I believe we all have a purpose to fulfill in life. Whether you fully walk in it or not may vary from one person to the next, or at various stages of your life. Whatever the case may be, walking in your purpose will require you to “p” on it in order to be effective at fulfilling it. By that, I mean walking in your purpose will require you to practice, prepare, pursue, and persist. In other words, you have to work at it, think through it, move towards it, and stick with it.
Practice basically means you work at something repeatedly to become more proficient in it. Typically, when you think about practicing something, you think about the things that you are adamant about becoming better at, so you intentionally set aside time to work on it to become better at it. But what about the things you have become proficient in not because you said I am going to work at it so many hours a week, but because you were exposed or introduced to it through someone or something else. Perhaps, you helped someone else accomplish their goals and objectives and in the process of helping them, you developed or picked up a new skill along the way without really realizing it.
One thing that I have learned over the course of my career is that practice can be both intentional and unintentional when it comes to walking in your purpose. The more I grow into my purpose, I start to see how the people and experiences I have encountered over the course of my life have helped form and shaped me into the person I am now. Some of the things I know how to do today I intentionally set out to become better at it, and if I can be honest, others I was not intentional about doing it, but it became something I did often for a role I was playing at one time or another, therefore I became proficient at it. It was not until I was in another season of my life that I realized how much I had grown and developed in my skillset. Trust me when I say nothing is wasted.
Prepare essentially means to make ready beforehand, work out the details, and put it together; which will require you to think through it. Some people know their purpose in life at an early age so they can assess the gap between their current state and future state, then prepare a plan for how to take action. When you know where you are going and what you may come up against, you can prepare for it. But how do you prepare for something you are not aware of yet? Knowing your purpose may require discovery. Many discover their purpose by thinking through a series of events and encounters they have had. This goes back to the unintentional practice. The unintentional practice can help you prepare for your purpose before you even know the purpose you were created to walk in. Now that I know unintentional practice can also serve as an instrument to prepare me for my purpose, I have become more open to the unexpected and the curve balls life may throw at me.
As you think through your journey you may come across somethings you may have classified as a detour. If you go back and think through what that mishap or detour caused you to do or become, would you still classify it as a detour or preparation for where you were about to go? Some skills and lessons can only be learned while you are going through a detour or unintentional experience. Life and circumstances may cause you to take an alternative route and that is okay; just keep looking for the thing it is preparing you for.
Pursue means to move towards or in the direction of something to obtain or accomplish it. You can be good at numerous things and even have a roadmap prepared for how to get from your current to future state; but it can be shattered if you do not move towards making it happen. There is a difference between knowing how to do something and actually doing it. Pursuing your purpose may take a lot of courage; especially when the journey requires you to go where you have never been before, or to expose yourself to risk. Take comfort in knowing that if you are truly walking in your purpose, it will be worth the risk and unknowns you may encounter. You have to go get it, no one is going to bring it to you.
Persist is mainly about continuing in spite of oppositions, disappointments, setbacks, or failures. Pursuing your purpose often comes along with difficulties as well as joy and excitement. It is easy to stick with something when all is going well; but what about the moments when nothing seems to be going well; when you give it all you have and nothing seems to be coming to fruition? Even then, you must endure it and stick with your purpose in spite of the difficulties. You must stick with it in order to see it bear fruit. As I said before, nothing is wasted…not even the difficulties because it only makes you fit and prepared for the next round.
So, go “p” on your purpose!