Unlocking the Power of Purpose and Passion

Eric Deschamps [00:00:00]:

What if finding your purpose isn’t as mysterious as people make it out to be on today’s show? We’re going to give you five ways to figure that out. That’s coming up next.

Rob Dale [00:00:10]:

Um, hi, and welcome to the Living Richly podcast. My name is Rob Dale, and I’m here with my amazing friend, amazing Aaron. I get enough daily chomp. I got enough. I’m I got an upgrade. Hey, Steve’s. Here my amazing friend, Eric Deshamp.

Eric Deschamps [00:00:30]:

And Steve won’t want no.

Rob Dale [00:00:34]:

We are talking today about purpose. Now, this is one of those ones that’s going to fire both of us up. I know that we absolutely love to talk about purpose. It is something that so many people are wrestling with and how do I find my purpose in life? And yet most people live their lives almost like it’s Groundhog Day, right? They go through every day over and over again. They got the same playlist on repeat. They’re just kind of living out the same day 20,000 times until it’s over and not really having any sense of this. And yet our purpose is kind of screaming in the background. It is doing everything it’s can to.

Eric Deschamps [00:01:13]:

Be discovered by us 100%. And this is what, very early on in the show, we want to turn this on its heels, is that oftentimes we talk about finding our purpose. And we’re going to give our listeners practical ways that they can do that, that you can get clear on what your life’s purpose is all about. We’re going to give you some principles to consider. We’re going to give you some questions that you can reflect on. But what we want to say to you right out of the gate is that your purpose is trying to find you. And it’s been trying to find you probably your entire life. And the tools that we’re going to give you and the questions we’re going to arm you with are designed to just get more present to that voice that’s been speaking to you. And that on the door of your life that’s saying, this is what you’re all about.

Rob Dale [00:01:59]:

It’s like your compass. It is really that center, that anchor that really lets you live out your fullest and most fulfilling life. It comes out of that sense of knowing the purpose, knowing why you exist, knowing what it is that you’re about. All of those things are absolutely critical to living your richest life.

Eric Deschamps [00:02:25]:

Yeah, it’s a vision of your preferred future. It’s getting clear again. We’ve heard it from recent guests on the show and really been enjoying those episodes, by the way. And we’ve got some more great guests coming up in the weeks to come. But this notion of crafting a vision for your life, crafting a strong sense of this is what matters to me. This is my why. This is what makes me happy. And I’m turning up the volume on that. I think it was even Anastasia again, who said that once you get clear on it, you protect it, you nurture it. Right.

Rob Dale [00:02:53]:

I love that language of the protecting, guarding it. It becomes so critical. I also love what Kelly Flanagan talked about, and it’s so important. Anytime I have a conversation with anyone around Purpose, I will use Kelly Flanagan to kind of start out that conversation. We do not want to fall into the trap that our Purpose defines who we are.

Eric Deschamps [00:03:15]:

Right?

Rob Dale [00:03:16]:

The sequence matters. We need to first come to grips with that radical self acceptance that we talk about so often. Once we’ve accepted we really are truly loving ourselves, then we find the community upon which we can live out our authentic self. And it’s in that sequence, purpose is found.

Eric Deschamps [00:03:36]:

Absolutely. And to your point, if we don’t get that right, then many of the things that can be attributed to Purpose are really an attempt to meet some unmet need in our lives, right? We chase that sense of validation and worth in either our work or our relationships. At Purpose is that work piece where we feel we’re making a difference or contributing. But I did it for so long. You did it for so long. Chasing validation, chasing work. Our worth in our work leaves us feeling very, very empty. So the sequence really does matter. But once you’ve gotten clear on the fact that you’re as worthy as you’ll ever be, right? There’s nothing that you and I can do or that our listeners can do to add to the inherent value that they already possess. Once you get clear on that, then you show up more meaningfully in all of your relationships. And when you then begin to experience that true sense of belonging, because it’s a belonging that’s not based on falsehood or presenting or projecting some false version of yourself that you think people are going to love and accept, it’s about actually living as your authentic self. That’s when you experience true belonging, true community, then all of a sudden, it’s like, I loved how Kelly said it. All of a sudden it’s like this, hey, I’ve always wanted to do this thing right? Begins to emerge as well. So purpose is so important. It really comes down to writing your own story. And I think of the people that have inspired me the most, the people that I’ve looked up to the most, these are people that have a strong I mean, they’ve got lots of things going for them. But what often inspires me is their sense of purpose, their vision, the clear sense of direction, the path that they’re on. It unleashes a power and a force in our lives.

