Time To Invest In You

If you do not invest in personal development, you are limiting your true potential. Personal development affects your entire life, not just your work life or your personal life.

It’s incredible how many people don’t attempt to improve themselves. And oddly, these are the same people that wonder why they are not getting anywhere with their lives.

Here are some guidelines to use that will help you:

Invest: Imagine How You Want to Shape Your Life

What exactly have you been waiting for? Is it the right opportunity? Or that perfect moment when it feels right? I know, maybe a signal from the universe?

Well, take it from someone who was waiting on those very same things, they are not coming.

And that’s a good thing because it means you can start to pursue actively, whatever you desire.

“Don’t wait for the perfect moment. Take the moment and make it perfect!” – Aryn Kyle

When I was younger, I would wait for good things to happen to me. I wanted a better future, but at the same time, I was afraid to take action. A lot of time got wasted, frozen in fear.

Wake-Up Call

As I’ve matured, I’ve realised that life is too short and far too precious to waste. That is a wake-up call to each and every one of us to start living our life.

Without a vision, you won’t be able to determine what kind of life you want to live. You need to balance what types of changes you want professionally as well as personally, as the two will ultimately overlap.

If you imagine yourself being more helpful to others, this trait will become part of both. There may be certain aspects of your personal development that you believe are specific to personal life but may eventually carry over to your professional life.

If you have wanted to increase your skills as a community leader, this could easily be incorporated into your professional career. The key is to identify and imagine what this new skill is going to look like.

Invest: Assess Your Current Situation

Many of us have asked ourselves, “What can I do to improve myself and my life?” Many of us have asked this question as part of their personal development and to help them achieve their goals.

Before you make any changes in your life, determine where you stand with your life as it currently exists. Determine strengths and weaknesses to help you formulate a plan to make the necessary changes.

Life Is A Journey

Life is a journey, and sometimes we can get stuck in the same position for a long time or sometimes we may even get lost. We may get frustrated by our lack of progress in our personal or professional lives.

This is when we need to stop and take the time to analyse ourselves and our lives.

We need to look at where we are in life, where we want to go, and how we intend to get there. One of the best ways to do this is by writing and using a strategic plan for your life.

Begin by assessing your current situation or where you are in life right now.

One of the best tools for doing this is SWOC. It is an acronym for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Challenges. And is a reworking of SWOT that is used in business with Threat being replaced by Challenges.

Invest: Set Goals And Make Them Happen

Once you know what your strengths and weaknesses are, create some goals to strive to complete.

These should include high-level goals as well as action steps. Most important, set milestones with firm dates for these action steps.

Goals big and small can be the stepping-stones to a happier life. And the critical point is the way we set them can make all the difference to achieving them.

An essential part of being human is having goals for things we want to do and working towards them.

The path towards our goals will not run smoothly, and it will not be easy, but having goals, whether big or small, is part of what makes life outstanding.

Sense Of Meaning

Working towards our goals gives us a sense of meaning and purpose, points us in the direction we want to go and gets us engaged and interested. All of which are great for our happiness.

“Reflect so that you will be able to draw from your experience and invest them wisely in your future.” – David Brett-Williams

Over 2000 years ago, Aristotle said, “Well begun is half done.” And with regards to goals, he’s right, as he has been on a lot of things. Paying attention to how we set our goals makes us more like to achieve them and achieving them makes us feel good about ourselves and our lives.

Invest: Consider Alternatives

There can be valid reasons why specific actions or goals can’t be met. Instead of abandoning the entire personal development plan, come up with alternatives steps.

Look at the challenges in different ways, find a new perspective that you haven’t thought of before. A brain dump or brainstorming alternatives no matter how silly they may appear is an excellent discovery process.

And once you have mapped or listed the alternatives, be open to their possibilities. While a suitable solution may solve the problem, it may not work if the resources aren’t available, if it causes new obstacles, or if people won’t accept it.

The Perfect Solution

When selecting the best alternative don’t consider any alternative as the “perfect solution.” If the perfect solution existed, there probably wouldn’t be a problem in the first place.

