What 731 Days in a Row of Writing Has Taught Me about Purpose
Today marks 2 years + 1 leap year day of consecutively writing and publishing an article on this blog. Technically, once I publish this article it will be the 732nd consecutive day of me publishing an article. I can’t help but stop today and give myself a pat of the back for the tremendous amount of discipline and consistency I continue to show each day.
Surprisingly, these 2 years have flown by fairly fast. As the time flies, at each milestone I always like to stop and reflect by writing about the lessons I’m learning along the way.
- 74 days into this journey I wrote about breaking my personal record for writing and publishing daily. My lesson learned at this point was all about focusing on winning the day.
- 150 days in I wrote about the lessons I learned on pursuing difficult goals.
- 180 days in I wrote about how I finally understood what it takes to build good habits.
- At day 199 I then shared my epiphany on how blogging daily teaches you about the art of loving bad ideas.
- Next, on day 318 I shared the productivity breakthrough that was helping me continue on this daily blogging journey.
- At the big 1 year mark on day 365, I write about my journey from what I thought was an impossible task of writing every day for 1 year in a row, to doing it and showing that it was possible.
- 594 days in I reflected on the importance of using your strengths and how that helped me get to this point.
- Finally, at day 600 I write about how this blogging journey started with me writing for myself, but ultimately transformed into a process of me defining my purpose of writing for others.
My Lesson Learned About Purpose
With that said, today I have a quick thought to share that builds on what I wrote at day 600 about purpose. Purpose is not about you. It’s not just a passion and it’s not just a goal either. Purpose is the combination of passion and the desire to achieve a goal with an impact bigger than self.
When you have purpose, it’s psychologically painful to not share it with others. It’s like having a valuable gift you get immense joy out of using, but you can only use it with others. However, this isn’t a gift you can put in a box, or on a shelf, or in a closet and hide away so you don’t think about it. Purpose is a gift that lingers at the top of your mind constantly. Each moment it goes unused feels like a moment wasted.
When you have something in your life you enjoy doing with others, doing for others, or giving to others this much, you have purpose. This is the gift writing everyday for the last 2 years has given me. As a result, this is the gift my purpose is calling me to give to others.