What is the most important thing in one's life?
Should someone ask this question to me, my one word answer
to it would be: "Purpose". In my opinion, everything else is
insignificant.
Consider any event, activity or action; if there is no purpose,
it seems illogical and futile. In other words, if any action is purposeless, it
is pointless doing it. It is like hanging by a rope and moving hands and legs
thinking you are flying. What's the sense in doing that? (Of course unless you
are shooting for a movie - but then there is a purpose!) If you are interacting
with someone, share your purpose for your action. It is the best negotiation
tool. And it leads to a win-win situation. This much is the power of a purpose.
You take care of the whys of others and they will take care of the hows for
you.
The most important action on this planet is living a life.
And that is why the most mysterious question for any human ever has been is,
"What is the purpose of my life?” There comes a moment in everyone's life
when he asks himself this question. There comes a stage when he thinks about
why he is born in this world. Even Buddha has said, "Your purpose in life
is to find your purpose and give your whole heart and soul to it."
They say, "Purpose of life is a life of a
purpose." I say, "Purpose of action is an action of purpose." If
you are dancing for fun, dance and have fun. Focus only on having fun through
dancing. Rest is unnecessary and unimportant. Zen philosophy doesn't confuse
spirituality with thinking about God while peeling potatoes. Zen spirituality
is just to peel potatoes. If you do this, and I know you can, you don't have to
be serious about anything, ever. Then each activity will become enjoyable.
Everything is done with a purpose of achieving a desired
goal and we just have to make sure that the goal is to flourish or to excel in
our desired fields as well as the happiness of every other individual,
regardless of our relationship with them. It's because we are not here from
somewhere else. We are here since forever. We are eternal part of this
universe. So all we need to do is, as Pablo Picasso has said, "Find your
natural gift and then give it away", to make the world happier and
peaceful place to live.
How to find a purpose?
I believe, only introspection can help us to find our
innermost reasons for living and the simple answer lies within ourselves. Life
is a creative process. We have a free will of choosing our ways. If
you don't have a concrete purpose right now, and you really want to find it,
make one! Any one! Make a resolution, promise yourself to behave
patiently and with humility with others and to perform better than your
previous performance in every activity.
In my opinion, if you make "habit of improvement"
your purpose, you won't need any other purpose for the rest of your life. Once
you make "continuous improvement" your purpose for everything you do
(Japanese call this "Kaizen"), you will grow in every front of life.
Whether you are leading a project or managing a team,
whether you want to learn handling conflicts or improve communication skills,
whether you want to learn swimming or singing or dancing or skating or cooking,
whether you want to make a lean and muscular physique or want an organized,
focused and calm mental state, make "continuous improvement" your
only purpose. Say this to yourself every day, "I improve myself at
anything and everything I do. And I do it for myself."
Once you make this a habit, you can't get out of this
continuous cycle.
First loop of this cycle is a little bigger than the
consecutive ones, which repeat itself. This cycle conveys that once improvement
becomes your habit, all you need to do is to make a choice and your job is done
because you know you improve yourself at everything you do. Now you are so
confident that if you take any task on hand, you are going to nail it.
Superbly! Now you know you can do everything. You just have to give it a shot.
Start from here and then introspect. Goals should match the
state of development of the individual and society. According to Hindu
religion, there are four possible aims to human life called "purushartha" (meaning efforts)
namely, Kama (wish, desire, love and sensual pleasure), Artha (wealth, prosperity, glory), Dharma (righteousness, duty, morality, virtue, ethics,
non-violence, truth) and Moksha
(liberation i.e. liberation from the cycle of reincarnation). In short, the
goal is to realize the fundamental truth about oneself. Tat-Tvam-Asi (Thou art that) says you are the reason behind all actions.
Then why not be a reason for something great?
I believe, a person should be valued on the basis of his values.
Once you take the ownership of your actions, you will attain
a great sense of achievement and satisfaction. You will have balanced state of
mind with serene calmness even when results fall shorter than expected. And
next time you will be better and mature.
Let us choose our action so wisely that this world becomes a
habitat of happily living creatures and Mother Nature will bless us with her
free flowing love!
Stay Happy!