You can even consider a compromise when you have a full grasp of the alternatives and the problem. And be careful not just to fall down and stall your progress when considering alternatives.

We do that because it is easier to stay in the alternatives loop than working towards the main goals.

Invest: Evaluate How You Are Doing

It’s in your best interests to take a hard look at your performance. When you reach a milestone, see how you did against the plan of action steps. This is a crucial step, and it’s essential to be realistic and truthful.

At some point, you have to assess what you think is good and bad about your performance against what it will take for you to achieve your goals. Because that is what matters, achieving your goals.

Reflection

Get in the habit of reflecting on your performance. At a minimum, every week, set goals for yourself. It is better to do it in writing because that helps to clarify your thoughts. Then at the end of the week, view your goals to see how you did.

I prefer to do it daily. Before I settle down in the evening, I think about how the day went and what I accomplished. I ask myself what went well, what didn’t go well, and what I could have done better.

Invest: Keep It Simple

When Kelly Johnson said ‘Keep It Simple Sweetheart’ she sure was right. I find that the less I have on my plate, literally and figuratively, the better I feel.

When you add a series of unobtainable goals to your plan, you are likely setting yourself up for failure. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to push yourself. It just means being realistic about your capabilities.

Complicating things that could actually be simple has become a cultural norm. Ever try to cancel a magazine subscription or changing banks? Automated systems that were designed to simplify, more often than not, don’t.

“It is not death that we should fear, but we should fear not beginning to live.” – Marcus Aurelius

The last time I tried cancelling my double subscription to the same magazine, I was happy with the magazine but wanted to save the trees, their computer kept trying to extend my subscription.

Sometimes it feels that everything we need to do requires us to prove we are human, follow a link, wait endlessly on hold, or remember a million passwords.

No More Complaining

No more complaining, “This is way more complicated than it needs to be.” Time to take action and Keep It Simple.

Keep It Simple Sweetheart (KISS) was coined in the 1970s by Kelly Johnson, the lead engineer and creator of US government spy planes. This was about keeping plane design simple so average mechanics could repair the aircraft. She was definitely onto something.

Let’s give up on being perfect. By seeking perfection, we complicate things. If you move a task on your to-do list from today to next week, without any plan of actually getting it done, you may be suffering from perfection procrastination.

The best way to work through this is to create deadlines on your calendar for the tasks you have been avoiding. The likelihood of getting a task done increases exponentially when you schedule it with a hard stop.

Use these guidelines to help you invest effectively in your personal development. That way you can maximise your true potential. When you do you will benefit from the changes in your work and personal life.

Now Is The Time To Overcome Your Self-Defeating Behaviours

This post includes powerful tips related to overcoming self-defeating behaviours. And it also contains three actionable steps you can take right away and a list of suggested reading for those people who are looking for even more information.

Many of us spend our time beating ourselves up and reverting to self-defeating behaviours, but still, like to think we are a positive person. Wake up. If you are always doing this, then there is a good chance that you are not a positive person.

We know the numerous benefits to being positive and avoiding self-defeating behaviours, and if you are constantly beating yourself up, or engaging in habits that are holding you back, it’s time to turn the tables and stop!

This may not be not pleasant, but they are something that you must deal with. Thankfully, there are many steps you can take to minimise the impact of self-defeating behaviours:

Start with affirmations.

Let’s explain what an affirmation is. They are statements said with confidence about a perceived truth. And if you were to conduct a poll, this would be revealed as a huge factor when changing from negative thinking to positive thinking and stopping self-defeating behaviours.

Affirmations have helped thousands of people make significant changes in their lives. And they work because an affirmation retrains your brain to focus on positive messages.

Affirmations work.

But they don’t work for everyone. Affirmations work, because the mind doesn’t know the difference between what is real, imagined or remembered.

When you watch a movie and start to cry or laugh, your mind empathises with the characters on the big screen even though it is only cinematic magic.

Don’t expect instant results. This isn’t a habit that will help you overnight, but if you commit to it regularly, it will help boost your positivity. Realise that you have so many years or decades of programming to overcome so stick with it.

