You don't 'find', you 'build' your purpose

"How do you find your purpose? That’s the wrong question to ask. Purpose is a thing you build, not a thing you find. Almost all work can be purposeful, i.e., school bus drivers caring for and keeping children safe, nurses treating people’s medical conditions and guiding them through life’s most difficult times, etc.

Some jobs naturally lend themselves to a sense of meaning, but many require some deliberate effort to feel meaningful. For the 20-year-old in college or 40-year-old in an unfulfilling job, searching to give life meaning is more likely to end in frustration than fulfillment.

To fix this frustration, we should be looking to invest everything we do with purpose, and to be comfortable with those things changing over time. Unpacking what we mean by 'purpose' can allow us to understand it in our lives better.

Inspired by: Harvard Business Review - You Don’t Find Your Purpose — You Build It, by John Coleman