As I’ve said, we understand alignment when it comes to physical pain. We understand indigestion. We understand fatigue. We know how to read those signals. But it is less natural for us to stop to read the more subtle implications of misalignment, especially misalignment in our lives and our minds. We get so busy that we don’t take a moment to feel how things are affecting us. Do I feel disappointed or sad by this circumstance? Do I feel a sense of well-being and peace? Do I feel joy around this person, or do I feel discomfort and anxiety around him?
Almost everyone knows when they’re in the presence of someone with whom they feel comfortable. There’s a feeling. It’s not even rational—it’s not because that person uses big words or dresses a certain way. That may have attracted you to (or repelled you from) him initially, but as you get to know him, your comfort level comes from an inner connection you feel. An emotional connection.
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There can be no knowledge without emotion. We may be aware of a truth, yet until we have felt its force, it is not ours. To the cognition of the brain must be added the experience of the soul.
—Arnold Bennett
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If you’re going to allow success in your life, if you’re going to create a life of peace and joy and satisfaction, you’ve got to become aware of and sensitive to what you align with. And you’ve got to discipline yourself to go there, to know what fits you best, to eat the kind of foods that contribute to your health, to engage in exercise that contributes to your physical well-being, to breathe air that is beneficial. It’s how alignment breeds success and well-being.
What we’re most ignorant of is how this alignment originates in our thinking. What thoughts bring us a sense of well-being? What thoughts bring us a sense of comfort, joy, and peace? If you are willing to notice it you can begin by deliberately nurturing those aligned thoughts.
You can also dismantle and dissolve thoughts that lead you away from success. Those are the thoughts that make you angry, sad, afraid, and disappointed; any thoughts that incite the fear-based emotions. Shine your light on them. Look at how they are positive course-corrections in disguise. Do not be afraid of them. Do not take them literally or seriously. If they are negative, they are not in alignment with the universe.
You may need to consider choosing a different position in the company if you find that as hard as you’re trying, the work you’re doing just isn’t fulfilling. But if you’re afraid of change, what can you do? Stay paralyzed and miserable? When you believe your negative thoughts, any possibility for bold change looks too difficult. That’s where the previous chapter on reversal becomes vital and useful. Because once you’ve altered your approach to life so that you can reverse whatever thoughts you wish, you will actually look forward to change. You will look forward to many of the very things you used to fear.
Once you have reversed your feelings about change, you can change anything, including your job. You can use the feedback mechanism inherent in this altered process to look from the inside out instead of the outside in and discover where you belong. You’ll feel what works best for you.
When we practice this we are focused on where we want to go, not what we want to get away from. So we can focus our whole lives on alignment. And when something doesn’t fit, it’s not bad or wrong—it’s a form of beneficial communication! Misalignment is a teacher who tells you, “This doesn’t fit with you. This isn’t an alignment with who you naturally are. You won’t find success here. With this line of thinking, you’ll only find obstacles.”
We’ve heard so much, and so many books have been written about your life’s purpose. Some people say their life’s purpose is to be a teacher, or an artist, or a CEO, or a spiritual leader. And yes, those purposes can apply, but what we are talking about is bigger than that.
Your purpose is to become who you are
All those professions and callings may be eventual aspects of your purpose. Wonderful manifestations of it. But your highest purpose is to become the fulfillment of your potential. Right now, in this eternal moment. Not in some distant, hard-won future.
Your purpose is to learn to manifest and bring into the world the gifts that are contained within you. Now. It is simply the most fundamental, the most profound, and the most important reason for living. It’s to become who you already are. That’s your purpose. That’s everyone’s purpose.
What if—just for a moment—you could live without any thoughts of money? What if you could live beyond all thoughts of need? What if you only showed up at work today to do what you most love to do? How would that be? Who would you be? That’s a good exercise to begin with.
And then we might go even further than that. Discovering our purpose is about gaining an understanding of it. It happens in silence and solitude. It’s not uncovered by reading 35 books on how to discover your life’s purpose.
Purpose is simple. Purpose is letting the best of what’s in you come through and then giving it to the world. That’s your life’s purpose. And everyone has the same purpose! No exceptions. And within that purpose, they have their individual outer manifestation of it: their gift to entertain, their gift to organize, their gift to teach, their gift to create.
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The best way of leading people is to let them find their own way.
—Byron Katie
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