Learn confidence.

If there is one aspect that will turn your self-defeating behaviour around, it’s confidence. Contrary to popular belief, it is something that can be learned.

Low self-confidence can be deeply rooted, with origins in childhood experiences. In later life, self-confidence can be undermined by negative life events such as ill health, losing a job or getting divorced, and a general sense of lack of control.

People with low self-esteem tend to see themselves as a victim and the world as a hostile place. So they are reluctant to assert and express themselves. As a consequence, they miss out on opportunities and experiences and feel powerless to change things.

Fake it.

Confidence is not a trait you are born with, contrary to popular belief. Taking active steps towards developing greater confidence will help.

One popular technique is “fake it until you make it” When I have used this phrase before it has sparked a lot of questions and comments.

To clarify, what I am saying is that when we do not feel confident, pretending to feel confident by engaging in confident behaviours can help you feel more confident. Your mind will follow your body in feeling confident.

Determine when you the self-defeating behaviours started.

In life, there are specific difficulties that we are destined to grapple with. In difficult situations, it is reasonable to find yourself challenged. We even find ourselves in regret and make less-than-stellar decisions.

When we repeat the same maladaptive behaviours continually, we may describe ourselves as being “stuck.” What we are doing is engaging in self-defeating behaviours.

Any behaviour that distracts you from your goals or takes you away from what you want is a self-defeating behaviour. They drain your energy, leave you exhausted and thwart your efforts to create an outstanding life.

The catalyst.

If you can figure out the catalyst that caused you to start thinking negatively, you can begin to address the issues with it.

It could stem from experiences in your childhood. When the issues are deep-rooted, you may want to seek professional help to get you through them.

You can start breaking the cycle by determining when the self-defeating behaviours began. You may start by identifying the self-defeating behaviours and recognising patterns that trigger those behaviours.

Embrace failure.

The one aspect people beat themselves the most over is failure. However, it is something people should learn to love. Failure is about approaching an unknown situation and trying something you haven’t tried before.

Heinz Kohut, the grandfather of psychology of the self, suggested the fear of failure is often intimately connected to a childhood fear of being abandoned, either physically or emotionally.

Overestimate the risk.

We overestimate the risk we’re taking and imagine the worst possible scenario when we fear failure. The childhood emotional equivalent of our parents deserting us.

The mental picture is so dreadful that we convince ourselves we shouldn’t even try to change. So we avoid opportunities for success, and then as a consequence of avoiding these opportunities, when we fail, it unwittingly reconfirms that “Success is not destined for me.”

A negative belief, deeply rooted in our unconscious mind, can override a positive affirmation, even if we aren’t aware of it. And that is the reason why, for some people, affirmations don’t seem to work.

Stop stressing over change.

Warning, a brutal life truth is coming. You have no control over many of the things that happen in your life.

For some reason, people don’t like change. However, it is something that everyone should embrace since it will always occur. Embracing change will help you roll with the punches in life.

Worries affect performance.

Stressing easily develops into worrying. And we can become powerless when worries and fear overtake us. Maybe your stress about change is only a small worry.

Whatever size it is, worries affect our performance. And they will chase us if we let them pile up. Worries are toxics to our body. If you don’t stop them, they can spread and eventually suffocate us.

Let’s look at change as a new opportunity and then face it with confidence.

Learn the stories of successful people.

When you read books or watch videos about the lives of successful people, many of us will find them empowering, helping us live a more inspiring, balanced, happier and successful life.

And you will soon realise that all of them encountered failure before finding success. You’ll learn about their trials and tribulations. The efforts they went through to reach their goal.

Success means different things to different people. Over the years, I have noticed that many have a resistance to the word success. Which is odd as deep down inside, that is precisely what we want.

Resistance to success.

From my observations of the world and from reading the stories of many great men and women, I noticed that many of the highly successful people are in a way or another living by a set of “golden rules.”

When you discover these “golden rules” for yourself, you will be encouraged to stop beating yourself up about situations that happened in the past and move forward with your goals.
 No more excessive ruminating over past mistakes.

