and old.  I was able to witness this silly thinking but not able to get over it.  Then I remembered my personal mission statement.  I realized that I was not making the 4 young stud’s lives any better.  I was not making the lives of the 3 guys I was playing volleyball with any better and I certainly was not making my life any better.  I was able to get over it immediately as soon as I remembered my personal mission statement.

A friend of mine is an artist and a bodywork practitioner.  She was not very comfortable asking people for business.  That’s because she thought she was asking for the sale and for their money.  After we did a little work to uncover her personal mission statement, she realized that she was really asking people if they wanted to be inspired.  Obviously these are two very different asks.  Her personal mission statement is about bringing inspiration to people.  Her bodywork and her art are simply vehicles for bringing that inspiration.

I talked with a woman today who has a network marketing business.  She’s been trying to figure out her "why" for doing the business for a while now. I suggested that instead of a "why" let’s look for a personal mission statement.

I said to her that she probably already knew what her personal mission statement is but just does not know that she knows.  Within a couple of minutes she had the bones of it – empowering women to live more fulfilling lives.

This gave here a completely different place to conduct business from.  It empowered her.  Doing business is not about getting a new client or distributor any more.  It’s about empowering women.

What is your personal mission statement?