What’s the meaning of your life? What’s its purpose? What are you living for?
Perhaps it’s raising happy children, being a great partner, reaching the pinnacle of your career, achieving financial security, or conquering impressive physical challenges. These are all worthwhile pursuits, certainly. But is that all there is?
Once you’ve raised those happy children, what then? After you’ve surfed that massive wave or climbed that imposing mountain, what next? When your bank account overflows, then what? These achievements, wonderful though they may be, often leave us with a peculiar emptiness once accomplished.
This explains why the wealthy person continues to accumulate wealth. It’s why the extreme athlete who has conquered the biggest challenge immediately seeks something even more daunting. It’s why the CEO who has reached the top often changes careers entirely—just to have somewhere new to climb. There remains an itch that external achievements simply cannot scratch.
You see, being a parent, partner, CEO, athlete, or financially secure individual isn’t who you are. These are merely things that you do.
Your true identity lies far beneath the surface of your accomplishments. It resides at your core. While you can always do more than you’ve done before, you can never be more than you already are—because the person you are is complete. Everything you are already exists within you; there are just parts you’ve yet to discover.
These undiscovered aspects remain hidden because you haven’t aligned your daily activities with your authentic self. So how might you achieve this alignment?
Your values identify what matters most to you, but it is your strengths that provide the means through which you express those values. Your strengths—not skills which can be learned, but innate qualities that form part of your character—reveal the authentic you.
You might value community and belonging, and those values may be expressed through strengths like kindness, compassion, generosity, and empathy, for example. But recognising these values and strengths is merely the beginning. To live meaningfully, you must actively engage these strengths in your daily life.
Consider the desire to surf enormous waves or scale towering mountains. Where does this urge originate? What values might underpin these aspirations?
Perhaps you deeply value connection with nature—not as a casual observer but as an integrated participant. Maybe your core strengths include risk-taking, physical capability, determination, and courage. For you, living these values and strengths means challenging yourself in natural environments.
But the purpose doesn’t lie in the climb or the surf themselves, nor even in the adrenaline rush or subsequent accolades. These are fleeting. The true purpose lies in that profound, enduring connection with what genuinely matters to you—that’s what will ultimately satisfy your deeper yearnings.
So, which of your strengths connect with your core values? And how might you express these strengths to deepen that connection?
Reflect on the values you’ve previously identified. What innate strengths do you possess that complement these values? What could you do today that would authentically express these strengths?
When you align your actions with your values through your natural strengths, you begin living with genuine purpose—and that’s when life truly comes alive.