Own your self-defeating behaviours.

Don’t hide your head in the sand. If you know you have self-defeating behaviours, then acknowledge them. Start by making a list of your behaviours you feel are harming you.

When we feel under-resourced and overwhelmed with the problems we face, we lapse back into negative behaviours that feel comfortable. The problem is that while it is comforting, it prevents us from focusing on solutions with a stable and clear mind.

Shine the light of awareness on your self-defeating behaviour
s. Pay close attention to acknowledge and recognize the defeating attitudes, negative self-narratives, or repetitive behavioural patterns.

Challenge your negative self-talk.

Take the opportunity to challenge your negative self-talk. Refuse to become it or identify with it. Your thoughts are not facts. The same is true for behaviours and attitudes. All of them can always be changed.

You are not limited or defined by your behaviours. You have the power to choose and change your actions at any time.

The next time you feel yourself getting bogged down by your negative thought-narratives or self-defeating habits, remember: you don’t have to be your thoughts, attitudes or habits. You are not your behaviour.

Ask for opinions.

Ask your closest confidants what they think your self-defeating behaviours are. Sometimes they will be more honest with you than you are with yourself.

We are naturally curious and desire to have our questions answered. But asking for feedback on ourselves overwhelms most of us with anxiety. It’s not an easy or natural task, asking for someone’s opinion or evaluation of you.

But it’s an essential part of your development. There is no promise that it will be painless, but with the proper preparation and guided questions, asking for opinions can be a smooth process.

An open mind.

You need to keep an open mind and accept the feedback graciously. You don’t have to agree with them, but asking for an opinion and then reacting poorly could harm that relationship.

Ensure  the feedback you’re seeking out is well rounded. So you will need to approach all sorts of people. It might hurt to hear what they have to say but keep an open mind. And remember to say, “Thanks,” regardless of their opinion.

Build a support network.

Once you have decided what self-defeating behaviours you need to focus on, reach out to people close to you for help. Developing a support network is a crucial element in eliminating self-defeating behaviours.

A support network refers to the people in your life that help you achieve your personal and professional goals. There are many ways to develop a support network.

An excellent first step is to recognise the supports that are already present in your life. That means friends, family members, teachers, colleagues, and maybe even your boss or line manager.

Create a list of the people you know and the strengths and contacts they have to offer you. Create a list of people you would like to meet. Attend events that put you in touch with people who can support your personal, educational, or career development.

Having a robust support system can mean the difference between success or failure.

Actionable Steps.

1. Brainstorm a list of all of your potential self-defeating behaviours. Spend 5 minutes now and list everyone you can think of. After that, take a break and then spend another five minutes trying to think of more.
2. Reach out to your friends and ask them what they think your self-defeating behaviours are. If they mention any that aren’t on your current list them add those. You can also run through your list to see if your friends agree with the behaviours you have come up with.
3. Choose 1-2 behaviours to focus on. Create a plan of attack on how to deal with them. List the steps you will take to tackle each one, and then focus on one thing you can do TODAY to get started.

It seems ridiculous that we continue in unwanted repetitive cycles of self-defeating behaviours. Quite often, these are coping strategies and learned behaviours that have become our default way to deal with stressful situations.

Somewhere along the way, we learned that doing these behaviours helped to relieve our stress. Our goal now is to break unwanted cycles by replacing those maladaptive behaviours with positive coping strategies and tools.

Further Reading.

The Problem is YOU

Get Out of Your Own Way

Instant Analysis

Reinventing Your Life

6 Motivational Quotes From David Brett-Williams To Inspire You To Be Successful

The Mona Lisa is one of the most famous paintings of all time. I believe that is due to her unique smile. A smile has the highest positive emotional content of any symbol.

I love the power of smiles so much I have researched about the power of smiling. I used to feel awkward about my smile, so I practised smiling in the mirror until it felt more natural.

When experience a positive emotion we smile. A neural signal travels from the cortex of your brain to the brainstem. That is the oldest part of our brains in terms of evolution. After that, the cranial muscle carries the signal to the muscles responsible for smiling in your face.

