How to Find Your Why
“He who has a why can endure any how.”
– Frederick Nietzsche
Knowing your why-your purpose-is the driving force behind achieving any goal and becoming your best future self.
This is what separates successful people from the rest of us-they weren’t born lucky, they’re not necessarily more intelligent or wealthy…
They were just driven to succeed, and followed the direction to their dreams.
No matter what it took.
Because they knew their why.
If you don’t have a why or you’re not sure what yours is, I’d like to help you find it.
Deep down inside of every single one of us, there is a why. Sometimes it just takes a little digging to find it.
How to Find Your Why
“There is one quality that one must possess to win, and that is definiteness of purpose, the knowledge of what one wants, and a burning desire to possess it.”
-Napoleon Hill
Make Time to Think and Get Clarity
First, you have to be disciplined about sitting alone in utter silence, and think.
Even if it’s just for 15-20 minutes a day.
Ask yourself these questions, and write down your answers:
- What are you passionate about?
- You can’t stop talking about _____?
- Your dream career-what is it?
- What would make you so excited to wake up for every day?
- Do you know your God-given talents? (if you’re not sure, ask your family and friends-they’ll tell you what you’re good at!)
- How do you measure success?
- What value can you bring to the world?
- List your strengths.
- If money were no object, what would you do?
- Which first action do you need to take to get the ball rolling?
- What would it take for you to look back on the year at the end of the year and think, “this has been the best year of my life”?
Related:
- 3 Ways to Expand Your Thinking Capacity
- 4 Keys to Cultivate Abundance Thinking
- 9 Questions to Ask Yourself to Find Your Purpose
Take Action
Learning your why can’t be forced-it likely won’t come to you overnight. That’s why it’s so important to take the time to think, and ask yourself questions, as I listed above.
When you do figure it out, you need to begin taking actionable steps toward it immediately. The difference between successful people and the rest of us is they take action while the rest of us are complacent and wishing instead of doing.
I personally find goal-setting to be the perfect first step and extremely helpful aid to get pointed in the right direction, if you know how to set goals correctly.
Goals should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.
These are called SMART goals.
They also help you see the end from the beginning-another learned trait people who succeed acquire.
If you can’t see the end from the beginning, you won’t know the order of steps to take to actually get to the end.
It all has to be thought out and mapped out before taking action.
Related:
- How to Set Goals and Achieve Them
- Grow You (Coaching)
- How to Be Persistent in Achieving Your Goals
- Goal-Setting Planner
- How to Set Goals the Right Way
Change Your Habits
People who live their dreams know when certain habits are hindering them from the success they desire, and the desire to win is so strong, they nix those bad habits in the bud because the desire to win is greater than the desire for the bad habits.
Your habits are evidence of how you view your self, so if your habits aren’t in line with the person you want to become, you’ll never become her.
Before you can change your habits though, you must first change your identity to align with your why and your ideal future self.
Related:
- How to Change Your Habits
- Atomic Habits
- 11 Habits that Make You Unhappy
- 5 Things You Must Let Go of to Achieve Success
Seeing (and Saying) is Believing
If you want something bad enough, you’ve got to visualize it and speak as if it is already happening.
You have to see it in your mind (a reason I love vision boards-you see your dreams, right in front of you, day after day.)
Make a vision board and a list of affirmations. Every morning, recite those affirmations while looking at that vision board. As long as it takes, until you are living that dream.
Create the affirmations as if those dreams have already happened. This helps build confidence, which will lead to you taking actions that support your goals.
Related:
- 3 Keys to Building Self-Confidence
- 8 Keys to Self-Improvement
- 6 Reasons Why People Give Up on Their Dreams
Before You Go
Having a why gives your life purpose and is the first step to setting attainable goals and becoming your best future self.
A life of purpose enables you to live intentionally and fully, creating the life you want and not just letting life happen as it may.
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[…] 1) FIND YOUR WHY! One of the best ways to fire up that motivation once again is to remember why you started in the first place! Write a list of all the reasons you started whatever your journey is. Create a mood board of images and quotes that relate to your why. Trust me this works every time, The moment you remind yourself truly of your WHY, you feel purpose again. It will kick you into gear. This blog post by Legend Of Lisa has some daily questions to ask yourself to figure out your unique why. https://legendoflisa.com/2019/02/01/how-to-find-your-why/ […]
[…] How to Find Your “Why” […]