I was going to post on something else today, but I just read “What then Should a Man Do” at Bright Darkness, and started to reflect.
The second point of his post is that a man should embrace a quest. My question is, how does one find one’s quest in life?
Growing up, I always did what I supposed to do. Succeeded at school, graduated university, found a job, buy a house. The next steps were to pursue marriage, raise a family, and continue to advance in my career. I would possibly enter politics upon my retirement.
So far, all I’ve accomplished has just been from stumbling through and doing what was expected of me; there was never any sense of purpose or aim to it; I had/have no real mission.
The closest I’ve had was a desire to start a family, but is/was that just doing what was expected of me? Even so, is that in and of itself a purpose? It would seem rather small to devote myself solely to raising a family, with no other meaning to my life.
I entered my career simply because my employer was the first to hire me for a decent job (a big consideration after a year of underemployment and living at home). I have been questioning my career path, as it is unfulfilling. Yet, maybe as I advance and my responsibilities increase, it will become more fulfilling. Or maybe not. Do I want to just be a desk jockey for the rest of my life, just another cog in the bureaucratic machine? (Now I’m talking in cliches, so I’ll wrap this up).
Anyway, one thing I want from this blog is to find a mission, a purpose. (Or possibly that there is no purpose, so I can give up the search to embrace nihilism).
I’ve tried to find a purpose before, but never had much success. I’ve always assumed I would stumble on it as I went through life, but here I am a few years shy of 30, having accomplished nothing noteworthy, spending my days in pointless government busywork, spending my evenings in front of the computer. I desire something more.
So the question: how does one find a purpose?
PS: I know that these first few posts have have had a lot of personal reflection on myself and my life. I’m trying to establish to myself what I hope to accomplish with this blog. In the future, my rate of posting will go down (the only reason I’ve had one major post a day so far is the spare time the long weekend has provided) but there should also be more analysis of issues in the future and less of me narcissisticly muttering to myself about myself.
Thanks for the link. You have a purpose and a mission with your family.
Oh, and it is not about “goal setting”. This is not something you manage. I have had many five-year plans ruined by circumstances, by the need to move into positions, and by doors closing or opening.
Your second mission, of course, is to glorify God.
I’ve added you to our blogroll.
Cheers.
A good response.
Thanks. I checked out your blog; I think I’ve read it before. It looks good; I’ve added it to my roll to read more later.
If you want to discover your purpose, start by budgeting your time.
Write down your expenditures of time throughout each week, just as an accountant writes down the amounts of money that he spends.
Even virtuous activities, such as lifting weights or commenting on manosphere blogs, take up your finite time.
Observe your time expenditures. You will probably find that you make some bad time use decisions because you get reinforced for making them.
You will probably find that your true purpose is not very socially rewarding.
I can easily spend 20 hours in a week on blogging, commenting, keeping up with current events. That’s enough time for a part-time job. But it gets a lot of reinforcement; if I spend that much time on blogs, lots of bloggers will email me and tell me that I’m a credit to the manosphere. We can call this kind of social reinforcement by praise an “attaboy.”
My truly productive activities don’t get the same social and emotional feedback. If my priority is building a network of professional contacts, I will spend 20 hours a week and get a lot more discouragement and fewer “attaboys.”
If your goal is to be the next Paul Elam or W. F. Price, by all means, spend 20 hours per week on blogging.
If your goal is to be the next Arnold Schwarzenegger, spend that 20 hours per week lifting weights.
If your goal is to be rich, spend that 20 hours chasing the cash.
Etc.