Sounds simple enough. But, that’s only where it starts. Once we smile, there is a positive feedback loop that now goes back to the brain and reinforces our positive feelings.

A Smile Or Chocolate

Smiling stimulates our brain’s reward mechanisms in a way that even chocolate, a well-regarded pleasure-inducer, cannot match.

Smiling stimulates our brain’s reward mechanisms in a way that even chocolate, a well-regarded pleasure-inducer, cannot match.

That’s why in recent research scientists concluded: “that smiling can be as stimulating as receiving up to £16,000 in cash.”

Inspire 2. “Confidence comes from discipline and training.”

A French man, named Philippe Petit walked on a wire across the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City back in 1974. While most people would have gotten ill just looking down from that great height, he was able to walk on the wire with grace and confidence.

You could argue that to some degree this was down to his dare-devil nature. After all, he was a bullfighter, rock climber, and loved slacklining. All of which are mighty dangerous pursuits.

But Petit was confident in his walk across the wire because of his discipline. By pursuing his passion for wire walking with vigour from a young age, he was able to understand both the process and his own capabilities better.

When people saw Petit confidently walking across the wire at the Twin Towers on that day, what they were seeing was a lifetime of practice manifesting in a single moment.

We all face doubts and negative thoughts.

Our personal challenge is to face these problems head-on rather than listen to the doubt and allow it to talk us out of pursuing our dreams.

Let’s keep a few things to keep in mind when turning discipline into confidence.

A. Negative self-talk isn’t all bad.

Just because you engage in negative self-talk doesn’t mean it is a bad thing. You can use this kind of self-talk to get an advantage.

The self-doubt is what makes you question whether you have done something correctly. It is what keeps you awake at night. While doubt and anxiety can be harmful, you can utilise it to take action.

If you use self-doubt to create discipline, it will set you up for success. For example, you may get up earlier in the morning to do your best work, or you eat better to ensure your brain is always sharp.

B. Trust discipline, not motivation.

We love motivation because it feels good. But we have to face that it isn’t useful for the purpose of solving our most important problems.

Whether it is a professional or personal challenge, discipline is going to be your saviour, not motivation. So trust discipline.

Motivation is often a fleeting feeling, while discipline is far more reliable.

C. Prepare for failure.

When you utilise discipline to prepare yourself as thoroughly as possible, then you will have complete confidence with humility in your task. This is a dynamite combination as you will be humble enough to take a closer look at where you could make mistakes.

And you come to the realisation that you are not infallible. However, you will have prepared so thoroughly that it will be inconceivable for you to encounter a problem you haven’t already thought of.

With discipline, when you prepare for failure, you gain a whole new sense of confidence in both yourself and whatever it is you are working on.

Inspire 3. “Enjoy life more, smile more, laugh more, and don’t get wound up about things.”

There is a growing body of research that indicates the benefits of laughter go far beyond the important factor of fun. Laughter may be a blood-pressure reducer, a stress buster, an immune-system booster, and a friend maker.

Being serious adults with responsibilities. Things like with jobs, or not, bills and meetings, and more bills it’s sometimes hard to remember to loosen up with a gutful of laughter.

Life is just too tragic and damn chaotic to absorb without the pleasure of an occasional giggle.

The whole “laughter is the best medicine” theory is correct.

It is impossible to experience the crippling burden of negative emotions while laughing. That fit of the giggles gives the body and mind a much needed moment to reset and forces us into the moment.

On top of that, it is energising, uplifting, and oddly calming at the same time. So get to laughing.

Inspire 4. “Most people are happy being average. Most are happy being faceless in a sea of faces.”

Inspire 5. “When you think little goals, you expect little achievements. Think bigger goals and win bigger achievements.”

Thinking occupies an immense role in our lives. We are a product of what we think. Every action, every process starts or emerges from thinking.

Thinking is the ignition that starts us. It is the fuel that puts us on a path. Thinking is the ability that makes us choose a path. On which path we place ourselves. In which direction, we move our life.

It all comes down to our thinking.

