Know Your Life Purpose, a GUEST POST by Sharon
April 3rd, 2008 by Rose Rosetree
Blog-Buddies, we’re going to take a brief hiatus on our series about AURA READINGS OF THE RICH AND FUNNY, because Life Coach Sharon Greenspan just made the most thought-provoking comment over on a previous thread.
“Knowing Your Life Purpose” has become as much a part of pop culture as carrying a yoga mat, but what does it mean to do this as someone who does focused kinds of spiritual reading, like aura readings, reading faces, empathic merges as a skilled empath?
I just HAVE to pipe up about Life Purpose, given that it’s one of the foundations of the work I do with clients. I agree that it has a place in pop culture which is probably misplaced. There are so many definitions and I think a proper understanding of what Life Purpose is and is not is necessary.
- Life Purpose is not the answer to all your problems.
- Life Purpose is not why God or any other being put you here.
- Life Purpose is not your mission.
- Life Purpose is not what you are supposed to do.
- Learning your Life Purpose reveals what energizes you when you express or use your talents to connect with society and create something (which can be a tangible or intangible).
- Life Purpose provides context for goals.
- Life Purpose provides perspective for making decisions that resonate with your authentic self.
- Life Purpose is a source of inspiration and, at times, can be a comfort when overwhelmed and not sure what to do.
- Knowing your Life Purpose empowers you to flow with life in a way that honors who you are on a deep level (some might say a soul level….but that phrase can be interpreted different ways, too). It establishes your relationship with yourself and with society or something larger and balances the “doing” and “being” in your life.
Sharon is really onto something here, isn’t she? Partly, that balance between doing and being is her huge gift, something she helps clients do (along with knowing life purpose) through her company, Wild Success.
Comment, please, about your reaction to any part of what she has said, or to your own views about life purpose. If you have a whole lot to say, I may do for you what I did for Sharon and turn your comment into a Guest Post! In fact, I may also do it for me. 
Sharon: According to your words, I understand clearly what life purpose is not, but I am not sure just what it is. But I tend to be the kind of person who prefers very concrete, dictionary-like definitions of terms.
I wrote a more elaborate comment relating to life purpose here.
RYAN: thanks for posting both here and in the other thread. There is a place on my website (http://www.wildsuccess.us/life_purpose_p2.htm) which provides several examples of life purpose statements. You might find them vague. Or encompassing.
I usually describe Life Purpose as those times in your life when you experienced or did something in which you most felt like Ryan. We’ve all had those experiences and few people have a way to describe them, let alone create additional experiences that help them to feel like their most authentic selves. Or to make decisions which are aligned with their most authentic selves.
I can tell you that in the process of defining Life Purpose, it all comes from you.
I wonder if we called it Your Ponefila, would you/Ryan/Rose/reader feel differently about it.
Maybe you can think of Your Ponefila as a tool rather than a thing. Your Ponefila allows you to measure decisions, actions, and thoughts which delight/excite/enchant/stimulate/electrify your soul/spirit/authentic self.
In the big picture of my coaching practice, we look at how different areas of your life would look when you are living Your Ponefila. I can also share that Your Ponefila encompasses doing, being, connects you to something larger and has an effect or result. I haven’t had my Thrill Your Soul session yet (it’s scheduled) so can’t make a comparison, though my suspicion is that Thrill Your Soul is more specific. In Rose’s description (http://roserosetree.com/IndivConsult.htm#thrill) she encourages people to ask whether “African dance would be good for me.” I would encourage a client to ask “Is African dance in line with My Ponefila?”
Does this provide clarification?
Since the readers here are the hippest, smartest group around, what might you call it rather than Life Purpose?
Upon reflection, the Life Purpose (or Ponefila) statement is a tool. Life Purpose (or Ponefila) is an experience, a sense of being….that’s why it’s hard to say what it is.
Sharon:
Does this provide clarification?
Yes.
Since the readers here are the hippest, smartest group around, what might you call it rather than Life Purpose?
If I had though to, I would have mentioned previously that what these types of terms mean often varies from person to person, so a lot of times we do not know what a specific person means exactly when he/she uses one of these terms.
The name given to a concept does not really matter as long as people know enough about the concept that they are not thinking of something else.
What is this “ponefila” word? An Internet search did not bring up anything.
RYAN and SHARON, laughing about “ponefilia.”
Sharon, am I right that the whole point is that this is a madeup word, so it doesn’t have the charge of the more grandiose?
Clarifying your “suspicions,” Sharon, that “In Rose’s description (http://roserosetree.com/IndivConsult.htm#thrill) she encourages people to ask whether “African dance would be good for me.” I would encourage a client to ask “Is African dance in line with My Ponefila?”
You’re right, but maybe not in the way some Blog-Buddies would assume. Being specific when doing aura readings leads some people to think along the lines of, “She’s going to describe a big green triangle in the fourth layer of my aura, just 40 degrees north-east of my heart chakra.”
Here is how I do research into life choices with a client, those THRILL YOUR SOUL readings. With the client, we brainstorm about what categories in life really matter. Would it be:
* Popularity
* Earning money
* Feeling sexy
* Having professional recognition
Just as you observed, Ryan, people can mean anything when they start musing about “What do I really want?” Until you ask a particular person, you don’t know which aura databanks will be the ones of real concern. Those are the important ones to read, not somebody else’s official protocol.
Once we have our list, for that person at that time, I describe a soul-level gift in each databank. That’s how my client is going to win in life, no matter what. (Often, just this kind of validation turns out to empower a person.)
