How is Your Purpose of Life Connected with Your Performance and Productivity?

Let me tell you a story that you most likely would have heard before. A traveller meets 3 workers cutting stone by the roadside, where a lot of construction seemed to be underway. He asked the first one - What are you doing? The first stone-cutter looked tired and exhausted. He said he was cutting stone. He asked the second stone-cutter the same question. He didn't look as fatigued. He said he was building a wall. The third stone-cutter looked happy and fulfilled; and was cutting the stone with a mesmerizing rhythm, flow and focus; almost like an artist. He said he was building a cathedral. No prizes for guessing which of the three would have the highest output, performance & productivity; and greatest energy, joy & fulfilment from his work.

Sure, this is a story. Let me get you some hard facts too. Here's a quote from someone who should know.

Being purpose driven provides a company the competitive edge, staff confidence and strong innovation. Recent research at Harvard shows that companies with a ‘higher purpose’ are more than three times as likely to retain their employees. Deloitte found that companies with a strong sense of purpose were almost twice as likely to be confident about business growth in both the short and long term. 
- Richard Branson. Founder, Virgin Group through which he started and controls more than 400 companies. Net worth: USD 5.1 Billion.

Remember organizations are made of people. For the organization to be purpose-driven, people who are a part of it have to be linked to their purpose of life and be able to see their purpose of life being lived through the work they do. That will have them be inspired from the inside which has far greater momentum and longevity than the external motivation that the leaders work so hard at giving to their team members.

If you want to increase the productivity and profitability of your organization, you have to begin with yourself. To increase your effectiveness and deliver more while working for less number of hours to create time to have it all, you absolutely have to begin with distinguishing your purpose of life.

Let's first begin with what is your quest this lifetime. Quest is what you really want for yourself. If you have just that; you will be totally fulfilled as you lie on your bed breathing your last,​ knowing you lived a full life and created all that you wanted.

Therefore, the first question to ask yourself is - What is my Quest this lifetime? Your answer could be success, fame, prosperity, happy family, abundance, adventure, love, peace, freedom or whatever else that you feel would complete you. Having identified that, fill in the sentence and say it aloud to yourself - My Quest this Lifetime is to be _______________________

Check your body if you feel the connection. If you close your eyes and hear yourself speak the sentence aloud, you will know if you feel connected to your Quest. Keep changing the blank space in the sentence above till you arrive at the Quest that has you totally come alive, fill you up with joy, has you experience being centered & grounded.

Let's detour to Science a bit before coming back into this conversation. Remember what Newton discovered. What we learnt at school as his third law? Absolutely - Every action has equal and opposite reaction. If the reaction that you want from the world is the fulfilment of your Quest, guess what needs to be your action? Your action would be to give away exactly what you want to receive back. Reaction is the second step. The source is the action and you are the initiator. If you then support others to have what is your Quest, won't it logically come back to you in accordance to Newton's third law. 

Then, your purpose this lifetime is to support others to have what you want. If you want happiness, fulfilment, success and prosperity. Then, your quest this lifetime is to be happy, fulfilled, successful and prosperous. The only way to create momentum for it to come back to you from the world is for you to give it to others, which then becomes the purpose of your life. Therefore, say this sentence aloud.

My Purpose this Lifetime is to support others to be happy, fulfilled, successful and prosperous.

Or fill in the blank with whatever is your Quest this Lifetime:
My Purpose this Lifetime is to support others to be _________________________________

Again, check your body if you feel the connection. If you close your eyes and hear yourself speak the sentence aloud, you will know if you feel connected to your Purpose. If you don't, go back to your Quest and go deeper to find another quest below the one on the surface. This is an iterative process. You will know when you discover your purpose.

Your purpose is your vision of your life, the future you want to create through the work you do. Your mission is to take specific action today to create this future. Summing it up - Your vision is the future you want to create through your work. Your mission is what specifically will you do today and for whom to create this future.

For example, you head sales for your organization and your organization sells technology solutions to businesses. Ask yourself what benefit will the solutions provide to your customers. Maybe, it helps them to attract more customers. Therefore, if they attract more customers, they will become more profitable and be able to hire more employees and add to the economic development of the country and increase standard of living for more number of people in the country and the world, support more families, have more children experience love, peace & prosperity as your customer becomes even more profitable and bigger. See, you are at the source of the transformation in the world. You have to keep looking at the difference you are making beyond here & now and exploring iteratively to find a connect between what you are doing and the big difference that you want to make that brings back stars in your eyes, makes your heart beat with passion & commitment, makes you feel young and full of energy & enthusiasm. Through this process, you may arrive at something like the below which is by way of example:
My purpose this lifetime is to support people to be happy, fulfilled, successful and prosperous by enabling the organizations they work in to be profitable through our Technology Solutions.

Language can be used to describe the world which can leave us feeling disempowered or it can be used to generate a new reality. Be sure you use the power of language to generate the reality you want. So, keep iterating on your purpose statement, continue playing with the words till you feel settled, till it inspires you, till it makes you come alive with possibilities.

Sure, you can choose cynicism & resignation, and say all this is nonsense. And yet, you can choose something else - Deep connection to your purpose of life, using your job as a playground to live your highest purpose. When you play the game like this, here are the outcomes you create:
1. Your work makes you come joyously alive.
2. You get the same adrenalin rush, exhilaration and peaceful centering at work, as you get spending your time playing golf, photography or whatever else is your favourite thing to do.
3. Every day at work feels like being on vacation. You experience fun, fulfilment, freedom.
4. You come home from work totally refreshed & rejuvenated.
5. You work moment by moment with a deep inner knowing that you are leaving footprints in the sand of time.

Yes, this is in the domain of possibility. 

The time has come. Let's march forth, Peaceful Warriors, to create this brave new world.

Love,
Jyoti.