Uncovering your passion and purpose may require you to spend time alone. Your greatest thoughts and ideas will come in times of quiet reflection and stillness. Remember, your purpose is not something you can just think through and figure out. Instead, it is something that you feel and experience. It comes from deep inside you.

If we are to find meaning in life, we must pay as much mind to our limbic “hearts” as to our neocortical cognitions. Our positive emotions evoke thought-action tendencies in humans that broaden human attachment to others and to community service. From thence comes meaning and purpose.

The first step along the road to recovering your true Self is to recognize that you're not who you've thought you were. It's like you've gone through all your life thinking you were Bobbie Jones, the child of Mary and Bob Jones, then you find out on your sixteenth birthday that your real name is Dale Smith, and your parents are Cindy and Carl. But, in truth, the case of mistaken identity you've been living is even more dramatic than that.

After dreaming to be a veterinarian since I was 7-years old, I now had my own practice, was well respected in the community, my brother and I had recently purchased a piece of investment property in the elite College Hill area where I was now living and managing the other apartments. What's going on? Why aren't I happy? Why am I so bored with my life? That was over twenty years ago. I was 36 years of age, and what I didn't know was that I was on the verge of a midlife crisis.

Seeking your calling is a process of discovery that continues throughout your life, informed by your questions, your conflicts, and your deepest dreams. It is the journey known by many names, from Homer’s Odyssey to the pilgrimage in Dante’s Divine Comedy and the quests of the knights of the round table, to the vision quests of Native Americans, and the path of the Chinese sage, Lao Tzu. Abraham Maslow called it self-actualization. Joseph Campbell knew it as “the hero’s journey.”

You can make an assessment of your abilities in order to help uncover your purpose. These gifts can be a clue to your purpose; they can help you fulfill whatever it is you believe you are here to do.

You can make an assessment of your abilities in order to help uncover your purpose. These gifts can be a clue to your purpose; they can help you fulfill whatever it is you believe you are here to do. Talents might include athletic abilities, dexterity, musical talent, taste, artistic abilities, a sense of humor, comfort with numbers, and so on.

Every once in a while you meet people who are inspired by their work. They exude enthusiasm. They appear to care genuinely about what they are doing, the people with whom they work, and the people they serve. They express a joy that seems to come from deep within...  When you meet such a person, you realize that their work is consistent with their purpose. You might say they are working “on purpose”. They know why they are here and they know the difference they want to make.

In order for you to live an authentic, meaningful life, which is the principal remedy for the depression creative people experience, you must feel that 1) the plan of your life is meaningful, 2) the work you do is meaningful, and 3) the way your spend your time is meaningful. These are three separate but related tasks, each with its own logic, demands, and obstacles.

Now, as I sit watching the exquisite sunrise over the Blue Ridge Mountains, that day in Greensboro [when I was close to suicide] seems to be from a different person’s life—and in many ways it is. I am no longer that confused, scared, lonely young man. And today I can truthfully say my life is filled with purpose and meaning.