Golden Rainbow - Photo by Monica Beck
I’m a life coach. It’s my joy to sit down with another human being and help them figure out just what they’re on this planet for. One of the aims of life coaching is to see people realize their full potential and fulfill their unique life purpose. Explicitly, and implicitly, implied in coaching is the idea that personal fulfillment is at the end of the rainbow of realized potential and purpose.
Now, to a large extent this is true. However, when we make anything simply about us, personal fulfillment becomes a short lived, fleeting, and rather illusive experience. The simple attainment of goals is not all that satisfying, at least, not for very long. Something much more significant must be added to the equation for the results of realized goals to have their ultimate impact in the heart of an individual.
We humans have been hard wired to serve a purpose that is larger than ourselves. When the purpose we are pursuing becomes measurably shrunk down to the size of ourselves, we become gutted of that which was designed to grant us our sense of significance. Significance does not come from simply feeling good about myself and my accomplishments. It comes from a higher source.
We were made to make a difference in this world for the sake and benefit of others, and, ultimately, for the glory of God. A life well lived is one that has enabled others to live well. Our temptation is to grasp and run after personal fulfillment. In the end we lose it. But if, on the other hand, we give ourselves for a purpose that eclipses our own life, in the end we find it.
For whom are you living?