Dr Myles Munroe shares a powerful idea that I would like to share with you. He says that the wealthiest places in the world are not the gold mines of South America or the oil fields of Iraq or Iran. They're not the diamond mines of South Africa or the banks of the world. The wealthiest place on the planet is just down the road. It is the cemetery. There lie buried, companies that were never started, inventions that were never made, best-selling books that were never written and masterpieces that were never painted. In the cemetery is buried the greatest treasure of untapped potential. There is a treasure within you that must come out. It is your potential. Don’t go to the grave with your treasure still within you.
"There lies within each person a huge reservoir of untapped potential for achievement, success, happiness, health and greater prosperity. It's like an ocean unsailed, a new continent unexplored, a world of possibilities waiting to be released and channeled toward some great good." – Jim Rohn
Your personal purpose is the original intent or reason for your existence. Part of your purpose may be being in relationship with a life-time partner, being a good parent, involved in the community in some way. But your life purpose is your unique service that you have been created to provide in your lifetime. You have a specific service to provide humanity, which no one else can provide the way you can. God has given you a skill or ability that the world needs.
Since God gave you your life, its possibilities are subject to His imagination. Thankfully, His imagination knows no limits, which means that things God can accomplish through you are even beyond your own imagination. Don’t let yourself be limited by statements such as: “You can be whatever you want to be”, because you actually can be whatever God wants you to be. And that is far greater possibility. You may be a nobody in the eyes of this world, but you are somebody in the eyes of your Creator. It is His will that your potential is fully utilized.
You are on this planet for a very specific reason. To positively affect people the way that only you can. This is your service to humanity. It therefore means finding and using your strongest talents. Where you are right now is part of your purpose. But it may also be a necessary step towards greater fulfillment. Your purpose is your passion and your power. It is the underlying driving force of your life. It gives your life meaning and direction. It is the driving force that compels you to make an impact on your world. Whether in your current career or perhaps in another field.
You have a unique purpose, and believing otherwise doesn’t change this truth. In the same way, not believing there is a force called gravity doesn’t change its existence. Acknowledging that you have a purpose will put you in a better position to discover your purpose. Your purpose cannot be invented or chosen based on your career. It must be discovered from within. It was placed in you by the Creator, so it follows that in order for you to discover your purpose; you have to pay attention to the workings of God in you.
Mankind was created to live in control of the world around. There is an area in this earth system where he or she is to exercise dominion. Your sphere of influence is your world; it is simply your immediate surroundings. Your world also represents the people you come into contact with each day. It includes the experiences that you get caught up in day by day. True exercise of power in your sphere of influence, is only possible through understanding one’s purpose. It is purpose, which is also the seed of dominion on the inside of every man that makes a person feel the need for greatness.
For example, people with musical gifts would feel the need to be recognized in the area of their calling—music. Such people would desire to touch as many people as possible with their gifts. For this to happen, they would have to develop their gifts to the point where they become a leading icon in the music industry. This is dominion—ruling in the area of your calling. The purpose of dominion is not to be a tyrant or to be oppressive; rather, it is to be a blessing to people. Influence that comes through effective delivery of purpose will empower others and bring delight to your world. This is why you must discover your purpose.
It is important to put in perspective the fact that the expression of your purpose should bring a foretaste of heaven’s goodness upon the earth and point your world to God. It was given by God, and it should be centered on Him. This is important because there are many people who have discovered purpose who are so quick to merchandise their purpose. In the name of serving humanity, they are self-serving, ambitiously looking for ways to keep their names in the limelight and keep the focus on themselves. Purpose yearns for greatness, but self-gratification should never be the motive driving you toward greatness.
If you have ever stopped to think that you should be doing more than what you are currently doing in life or said to yourself, “My life should be making a major impact in a certain area,” you are in agreement with the seed principle of purpose within. It is the seed of dominion (or destiny, as some may call it) on the inside of you beckoning. It is a call to purpose and not to ambition for self-glorification. It is a call to serve and not a call to be served. It is a call to point society to God and not to you.
Discovery of purpose is a search for your own greatness. It happens first through an inward witness—a tugging of the spirit, a signal deep within that points you in a certain direction. It is an inward knowing where you just know exactly what you need to be doing in a particular season. In a moment of quietness and stillness, when you’re not caught up in so much of the day’s activities, have you ever sensed deep within you—a call to greatness? It’s a bell that rings on the inside of you, calling you to something that is beyond you.
You think about the world around you and feel an urge to do something that will empower people in your world to lead a better quality of life. This sense of calling is a pointer to your purpose. Your drive is not monetary and neither is it fame but simply a selfless desire to see improvement in a certain area or provide the best value based on your resources and abilities in the world around you.
Life lived without a purpose is not a wisely spent life. Only God knows why He created you and put you on this earth and He wants you to know it too. He did not create you to live a purposeless existence. The answer may not be immediate. He may be revealing His will in stages and over a certain period of time to you, but if you will maintain an unbroken relationship with Him and stay obedient to His word, you can be sure that you will soon start living the purpose driven life.
Don’t doubt yourself. You are more than enough. You are good enough. If no one else tells you that, I will reaffirm you that you are good enough to do whatever you want in life. Life is too short for you to paralyze yourself with doubts. When you believe in yourself, your potential isn’t something you need to reach; it’s something waiting to be discovered. Potential is the possibilities we each have inside us to perform to our maximum capability. We all have unique talents not possessed by anyone else. It is the way that talents are developed and used that distinguishes the so-called “talented” from other people.
"What we can or cannot do, what we consider possible or impossible, is rarely a function of our true capability. It is more likely a function of our beliefs about who we are." - Anthony Robbins
What we can achieve in life is a blend of talents, drive, circumstances, skill, luck and positive self-belief.
Self-development is a do-it-yourself skill and a do-it-yourself activity. Develop it. Knowing your potential does change your life by helping you understand what you can excel at and who you can become. Knowing that allows you to overcome your fate and make your dreams come true.
We all need to have some goal in life. Most of us just go through life without any sense of meaning or purpose though. I once heard it said, "If we aim at nothing we're sure to hit it every time". I realized that I didn't want to hit nothing - I wanted to achieve something in life. I wanted to make a difference. After all, what's it all worth if we can't at least make a small difference?
We can face anything if we have a clear sense of meaning and purpose. Nothing can sway us from our goal - if we have a clear goal. If not, we'll be blown around by every wind of chance. We'll wander aimlessly through life shooting our arrows everywhere and not really achieving anything. Live your life with passion. You have so much to give. The greatest thing that you could do is to be all that you can be. And never forget: You were conceived a winner and are destined to succeed! You have incredible potential. I wish I could take you into the future and show you what you can and will do with your life. It is truly unbelievable. What you can still accomplish is only limited by what you can imagine.
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