You will hear a lot about, and read a lot about thinking big. You might hear that thinking big has a gravitational pull. And that is true.

I would say that thinking big attracts opportunities, it attracts new horizons, it makes lives, it attracts joy, prosperity, happiness. It attracts success.

David Schwartz said, “There is magic in thinking big.” Thinking big has played a significant role in the lives of every successful person.

The Magic Of Thinking Big

The magic of thinking big can create miracles in our lives. We are products of our thoughts. We behave and act in accordance with what we think.

To put it just, if we think positively, then we will act positively. If we think big, then our minds expand and we will search for ways to find greatness.

Conversely, if we think negatively, then we will act negatively, whether consciously or unconsciously. We will be unable to find ways to greatness. And will only see obstacles in our way.

We will just focus on what we not have and what we cannot achieve. As Paul Coelho said, “If you think small, your world will be small. If you think big, your world will be big.”

It is dependent on your thoughts. Who you are now is the sum of all of your thoughts. And who you will become in the future is dependent on your thinking.

An Obstacle

You can become anyone you want to. Do virtually anything. You can achieve anything. But in your journey towards greatness, there is an obstacle.

Curious what the obstacle is? Is it your circumstances? Your origin? Your country? Or your face, colour, height, education? Your financial situation?

None of these is the obstacle. The only constraint is YOU. The only obstacle is your THOUGHTS.

Because your thinking is the origin of your ideas, the birthplace of your achievements .

If you want to become outstanding, you have to think big.

Everything begins with the thoughts we think. We cannot rise above the thoughts that we think.

If you think small, you go small. You are just one thought away from your greatness . You are only one thought away from your ideal life.

Quoting David Schwartz, “Think Big, and you’ll live big. You’ll live big in happiness. You’ll live big in accomplishment. Big in income. Big in friends. And big in respect.”

So we need to program ourselves to think success, and not failure. Thinking success conditions your mind to create plans that produce success.

The opportunities are in front of you, but you have just to think big. So think big to achieve big.

Inspire 6. “I never perceive failure as failure, only as the game I must play and win.”

When I was growing up, I was told, “A game should be played to win.” So even if you lose 1000 times when you play for the 1001 time, play to win.

At the age of 21, a guy was defeated in a legislative race. He business failed at the age of 24. At 27, he had a nervous breakdown. He lost a congressional race at age 34. Then went on to lose a senatorial race at 45. He then failed to become vice-president at age 47 and was elected president of the United States at age 52.

This man was Abraham Lincoln. Everyone called him a failure. But was he a failure? No, he had optimistically taken the path of failure.

A young cartoonist faces numerous rejections from newspaper editors, who said he lacked talent. But then, one day a minister at a church hired him to draw some cartoons.

Steamboat Willie

He worked out of a small mouse­ infested shed near the church. After seeing a little mouse, he was inspired and that lead to the character Steamboat Willie.

After being fired from a newspaper agency because he ‘lacked imagination,’ he went on to become an icon in the field of entertainment.

That man was Walt Disney. He was labelled a failure many times. But was he a failure? No, he had optimistically taken the path of failure.

She was living on welfare, divorced, depressed, and a single mother while studying and attempting to write her first novel.

That woman is J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter books. I won’t tell you how many times editors rejected her novel. She could be labelled a failure. But was she a failure? No, she had optimistically taken the path of failure.

The path to success is lined with failure. The more we fail, the greater our likelihood of success.

A Typo

Successful people fail. And yes, please read that again, it is not a typo.

Successful people fail.

Failure is an option, failure is always an option.

Failure is frequently, but mistakenly, viewed as an ending. However, that doesn’t have to be the case.

For those with resilience, failure is just the beginning. If you find yourself faced with failure, it’s time to shift gears, rediscover what will inspire you and find a solution to the problem.

Maybe you need to start from scratch again. If so, that’s perfectly acceptable. One of my first business’ failed, but I rediscovered what would inspire me and here I am, still standing and then some.

But why? I diligently examined the problems with my first business and ensured that what I learned from that experience influenced my future decisions.

