Cultivating a Sense of Purpose
The Cornell University psychologist Anthony Burrow has spent most of his career researching how cultivating a sense of purpose in life can improve our lives in a variety of ways, making us happier, healthier, wealthier, and even more attractive to others. Those who lack purpose often have a sense of despair about their lives, feeling that their lives lack meaning. Those who have a sense of purpose, on the other hand, feel that their lives are meaningful and worth living. Having a sense of purpose is more than just reaching a series of disparate goals, but rather is about having your goals ordered by some larger purpose that governs our lives. Reaching a goal may make us temporarily happy, but if that goal isn’t part of a larger purpose we soon find ourselves drifting aimlessly. A crucial aspect of purpose in life is that it is internally driven; it has to come from within and be something that one gives to oneself. A lack of purpose can afflict us at all stages of our lives. Adolescents, parents, and people in the prime of life or in the final years of life can all struggle to find purpose in life. Burrow’s research suggests that we don’t discover our purpose in life but rather create it. Do you feel your life has a sense of direction? Are the daily activities of your life engaging? The answer to these questions is obviously subjective; whether you have a sense of purpose is up to you and how you feel about your life. “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” – Victor Frankl – Christopher Simon
