#24. Do Follow Your Purpose

Fuck purpose. Let me build my empire. Yeah, I’ll give back when I get mine first. This is America and that was my mindset. I needed to sell scripts so I could get my house in the hills and have the matching Porsche / Rover combo in my horse-shoe shaped driveway. Purpose comes after. So I sat in coffee shops pounding keys. I was a fucking zombie chasing a commercial. Spent zero time following anything except this movie poster staring John fucking Kim.

It wasn’t until the universe ripped that poster in half by pulling my life rug out from underneath me that I discovered the importance of the word, purpose. You know the story. I got a divorce, changed careers from screenwriter to therapist, and started working in non-profit helping teenagers with their addictions. Purpose didn’t hit me over the head. It’s not like I suddenly woke up every morning with a heart boner to help kids. I dreaded it. Because I was a kid myself. I was still holding onto me, myself, and I. It wasn’t until I accepted my path. I rolled up my fucking sleeves and said, okay let’s do this. I stopped making it about me for the first time in my life. And the funny thing about the universe is when you stop making it about you, the universe will

I found purpose. But it was a very slow burn. For anyone who tells you to find your purpose, tell them to fuck off because sometimes that shit needs to find you. That was my case. I didn’t find purpose by waking up one day saying I was going to help people. No, I woke up one day and told myself I’m going to be honest with myself. I followed my actions with my new promise and slowly my life lined up and a vague sense of purpose started to appear. It would take years for me to really see what my purpose was. Because it doesn’t come to you just because you follow what you’re passionate about. Passion doesn’t always equal purpose. Your purpose is greater than you and what you want to do sometimes. It comes to you when you become self aware, really start to know yourself. And that shit takes time. Then you discover your gifts as a being, and purpose grows at the intersection between who you are and what you can do (gifts / passion).

-Angry