An Easy Way To Find Your Purpose

This report includes powerful tips related to finding your purpose. It also contains three actionable steps you can take right away and a list of suggested reading for those people who are looking for even more information.

Do you know what your life purpose is? Most people don’t.

Going through the motions.

Sometimes, people pretend they know what they are supposed to do in life. But, they are merely going through the motions.

“The climb might be tough and challenging,but the view is worth it. There is a purpose for that pain; you just can’t always see it right away.” – Victoria Arlen

Life is too short to let this happen. Find something that you are passionate about, something that makes you look forward to getting up in the morning.

Ask yourself why?

If you don’t look forward to getting up for work, ask yourself why.

It’s true that most people need a job to survive. You may have gone to college to study what you believed was your life purpose.

But, now that you have been working in the field for many years, it’s lost its edge.

What do you daydream about at work?

Focus on your recurring daydreams. When you do, this is a great starting point for you to explore what you want to do with your life.

“Those who improve embrace the power of personal achievement and personal growth and replace a lack of purpose with self-actualisation.” – David Brett-Williams

The next time you catch yourself daydreaming about doing something different with your life, write down what it was about.

Seek out forums online that are associated with topics you are interested in.

This will show you what others are doing or what kinds of questions they are asking. If you resonate towards one or two forums, this will show you where you should focus your concentration.

Connect with residents.

Most cities and towns are using Facebook to connect with their residents.

Join the groups and pages that are dedicated to these municipalities. Then, find out where the community needs help and volunteer your time.

“Achievement of your happiness is the only moral purpose of your life, and that happiness, not pain or mindless self-indulgence, is the proof of your moral integrity, since it is the proof and the result of your loyalty to the achievement of your values.” – Ayn Rand

You’ll meet people, and you may find that helping others is part of your purpose. You can also join church groups in your area.

Keep on the topic.

When you have an idea about what might be your life purpose, pick up several books on the topic.

Pay attention not only to what the books are telling you, but also your interest in reading them.

If you pick up some books from the library and they sit on your table, this may be an indication that it’s not the right topic for you to pursue.

Offer to volunteer some of your time at work to set up initiatives that help people in the community of the business.

Leadership abilities.

Your company may already have a program, and you can choose to either join it or form a new initiative if they allow for it. Companies need people who can show leadership abilities with these initiatives.

“Everyone has a purpose in life and a unique talent to give to others. And when we blend this unique talent with service to others, we experience the ecstasy and exultation of own spirit, which is the ultimate goal of all goals.” – Kallam Anji Reddy

This leadership ability could help you advance in the company if that is where you want to go.

Start reading a few blogs that relate to the topics you are thinking of pursuing. 
Like reading books, pay attention to which blogs you spend the most time with. This can give you a clue to your life purpose.

Actionable Steps

1. Join one forum per month.

To determine which forums to join, start with your hobbies. If those hobbies are idle for you, that’s okay. Join the forums anyway. Forums will help you renew your interest.

2. Create a journal to jot down ideas whenever they pop into your head.

You can do this on a smartphone which many people find easier to manage. Just make sure it’s easy to access as spending too much time searching for the app may make you lose the thought process.

3. Join Meetup.com groups that cater to your interest.

There is nothing better than meeting face-to-face with people who share the same interests as you. It’s a great way to learn about those interests, and you gain contacts that may help you advance your participation.

“I truly believe that everything that we do and everyone that we meet is put in our path for a purpose. There are no accidents; we’re all teachers – if we’re willing to pay attention to the lessons we learn, trust our positive instincts and not be afraid to take risks or wait for some miracle to come knocking at our door.” – Marla Gibbs

If nothing else, you get some social time in and a chance to meet new friends.

Further Reading.

Your Best Year Yet!: 365 days of little changes that add up to big results!

Your Best Year Yet!: Make the next 12 months your best ever!

2019 Success Journal: Create Your Best Year Ever

Your Best Year Yet!: Ten Questions for Making the Next Twelve 
Months Your Most Successful Ever

Your Best Year Ever: A 5-Step Plan for Achieving Your Most Important Goals