Many times I have heard people say "it's important to know your WHY." I have to say I struggle with this sometime and wonder if it's more important to know your WHAT before your WHY, which then motivates you to determine your HOW.
I know for a lot of my life I knew my WHAT. My what was all about people. I have known from very early on that I wanted to help people become the best person they wanted to be. It has been in the last 10 years, that it has become clearer that I want to help people be the best person they have been created to be. There is a difference between who we want to be and who we have been created to be.
I always wanted to be a barrister! Maybe it was more about being on stage, and wearing a costume? What I know now is that I am created to help people live an authentic life, where they experience the peace and joy that comes from living in the freedom of being their true selves.
For many years I wore a mask, as I didn't want people to get to know the real me. It's stressful to live wearing a mask (not the kind of mask that we think of wearing during the pandemic!). It was only after my second suicide attempt, through my recovery, I realised and accepted that my WHAT was aligned to serving others to become their best selves. I had become more focussed in wanting to serve "working professionals", who are out of balance when it comes to the whole person wellness (mind, body and soul) including physical and mental.
I have my WHAT: serving people so they can take the awareness created from understanding themselves further, and the connection between mental and physical; turning this to action, with a change, starting with micro-steps, which leads to the overall change as defined by the person.
My WHY: to reduce the stigma associated with mental wellness, so that a person can live in freedom giving them the ability to live a life they can only imagine. This has a ripple effect into family, society and globally. There are so many statistics about the impact of mental illness, my aim is to make an impact to these figures.
So HOW?: I have the ability to use all the skills that I have learned in my life (personal and working) to build relationships, create the connections, see opportunities and take the necessary steps to move from awareness to action.
My WHAT, WHY and HOW doesn’t always seem linear as they are all connected. For me, that's OK, as long I know my WHAT, WHY and HOW.
Can you relate?