Pursuing a Two-Track Strategy

Many of the people I coach on life purpose issues are in a situation where they need immediate income. They need to get a job pretty quickly to pay the bills, and they also want to find a career that reflects their life purpose.

These are both important goals, but they shouldn’t be mixed up. Frequently I find that people get stuck because they don’t want to settle for a job that doesn’t really reflect their life purpose, but they must find work quickly. This doesn’t leave them the time to truly explore their life purpose and then engage in all the work that usually is required to actualize it.

Most people who truly find their life purpose don’t just go out and get a job doing it. Usually a person’s life purpose is too unique and specialized for there to be a job out there waiting. Most people have to create the job and career that reflects their life purpose. And often they must develop themselves as well. Perhaps they need to enhance their ability as a writer or a healer. Perhaps they need to collaborate on developing a new educational program for disadvantaged youth. Perhaps they need to further their personal or spiritual development. Perhaps they need to create a marketing campaign for themselves as a unique independent practitioner of some sort. Perhaps they need to get additional training or schooling. Perhaps they need to start a new organization that engages in philanthropy or corporate sustainability or water conservation.

All these pursuits take time. They also require that you be able to spend a certain amount of time each week on actualizing your life purpose, perhaps for years.

Therefore, if you need immediate income, it doesn’t pay to mix this with life purpose work. You need to separate out your long-term life purpose plans from your short-term plans for an income-producing job. Some of my clients choose to just go out and get a decent job, and then come back to me to explore their long-term life purpose issues. Others find it is best to pursue a two-track strategy. We explore your life purpose, keeping an eye on both the long-term possibilities that truly reflect your life purpose and the short-term job options that only partly reflect it. Our initial life purpose exploration can apply to both situations. When you have a clear sense of what you enjoy doing and find meaningful, we first sort out the immediate job possibilities that embody some of that. Then you can pursue these jobs right away. I encourage clients to focus on jobs that will allow them enough spare time to devote to their larger life purpose project.

When you are settled in a job that gives you financial stability and some extra time, then we can continue your life purpose explorations with an eye toward finding your true life purpose, even if this takes you years to manifest. Hopefully the immediate job will provide a stepping stone toward the longer goal. But if it doesn’t, it at least provides the financial stability to allow you to pursue your true life purpose over time.

Through using this two-track strategy, you can arrange your life so you can not only find your life purpose, but really make it happen in your life.