3 Simple Tips From Brendon Burchard to Help You Live a Life of Purpose
#1: Realign with the truth of who you are
Motivational speaker Jim Rohn said that we are the average of the five people we spend the most time with.
So, in an effort to live with intention and purpose, I’ve decided to spend more time reading and listening to inspirational leaders and less time watching people clean their homes on YouTube.
One of the inspirational leaders I’ve stumbled upon is Brendon Burchard. If you don’t know who he is, you need to. He has an amazing story and every time I listen to him I feel like I can do absolutely anything.
Brendon shares 3 simple tips for finding your purpose. You can watch his full video here, or read on for a summary (all quotes below are Brendon’s unless otherwise stated).
#1: Realign with the truth of who you are
Brendon coaches some of the highest achievers in the world who have accomplished great things (such as leading Fortune 100 businesses, best selling authors, professional athletes, etc.). But they still don’t feel they have a sense of purpose — why is that?
According to Brendon, achievement is not the problem, alignment is.
“The hunt for purpose begins with the realignment to personal truth.”
Instead of living the life others want us to live, we have to realign with the truth of who we are, the core of who we are, and what is authentic to us.
What are our passions? Our desires? What excites us?
When we live our life based only on our obligations to others or only in reaction to the world around us, “suddenly your life isn’t really your life.”
Brendon teaches us to listen to our souls again.
“If your soul is screaming for change you gotta change.”
Let go of other’s expectations. Let go of false expectations and feeling like you have to do everything for everyone. And, if you can, let go of work that’s not in alignment with your passions but done only for a paycheck.
What does it mean to realign to our personal truth?
What does it mean to be in alignment with our core, authentic self? According to Brendon, it means to connect to and grow our three primary aspirations:
- The aspiration of “being” — We all aspire to be a vibrant, healthy person who we are proud of and who does things we are proud of.
- The aspiration of “relating” — We all aspire to feel cared for, to connect with others, and to be part of a community. To do that, we must be more authentic in our interactions with others.
- The aspiration of “creating” — We all want to create something in the world — a legacy, a difference, art, a mission, a building. Ask yourself, are you creating things that matter to you? Are you spending your days doing your life’s work and not just busywork?
If we want to feel purpose in our lives, we must realign to the truth of who we are. And to realign to our core truth, we must strive to be more, to relate better, and to create more authentic things.
“The more we are true to ourselves, the more we can connect with and contribute to the world.”
#2: Adopt the role model mindset
According to Brendon, people feel they are missing a sense of purpose when they don’t activate their potential.
The more you sense your potential is higher than how you perform in your daily life, the more misery you may feel, and the further away you will feel from your purpose.
So how do we change?
“There has to be a realignment and a reactivation of your potential. Your daily actions are leading to a momentum. And that momentum each day is leading you towards a particular kind of destiny, a particular direction, a particular legacy, a particular style of life.“
Ask yourself, what is the momentum of your energy — of who you are being, how you are relating, and what you are creating each day — leading towards? If the answer is not much it’s because you’re not activating your potential.
“You are more strong, more capable, more extraordinary than you could ever imagine, but that must be activated by your daily habits…you must activate your potential on a consistent basis.”
How do we activate our potential? One way is to adopt a role model mindset.
What is the role model mindset?
We have to see ourselves as role models. We need to recognize that our kids are watching, our family is watching, our community is watching.
Brendon reveals that one of the greatest things he’s noticed from training the most powerful influencers in the world (like Oprah!) is that they all say they want to be a role model for others. They make choices from a mindset of service to others.
Which makes sense because when you serve others then you almost always feel you are serving a purpose.
When you adopt a role model mindset, you activate your potential and connect to your purpose.
“You have a chance every single morning to make that change and be the person you want to be.”
#3: Create small but meaningful moments in your life
How many times have you gotten to the end of the week or the month or the year and said where did the time go? What did I even do? For me, all the time.
That’s because we’re going through our days without really feeling the day — without being truly present in the moment.
“Too many days unfelt leads to a disconnect with purpose.”
How do we feel the day? How do we create meaningful moments?
We have to take those small, every day, mundane moments — when you kiss your kids goodbye, when you give your partner a goodbye hug — and really feel the moment.
We’re always moving on to the next thing and we’re not feeling this moment.
Put away the distractions and be in the moment. “When you’re with your partner, be there. When you’re with your kids playing, be there. Then you just feel purposeful because you are doing things that are meaningful.”
“I get so busy sometimes chasing the extraordinary moments that I don’t pay attention to the ordinary moments. The moments that, if taken away, I would miss more than anything.” Brené Brown
In her Netflix special, The Call to Courage, Brené Brown shares what she learned from interviewing those who have survived tremendous things — mass shootings, loss of a child, genocide. She shares that many of those who had experienced grief said what they missed the most were the ordinary moments. The moments they barely noticed while they were happening. A quirky text message from a parent. Or the sound of a child slamming the screen door.
We often spend the majority of our time and energy focused on the big things — weddings, vacations, graduations. We gloss over the small moments even though they make up the majority of our lives.
Those seemingly small moments we ignore or even roll our eyes at may become the moments we miss most one day.
Brendon’s advice helped me see that my kids give me the greatest sense of purpose.
They’ve helped me learn more about myself and get clearer on who I am and what I value (tip #1).
They push me to become the best version of myself since I know they’re watching (tip #2).
And they’ve helped me slow way down and be present (tip #3). One of the things I now look forward to every day is a morning hug from both of my kids. No matter what happened the day before, I know each morning I have the chance to start over and do better.
A life of purpose is nothing more than than a series of days lived with purpose. When we strive more days than not to live our truth, serve others, and embrace the mundane but meaningful moments, we can achieve a life of purpose.
