By BELLA BRINKERHOFF
“Your career is like a garden. It can hold an assortment of life’s energy that yields a bounty for you. You do not need to grow just one thing in your garden. You do not need to do just one thing in your career”
Freshman year, I had no idea what I was doing. I went into college thinking I would major in public relations and changed to music dance theater until I realized I couldn’t dance and got a D+ in ballet. I thought about business for a while, and then I landed in a psychology major. While pursuing psychology, I continued to constantly change my mind. I began with the desire to work in juvenile detention, shifted towards addiction recovery, and then decided I would get a PhD in psychology. After realizing how much schooling this would entail, I decided a Master’s program would be better for me, and my interests again shifted from addiction recovery counseling to becoming a licensed therapist.
For the last year now, I have been preparing to apply to graduate school, researching all of the different options, and writing essays and resumes. This semester, I had it all planned out. I had already asked for recommendation letters and had written my personal statements and curriculum vitae. I had taken the GRE and even finished applying to one of my backup programs before everything changed.
This past summer, I got married. Alone, that need not affect my career, but it opened up new possibilities that I had previously pushed aside. As I reached a certain point in the semester, in the middle of the application process, I faced a crisis of decision-making as I seriously took a look at my future. I asked myself questions on purpose, such as, “What do I want out of life?" “What do I want to see as I look back on my life someday?" and “Where is my path?" Diving into the discovery of my personal purpose in life helped me come to a satisfactory conclusion—one completely different from my previous plan.
Why did finding my purpose mean so much to me and the choices I make for my future? In the literature on the subject, purpose is defined as “a central, self-organizing life aim that organizes and stimulates goals, manages behaviors, and provides a sense of meaning” (McKnight & Kashdan, 2009). This implies that once an individual finds their purpose in life, the goals, decisions, and actions they take will naturally lead towards that purpose. For me, once I was able to identify what my personal purpose is, the decisions I needed to make right now became intuitive. This idea is in line with the findings of Kang et al. (2019), showing that purpose is related to less conflict-related brain activity during decision-making. This is likely due to the self-assurance that comes from knowing in what direction one’s life is moving.
Research on the effects of finding one’s purpose in life has shown that it is an endeavor worth pursuing. In a systematic review on the benefits of such, purpose commitment, or the amount of personal investment individuals put into a belief or course of action, was positively associated with life satisfaction and positive affect (Pfund & Hill, 2018). These individuals with more purposeful commitment were also found to respond better to daily stressors (Pfund & Hill, 2018).
These benefits are true for general well-being but have also been studied more specifically pertaining to an individual's career choices and the satisfaction that follows. The concept of a “sense of calling” was explored in studies, showing that being able to pursue a calling-infused career is positively correlated with well-being (Ahn et al., 2017; Yuliawati & Ardyan, 2022). These individuals exhibited greater satisfaction in both their job and in life, especially compared with those that did not seek a purpose in life at all (Yuliawati & Ardyan, 2022). Zhu et al. (2017) found that even just the process of pursuing and developing one’s purpose has a positive effect on well-being, allowing individuals to better overcome challenges and distressing emotions that manifest in career changes. Interestingly, all of this pursuit of purpose or callings is done solely for internal rewards, with people gaining greater satisfaction but certainly not prestige or money (Zhu et al., 2017). This was made obvious in a study where subjective (work satisfaction) and objective (occupational prestige) forms of career success were studied in relation to sense of purpose in adults (Weston et al., 2020). They found that a greater sense of purpose was associated with subjective but not objective career success (Weston et al., 2020), affirming that people will be happier when making decisions and goals based on their personal purpose.
In response to my own purpose in life, I chose to postpone a graduate degree and instead save money to have children. The answer to those questions from earlier brought me to the conclusion that my life purpose is to become a mother and be fully involved in the raising of my children. As I imagined what I wanted out of life and what I hoped to see looking back from my deathbed, I hope to make an impact in the lives of those that I love, encouraging genuineness, vulnerability, and growth. Although many worries and "what-ifs" have arisen against this decision, such as wondering what others may think, whether it is the smartest financial decision, and if it will ruin my chances at education later, knowing my purpose in life allows me to move forward with confidence that I will not regret this path.
“Do not be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment”
References
Ahn, J., Dik, B. J., & Hornback, R. (2017). The experience of career change driven by a sense of calling: An interpretative phenomenological analysis approach. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 102, 48–62. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2017.07.003
Kang, Y., Strecher, V. J., Kim, E., & Falk, E. B. (2019). Purpose in life and conflict-related neural responses during health decision-making. Health Psychology, 38(6), 545–552. https://doi.org/10.1037/hea0000729
McKnight, P. E., Kashdan, T. B. (2009). Purpose in life as a system that creates and sustains health and well-being: An integrative, testable theory. Review of General Psychology, 13(3), 242–251. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0017152
Pfund, G. N., & Hill, P. L. (2018). The multifaceted benefits of purpose in life. International Forum for Logotherapy, 41, 27–37.
Weston, S. J., Cardador, M. T., Hill, P. L., Schwaba, T., Lodi-Smith, J., & Whitbourne, S. K. (2020). The relationship between career success and sense of purpose: Examining linkages and changes. The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, 76(1), 78–87. https://doi.org/10.1093/geronb/gbaa162
Yuliawati, L., & Ardyan, E. (2022). The Role of Life Planning in Finding Purpose and Living Out One’s Career Calling Among Indonesian Emerging Adults. Journal of Career Development, 49(3), 538-550. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894845320950834
Zhu, J. J., Lomas, T., Burke, J., & Ivtzan, I. (2017) Exploring the Role of Purpose in the Lives of Career Changers: A Qualitative Inquiry. Journal of Positive Psychology and Wellbeing, 1 (2). pp. 109-128. ISSN 2587-0130. https://journalppw.com/index.php/jppw/article/view/14