Tag Archives: purpose

Our Plan B Life

Doing Your Thing

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Every few years I do a short inventory of big picture stuff I care about. Usually this is when I’m considering a new job, or identifying themes for my writing. Everyone has these chinks in their armor: the causes or crises you always donate to, the moments that make you cry when you watch a movie.

My lists always include these:

and then the “make me cry” moments:

  • when someone acts on a daring goal / calling and achieves it.

This last bullet is why that chapter in Stephen King’s On Writing where he gets the phone call that Carrie will (finally!!) be published and his family will no longer be destitute makes me weepy.

This is why my heart gets warm when I see the incredible success of Kicking Horse Coffee (currently Canada’s #1 employer, based in a town of 3,000 people), because I was in the room 22 years ago when Leo and Alana were first brainstorming their daring dream of roasting coffee.

I love it when someone dares to break free of their mainstream life rut. I love it when they manage to live their dream and answer their calling.

This is one of the qualities I loved best about Brock: he quit his comfortable government gig because he wanted autonomy as a farm business owner.

It takes guts to risk your financial security, status and comfort for a dream. That kind of bravery is my favourite kind.

There’s a word for that

Victor taught me a great word many years ago: duende (do-EN-day). He defined it as: When someone is doing the thing they are meant to do. They are in the zone, and everyone gets goosebumps. I’ve been using this word in this context ever since.

I Wikied duende today, excited to share it with you here, and was disappointed. The interwebs has a more specific, limiting definition:

“to have duende” is a Spanish term for a heightened state of emotion, expression and authenticity, often connected with flamenco.

This is not the right word to describe my favourite thing. There should be a word for living out your purpose. If there isn’t a word for it, what does that say about our culture? Shouldn’t living your dream and answering your calling be something we all strive for? There should be a dozen words for it.

Writing is my dream. Writing makes me happier than anything else in my life. It doesn’t take much to write: just the cracks of time in my busy days and a pen/paper/computer. And yet it still takes effort to let myself write. I have a theory about why it’s so hard to do the things we’re meant to do and most want to do …

Why we hunker in the ruts

First, a story:

Once upon a time I knew a woman who worked a desk job. It was a good job, but what she REALLY wanted was to have a dog kennel. She loved dogs and wanted nothing more than to spend her days with them, walking and brushing and loving them. But she was a Responsible Person and a dog kennel “wasn’t realistic” so instead she worked her desk job.

Meanwhile …

Once upon a time I knew a woman who owned a dog kennel. But what she REALLY wanted was to have a market garden. She wanted to grow vegetables, and spend her days with her hands in the soil, and sell her produce at the farmers market while wearing a sunflower apron. But she was a Responsible Person and market gardening “wasn’t realistic” so instead she had a dog kennel.

MEANwhile …

Once upon a time I knew a man who had a market garden.

The moral of these stories is that each of us defines what is “realistic” and often those definitions vary. My theory is that we tend to see the thing we MOST want as being the MOST unattainable, and so we come up with all these reasons why that dream is “unrealistic” and “irresponsible” and impossible. We are our own greatest obstacles to living our dreams and fulfilling our destinies.

How to fulfill your destiny

The first step toward breaking down these obstacles is to know what your dream/calling/destiny is. Time for an inventory of big picture stuff you most care about! What are the weak spots in your armor? What would you do if you only had a year to live? What brings you the most happiness?

We’re going to close with the thematically appropriate song Home, by Lion Bear Fox:

P.S. My writing/website isn’t officially sponsored by anyone, but I’m still going to put a link here to The Leaping Connection. John can help you figure out what you want to be doing, and then help you actually do it. Just in case you need a kick in the butt.

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Terminal Cancer, Day by Day

Living on Purpose

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I read Mark Manson’s 7 Strange Questions That Help You Find Your Life Purpose this week (thank you, Facebook) and subsequently had an epiphany last night.

How I’ve felt for most of the past year.

I’ve been feeling off balance since Isaac was born — this whole “caretaker to an infant” thing really threw me for a loop. Brock euphemistically calls it a period of “adjustment” but I tend to use words like “trauma,” “denial” and “nightmare.” The sleep deprivation didn’t help.

I’ve felt very un-Heather-like and have been struggling to remember what “Heather-like” looks like, or to redefine it now that there’s a 1 year old boy in the picture.

At first I thought I needed a project, like learning Latin or working toward a new career: I thought I needed to change my life in order to be happy.

But, after some quality thinking time last night, the questions in Manson’s post helped me realize that I’m accidentally living my ideal life.

My sweetie and our iBaby.

In fact, I even have a journal entry from 2012 where I described my ideal future, followed by some “more realistic” plan Bs, and that ideal future is exactly what I’m living these days: I’m a full-time mom, I’m at home, I have a role to play in the farm work, and I have a fair amount of flexibility with my day that lets me play in the kitchen, write, read, go on adventures, visit friends, and so on.

So I’ve decided to live these next 12 months with intention.

Eerily, I have a postcard from my twenties that reads: “Begin each day as if it were on purpose.” This is the first time I’ve really understood what that means.

So what does my Year of Purposeful Living look like?

1. I will keep a daily journal of at least a few words per entry. That way I get to write every day.

2. I recently discovered the BC-funded miracle that is Strong Start, where Isaac and I can drop in to a room full of toys, other children, parents, and a knowledgeable Early Childhood Educator who can coach me on parenting skills. We need to keep going to this whenever possible, and find other opportunities to play together outside our home. I’m currently reading a great book called The Philosophical Baby, by Alison Gopnik. I’ll continue to read parenting books and actively seek parenting advice from the pro mamas I know. The more I understand parenting strategies and childhood development, the better I understand Isaac and how I can be a great mom to him.

3. Brock and I will have weekly dates without Isaac, to remember how much we enjoy each other.

I made time to can salsa back in the heady days of 2008, with our farm’s first tomatoes.

4. I’ll let myself spend more time in the kitchen, cooking and baking. Also, I love making jam and salsa, drying apples, etc., and yet I don’t take advantage of having my very own vegetable farm by making a point of doing these things every fall, to preserve food for the winter season. 2015 will be different.

5. I’ll make time to visit with friends and family. (I’m already booked for a visit home, thanks to mom’s Air Miles.)

6. This is the big one — this is when Brock knew I was serious: I’m going to cancel my Netflix subscription. Netflix saved me when I was healing from tendinitis and then brain-dead from breastfeeding every three hours, but it has served its purpose and I will start using my downtime more intentionally. Specifically, I’ll write in my journal, listen to parenting TED Talks while washing dishes, play music and dance with Isaac, go for walks with friends, and seek out great books and read them.

Yay!

I feel more control of my life and happier than I have in months. If you’re hungry for your own epiphany, try reading Manson’s post yourself. Let me know what happens.

I have a thing for church signs.

[2017 update: this newfound positive attitude lasted for about 24 hours. Netflix stayed.]