One day I asked the chairman of the organization I work with “What wakes you up in the morning?”. He responded “the alarm”; of course that was on a light note, and went on to tell us what drives him to wake up every morning. I think this is a fundamental question that we should reflect on. I’ve pondered this to myself over and over, and my unfortunate response was either the alarm, the fear of losing my job, or the fear of getting late, the fear of my bills, among many other reasons, you can see the pattern, I was heavily driven by fear.
This is a bad way to live; driven by fear, which limits you from thriving. With fear comes anxiety and a cocktail of many other problems, both mental and physically. I borrow from what my chairman said, he’s driven by a deep understanding of his business, he knows what he wants out of it and every morning, he wakes up with a plan to keep moving closer and closer to his goals, which he pushes upwards once they are attained. Basically, what wakes him up every morning is his business, that he is passionate about, and I dare to say, his purpose.
Many of us might struggle with this question, or like me, have been driven by fear, (thankfully I am getting out of it although it’s a process). I believe that when you have a purpose higher than yourself, you’re able to have an inner drive that eventually overtakes the fear, and you are able to wake up to your purpose instead of your fear.
We are all born with a purpose; to live your purpose is to use your talent or gift to impact others. A mango tree produces fruit that it does not consume, however, when it fails to produce the fruit, we consider it useless and it can easily be chopped off. The most successful people are those that do or did something to make other people’s lives better, and as a result, the universe rewarded them in return with success. This, I believe is a very good reason to wake up every morning, to use your gifts and talents to help those that need it. For every purpose, you’re sufficiently equipped to fulfil it, it might just need some refinement, but you already have the ‘seed’ within you. The mango seed is a potential mango tree, it just needs proper environment and conditions.
I dare to propose that if you found your purpose, each waking day will feel more purposeful.
What wakes you up?
