Hello and welcome to Find Your Way, the podcast. I’m your host Gena McLean, author of the book Find Your Way and writer under the name Seeker and Sage. It’s a joy to be bringing this content to you, and my hope is that it finds its way into your mind and heart, nourishing you and supporting you as you find your way.  

Chapter 3 lead with purpose. 

Purpose is not just about the big picture or the meaningful goal. Every day we have the opportunity to live and lead with purpose. 

The first entry I’d like to share from this chapter is a brief one, but a really really valid one. And it’s one that I have struggled with so many times in my life and it’s on page 78 and it’s called your life needs you. 

If we want to live a rich and happy life, we must show up for ourselves. We must dare to be brave and vulnerable, conscious and committed – connected to ourselves to our path and to life. 

Our fulfillment depends on it. 

When we fall into the trap of living for others, we inadvertently put ourselves last. Our needs and dreams go unattended and we wonder where the longing and emptiness comes from. Resentment builds from the self-neglect and before we know it, we are miles away from the happiness we crave. 

This is why your life needs you – not just to care about it, but to participate in it wholeheartedly. 

You can’t live a fulfilling life without you. 

Now you may be listening to this and thinking to yourself, Gena, this is common sense. Of course I can’t live a fulfilling life without me. Yes, it’s true and it is common sense, we all know this, we all know it, but we all forget. And it’s really easy to forget when we are going through some kind of change or challenging circumstances. 

Sometimes it’s a family member or a friend, or maybe a work colleague that we are supporting through a challenge or a change, and that’s one of those times where we might fall into the trap of putting ourselves last and helping others to live their life. 

And so it’s really just bringing you back to you, so that you can show up for your life the way you need you to do that. Reconnecting with your purpose daily. As the title of this chapter says, this is about living with purpose. It’s not just about the big picture goal. 

We can bring purpose to our life every day and we can bring it moment to moment. So rather than neglecting our dreams and our goals and the happiness that we crave. Rather than do that, we can consciously connect and reconnect and recommit to our own path and our own life. 

We can still be there for other people, but we need to include ourselves as well. 

There’s a couple of other entries in this chapter. 

One is called just do today on page 70. 

And live with purpose, on page 68. 

Both of those really speak to what it means to live and lead with purpose. 

Another entry I’d like to look at today in this episode is called, if I can find the page 86 it is, and it says look for the good. 

This is not about being grateful, although it will lead you to that state. Nor is it about putting a positive spin on and thereby minimizing what you’re going through. 

It’s a gentle wake-up call reminding you that some days sometimes, despite the turmoil you’re experiencing, it helps to actively look for the good that is innately present in every situation. 

Life continues to show us that no matter how difficult, troubling or traumatic things can be, there is always something to be gained from the experience. 

You may not see it straight away – it can take time for the dust to settle – but the moment you start looking for it, or even entertaining the thought that something ‘good’ could come from something so ‘bad’ you are on the road to healing. 

Some circumstances are catastrophic making it hard to see how any good could come from such an event. 

Even change that is welcomed can contain its own dark periods. But keep looking. 

The good may be disguised or so deeply buried amid the difficulty that you think it doesn’t exist. 

But it’s inherent in everything and all it takes is your willingness to see it. 

Finding the good won’t replace the loss you’ve suffered, but it will refresh your spirit, give you hope and help you keep going. 

May I look for and find the good inherent in this situation.

This entry ‘look for the good’ is one way we can reconnect with purpose. And we can bring purpose to our life and our experience, even if it is a very difficult and devastating one. As I say, sometimes we have to wait for this dust to settle. But if you are going through something that’s really devastating, and very hard to live with, all you have to do to begin to look for the good is to be willing to see it. Just be willing. That’s a great place to start. And as I say, it will never replace any loss that anyone has suffered, but it can refresh our spirit, it can renew a sense of hope, it can help us to keep going, we can find meaning. And in another entry that’s called meaning matters. I talk about just how important it is that we assign our own meaning to the shocks and the losses and the learnings that we experience. 

So, as I say in the opening paragraph – this is not about being grateful, although it will lead you to that state and I’m not trying to minimize anything that anyone is going through. 

I wholeheartedly honor, in you and in me the journey, and whatever you have faced, that is really hard, hard to accept, hard to heal, hard to move on from or forward with. So it’s not to minimize I am still validating, validating the difficulty or the set back or the loss. So we still validate that. But we also, also entertain the notion that something good will come. And something good is available for us to hold onto and that helps us. 

As I said, to reconnect with meaning and purpose. 

There is one more little reminder that I would like to read you from this chapter. 

I say little even though it’s a very, very big important message. 

It’s little because it’s one of those ones that’s on the double page spread. One side is the signature font, and it says “bring your presence to the present”.

And on the other side of the page, it very simply says “We’re all running a metaphorical marathon. 

But the only way to make it to the finish line is to focus on the present moment. 

That is how we bring purpose to our days. That is how we bring purpose to our life. That is how we make it from the start line to the finish line of the current marathon, so there’s, maybe a situation that you’re in at the moment, or a challenge or a change, and it’s a bit of a marathon. 

So that there’s marathon after marathon after marathon and some overlap. 

This is my take on on the journey of life. 

And then there’s the overarching life birth right through to death that’s a massive gigantic marathon in itself. 

So either way, whichever way you look at it, whether it’s the current challenges you’re facing or working through or change that you’re managing, it is like a metaphorical marathon. 

The only way we’re ever going to make it to the finish line is to focus on the present moment, we can’t run the marathon in one gigantic leap. 

So we bring our presence back to the present, that’s where we bring our purpose to the present and all these other magical wonderful things happen. 

We are reconnected with ourselves, we reconnected with life, with purpose, fulfillment, meaning, it all adds up to a little bit more joyfulness, maybe happiness, contentment, ease, wonder. 

It’s all there, but we can’t really grasp it unless we’re living moment to moment. 

So I hope what I’ve shared in this episode gives you some understanding about what I mean when I say that we can lead with purpose. 

And that leading with purpose is just one of the ways that we can support ourselves as we find our way. 

Thank you for being here. 

Thank you for listening. 

It’s an honor to have you with me.