What Is My Purpose in This Life?

I’m of the strong belief that everything happens for a reason.

Sometimes it doesn’t make sense and never will, but there is a reason for it. Every person we meet, every disaster that takes place, every compliment, every split second of eye contact.

Every. Single. Thing.

We are placed on this earth for a reason. We have the parents we have for a reason. To think that they were here because their parents were here, and so were their parents, is mind-blowing. These people just so happened to be in the same place at the same time, which all led to you. These people weren’t born knowing each other; they were destined to meet each other.

Everyone is always looking for their purpose for being alive. I do it all the time. Constantly searching, to the point it’s the only thing that I can focus on. I start to live internally and ignore my real life, which is ultimately the greatest gift I could have ever been given. I’m always trying to find what I’m good at or looking for signs that will lead me to my purpose or what I was destined to do. I feel like I don’t have something that sets me apart from anyone else. I don’t have an amazing special talent like a musician, an actor, or a multimillion-dollar business owner.

I’m not good at singing. I’m not good at dancing. I have no level of comedic timing. I couldn’t piece together two random items of clothing and call it fashion if my life depended on it. I currently don’t relate to the women who only want to be the best mothers in the world and nothing else. Sometimes my house stays messy for two weeks straight because I am just too busy and exhausted to clean it. The only time I can act is when someone makes a backhanded comment to my face and I act like it didn’t hurt my feelings. Numbers aren’t my thing, and I have an internal fight with myself every time I look at the treadmill in the corner of my sunroom.

Each time I try to find my purpose or talent, I am left feeling empty. Like an imposter. In a room full of people wearing white, I’m the one with a tiny stain on my white shirt that just so happens to stand out more because I tried to use bleach to clean it. The same way I tried to buy clothes to fit in with certain friends, or pretend to like the same song as someone else just because I knew they liked it, or plaster a fake smile on my face because I thought maybe if I pretended I was happy where I was, I would eventually start to actually be happy.

I can try to force myself to be places I don’t actually want to be, or to be around people I don’t actually find fun to be around at all, or to like things I wouldn’t normally like, but I’ll never fit into the mold I am forcing myself into if it’s not an exact replica of myself.

While writing this post, I’ve decided that maybe we are meticulously placed on this earth with the sole purpose of just learning how to embrace who we are. We spend so long trying to find who or what we are supposed to be that maybe God’s intention was for us to learn how to love ourselves as He made us. Maybe that is our purpose. He already made us exactly who He wanted us to be, but we’re—for some reason—constantly chasing after someone we’re actually nothing like.

We think we have no talent or skill, but learning how to love ourselves and how to be ourselves really is a special talent. One that sets us apart from many others in this world today. Maybe once we’ve learned how to do that, then the universe won’t be able to do anything but reward us in some way.

Like I said, everything happens for a reason. Maybe who we are is part of that reason as well.

“Love yourself first, and everything else falls into line.” — Lucille Ball