Then I help the client’s aura to morph into one choice at a time. What will be the consequence of that particular job? Living where? Dating whom? Changing or not changing?
Yes, I can even do this sort of research with different types of psychicatric medication, as someone was asking me recently (whether in email or on this blog).
Any choice has consequences. Often we’re encouraged to think there is “One perfect choice.” True, occasionally, one choice will far outshine all others, producing excellent consequences for every databank we are researching. Usually, some choices are good for some things, with other choices superb for others.
Knowledge like this helps a person to choose more freely, more wisely. Being able to make choices like this is one reason to do learn to do aura readings!
I want to chime in here because I have probably done more “thrill our soul” sessions with Rose than any other client.
For a job, you can investigate whether you’ll make a lot of money doing it. That’s what many people are probably interested.
However, since most of Rose’s clients (and blog readers) probably don’t reflect most of mainstream society and present-day consciousness, I would gather that you’re probably not just interested in how much money you can make at a job.
Or if you think you can be “bought” for any price, let me give you some contrast…
What if you could have a job where you would make money beyond your wildest dreams…. BUT, the big caveat is that you would be bored to tears every day, every minute, every second? Or nobody would respect you at that job? Or you would hate all the kinds of other people drawn to that kind of job - and those people are now your co-workers? Or the job stunts your spiritual development and evolution? Or, a big no-no in a job for me, I have no opportunity to make any intellectual contribution and advance the field (and the rest of humanity) through my work?
From my experience, most people are willing to make less money in exchange for a more balanced job. And trust me, I know people in jobs who make lots and lots of money, but they also work 100 hours/week, take anti-depressants to assuage their unhappiness (so that they can ironically be able to function enough to continue to work at the job that is bringing them such misery - a vicious cycle, if you ask me), and pay a therapist lots of money to provide some human contact because their job keeps them from meeting people or being able to make friends with more like-minded people (they spend most of their time with co-workers they dislike and don’t have much in common with).
Sounds like such fun, doesn’t it?
In my humble opinion, all of these consequences are magnified and even more important to consider if you are an empath. What if your biggest empathic gifts are emotional (emotional intuition, emotional oneness)? So you’re job has no outlet for that for you, as an empath, so you start taking on other people’s physical pain as a way for you to express your empathic gift instead? That sounds pretty miserable and a less than ideal way to exercise the true gift, which is actually emotional and not physical.
If you’re researching a hobby, you’re probably less interested in how it will affect your “making money” databank but more interested in whether it will bring you joy and emotional satisfaction. Who wants to take on a hobby that makes you feel like you’re in prison alone all day? I can think of something I investigated that made me feel emotionally destitute.
Anyway, just some food for thought.
Sorry for the delayed response. Weekends are my time away from the big, glowing box.
Ponefila….just a made up word. Doesn’t have all the attachments of Life Purpose. Hey, we finally found something Google and Wiki don’t have yet! (well, now Google has this blog to point to…)
Anita, I wonder…given that you’ve had so many Thrill Your Soul sessions with Rose and that you’ve probably taken many of her classes….do you feel able to read your own databanks about questions? Or is it better to have it facilitated? I know that some processes really need “outside eyes” looking in.
Hi Sharon,
I am good at reading other people’s databanks but not as good at reading my own, especially if the decision is highly charged (the same goes for aura readings). Because my rational mind will try and take over.
E.g., I always knew that medicine thrilled my soul, ever since I was in kindergarten. But until I did lots of aura readings with Rose and “thrill your soul” sessions with things I was familiar with, I was sure that dermatology and plastic surgery should thrill my soul way more than psychiatry. Because logically, these were the fields everyone thought were so great, and the environment that I’m in is so powerful at socializing people that there was no way I could outsmart my logical mind. (I am also a very difficult person to put under hypnosis for this reason and have to really trust someone before I will ever have that kind of session with that person.)
But if it’s something that has medium- to low-impact, like checking out veggies and flowers at the store or what brand of peanut butter is better for me, I can do those just fine.
Or even some hobbies - I can do that kind of self-investigation.
Also, the closer the distinctions are, then it gets harder and harder for me. And that’s where Rose’s help can be invaluable. I investigated three really similar specialties and getting Rose’s feedback was really helpful.
Incidentally, the specialty that ended up thrilling my soul was the closest thing to anything you could call destiny or life purpose or whatever made up word you want to ascribe to it. In every databank that I have ever found to investigate it with Rose, it is always the one that thrills my soul hugely and in a well-balanced way. It really is my dharma in life.
I would do a session like that with Rose - pick a few jobs you’ve had and have Rose investigate them as a baseline, then pick some really different jobs for contrast (”being a lawyer,” “behind a chiropractor,” “being a rodeo star,” etc.), then start zooming in on the ones that seem promising and start investigating more databanks.
Also, sometimes you hit surprises. I once had a conversation with someone at business school about his work and thought to myself, I bet I would be really good at his line of work. So I investigated it with Rose and it thrilled my soul hugely and, in fact, I would have made way more money at it than being a physician - money beyond my wildest imagination.
But the downside is that my emotions would get numbed, my spiritual development would get stunted, and I would become the closest to Paris Hilton-like that Rose has ever seen me morph into in a session.
So… the upside is that I’m considering getting an MBA so that I can start a hedge fund or raise venture capital to raise money for charity in the future. And medicine will be my day job. And then I can get the best of both worlds!