DianaFr

I don’t really buy the idea that life purpose can be “found”. I also don’t think that life purpose is the same as one’s passion. They’re definitely closely linked, but not the same. I have spent my entire life looking for “my purpose”. And I’m a deeply passionate person, I have always known what I’m passionate about and I have deliberately pursued those things, built my career around them, worked really, really hard which I could do since I have always been internally driven and motivated by my passion. What I’ve learned? Passion is something to explore, build upon and learn from, and as you do that you grow and mature, not only professionally, but also mentally, emotionally and character-wise. And this is exactly that take-away that matters the most. Passion can fade. Your values and priorities may change, and they will. Life will also happen, all sorts of things will happen. What I want to say is that if you put your life purpose outside of yourself (attach it to certain activities, external conditions, etc.), you risk a lot to lose a lot. What if your passion is playing football and you decide that your life purpose is to become a football player, but then you get injured and lose your ability to play for good? What happens to you then? Silly example, but still… Being a football player is just a temporary expression of your life purpose. Your purpose is rather something that you create, not find, and by creation I mean adding meaning to the things you do, meaning that matters to you. But first you must discover what matters to you and why. The more you get it, the more purposeful your life gets. These days when I’m a new mom and my whole day (and night) revolves around my baby’s needs, it’s a real challenge to find uninterrupted time when I’m sane enough and not terribly tired to keep up with my passions. If I viewed them as my entire life purpose, I would feel miserable knowing that I’m not living it, since all I’m doing now is changing diapers and washing bottles which is as far from my purpose as possible. But it’s not about the act of changing diapers, and it’s not even about those things I’m passionate about but don’t have time for. It’s about what all that means to me and my ability to see how that meaning adds to my purpose and molds it. I think you would not have to worry about finding your purpose, if you asked yourself this one question – what constitutes a meaningful day for me? You ask yourself this every day, and you make your day meaningful. The answer will change slightly day by day and a lot over time, but today you don’t have to look too far ahead to find your purpose. It’s already with you.

Yes, I know what you’re talking about. I have the same fear and I have been struggling with if for nearly my entire life. The cause for me was a childhood trauma – I lost an attachment figure (my grandfather) at an early age and it messed my life up in many ways. I learned that my loved ones I depended on can suddenly depart and get erased from my life, and I transferred that fear on other people that were taking care of me as a child and later to every romantic partner I had. What has helped me. Realizing that my fear is not predictive, that when I feel it, it’s not indicating that something bad has happened to my loved one, but that it merely points to the situation that I experienced as a child. I came to this realization once I noticed that as soon as I ended my relationship with somebody, the fear about them went away as well. I stopped caring whether they answered or not. So that fear is just my stuff that is not pointing towards any real danger, simply reminding me to keep healing my childhood trauma. Another thing that helped is to accept that I have no control over other people’s life and death. That is something I can’t control, and this realization made me focus more on building my life skills and spending my time in a meaningful way. We never know what and when will happen. So we better do something useful with the time we have and appreciate the people we share our journey with. I suggest you try to decipher the meaning you have attached to the possibility of losing your loved one. What is that part of you that finds coping with death so horrific? What would happen to you if somebody actually died? What are you actually afraid of? As far as I have found out, at the very root of that is the massive amount of pain and suffering we think we will have no way of overcoming and which would eventually lead to our own demise. But is that really true? If there was a way to lead a good life even after losing somebody, what would it be and how woold it look like? Basically, this thing becomes pretty existential. But anyway, at least I shared

@Raptorsin7 Clean you room! Seriously Watch this video to find out why. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGuow4yRtn8 I would also like to add a few things. I really resent my parents for how i turned out Your parents can be blamed for the way you turned out, at least partly. But from this point on you can blame only yourself for choosing to stay the person your parents raised. My thought process is completely toxic, and my habits are toxic as well Are they really? Every single thought that comes into your mind is toxic? Is wanting to change a toxic thought? Is wanting to be happy a toxic thought? Your own words… I guess you also have some good and healthy habits, too. You do brush your teeth every day, or drink water, or sleep? My point is – if only you wanted, you could notice how only a fraction of your thought process is toxic and the same goes for habits. That may be a lot still, but it’s probably not true that absolutely everything about your thoughts is toxic. If I’m right, how do you discard the evidence of the opposite? I take no responsibility for my life, and i'm a perpetual victim as well What do you get out of it? How does it serve you to be a victim? I know my life's a mess and i want to be happy and functional You’re aiming way too high… Becoming happy and functional from a place you’re at currently would be the same as to ask somebody with broken legs to win a marathon. What if you can never attain this goal? What if no matter how hard you try you can never be happy and functional? If that’s the case, you condemn yourself to live a life of constant failure. If you have broken legs, you don’t think about winning marathons, especially if you have never run one before. You focus on healing your legs, you move on to learning to walk without aid again, you keep on building muscle strength, you get your normal basic walking ability back, then you perhaps decide to go jogging for some 15 mins, maybe it goes well and you make it a daily practice. You find a way to enjoy this process and have gratitude for how far you’ve come. And there may come a day when you decide to take your practice to the next level and develop your skills further. And perhaps one day you enter a marathon, and perhaps you finish it and eventually win. However, the main issue is not about having big goals. The issue is that those big goals make your current self look and feel miserable by comparison. You will become resistant towards that goal and self-sabotage to avoid becoming an even bigger failure. If the goal actually feels attainable, there’s a bigger chance you will achieve it, since why not?

Hi! People see that death is bad or sad because it is! It’s bad because it takes our loved ones away, and it’s very, very sad because the loss hurts like hell. But at the same time it’s one of the most natural things ever. Things must die in order to keep the cycle of life going. So it is definitely ok for you to die. It is ok to die for everyone, and we all will at some point. I just don’t see how that excludes love for life and appreciating its beauty. Life and death is not mutually exclusive. It’s the two sides of the same coin and one cannot exist without the other. By accepting death as normal you don't have to stop living. Just the opposite - you can have an even fuller and more complete life, since you know it's not gonna last forever.

Why not stop chasing your life purpose but create one instead? For most part, life IS pretty meaningless and painful, and we are here for a very short amount of time. At one point you will be gone and after a while nobody will really remember who you were. But there's also some magic to that. Why not enjoy yourself while you last? But true enjoyment comes from creating meaning, not seeking for it.