Rob Dale [00:05:24]:

Having a purpose and letting it come out of who we are, our authentic self. There’s a freedom then in living how we live that out. It’s interesting because we’ve both made comments many times that the living richly stuff that we are working on this podcast and all the other elements that come into what Living Richly is all about is our most passionate, it is our most significant, important work. It is our purpose. It is really what wakes us up in the morning, gets us going and all of this. But it’s interesting because if you were to go back five years ago, maybe eight years ago, as Rhapsody, of course, the company that we call with Trevor, when we were exploring the idea of life coaching, at that point, there was a lot of kind of where we were discomfort. We didn’t really want to be in that world.

Eric Deschamps [00:06:17]:

Let’s face it. All three of us at that point were not in a great place personally.

Rob Dale [00:06:23]:

That’s why. So we are looking and going, I don’t want to do it. And we would use all the excuses in the world. Anybody’s read Chicken Soup for the Soul? And they’ve become a life coach, right? And it’s like right? Exactly. So we were just so uninterested in that fast forward and we start doing all this internal work, and we start to really see transformation happen and all of this and that. You introduce the four x four model of what we Living Richly is based on it. We start to put that into practice, and all of a sudden, the lens of what this is about opens up and the freedom to step into what is at its very core, some would call life coaching. Right? We think it’s so much more than that, but at its core, all of a sudden, it become the most important work that we do.

Eric Deschamps [00:07:15]:

Right. I think we were even having a conversation recently with Steve, our producer, and I think he was trying to gauge, so where is this thing going? Are you guys like, are you thinking you’re kind of running out of steam?

Rob Dale [00:07:27]:

Do you think you just be gone?

Eric Deschamps [00:07:29]:

It’s just begun, baby. But he was honestly just inquiring about where do you see the show going and is it going to be like 30 episodes and done or whatever the case may be?

Rob Dale [00:07:40]:

Well, we know the answer to that is this is episode 31. So it’s not 30 episodes.

Eric Deschamps [00:07:46]:

We’re going to do 32, 33, and then we’re calling it no. I think my answer to him was based out of a conversation you and I recently had where I said to you, like, I have never been more clear about my purpose in life, and my purpose is about this. This podcast has been born out of purpose, and we’re going to get into the principles and the questions. We will just a second here, because we promised to give them to you, and we’re going to go there really, really fast. But this podcast has been born out of purpose, and one of its key reasons for existing, I believe, is to wake people up is to be that wake up call, to be that rallying call that there is a better life waiting for you. Your purpose has been waiting for you. Your purpose has been pursuing you. And we hope that the principles we share in today’s show are going to help you find it.

Rob Dale [00:08:37]:

Yeah, absolutely. And let me say, normally this is something we say at the very end of the show. I’m going to say it now, and I’m actually going to encourage you. If you’re listening in right now, hit pause and hit subscribe, and then you can start playing again. But subscribe to the podcast because we’re so excited with some of the guests we’ve got coming on, some of the things that we’re going to be doing. Again, we’re passionate about this because it’s something we believe in, but want to encourage you to be part of the journey with us and really make sure you don’t miss any of this at all.

Eric Deschamps [00:09:12]:

And I’d say as well, we may as well, while we’re on this testimonials, help liking and sharing it on social media. Help folks. We really are passionate about getting this message out to as many people as possible. Folks that have been writing in and sending us messages. We keep getting kind of a similar refrain saying, oh, my God, I’ve been waiting for this show. I can so relate to the message. It’s really, really helping me take stock of my life and revisit what’s important. So you can help us spread the message simply by hitting that, like subscribe, leaving a testimonial or review and sharing it out on social.

Rob Dale [00:09:49]:

Yeah, absolutely. So now I feel like I need to wrap up the show. No, we’re only ten minutes in and we haven’t given them the five steps. Five principles? Yeah, they’re not steps, but let’s talk about the five principles. Let’s get right into the meat of that and then we’ll talk about kind of what are the benefits, what will come out of doing this, the work that we’re about to suggest. But maybe why don’t you dive in on the first kind of principle, the first best practice? If someone is listening in and they’re like, okay, I’m ready. I want that passion. I want to find my purpose, my why, what’s the first thing they need to do?

Eric Deschamps [00:10:26]:

I would say as I was preparing for the show and I began to reflect on what are some principles that could be helpful for our listeners and that have been useful to me. The first one is learning to listen to your heart. When we talk about the model that’s emerged out of Living richly. And part of that model is looking at to the four traditional elements that have been used throughout the centuries of water, earth, air and fire. Of the four elements, when we talk about purpose, we talk about passion, we talk about your heart. That’s the fire element, right? It’s about what matters most to you. It speaks to a lot more than that, but it certainly speaks to this element of fire. It’s about following your intuition. It’s about learning to tap into your passion and how you feel about something. And this is where I think a lot of people struggle and I’m going to say this and we’ve already said it unapologetically on the show. I think for men this is really difficult. I think men get fired up about all kinds of things, but they struggle to tap in. We struggle to tap into intuition, we struggle to tap into our feelings and what we’re experiencing, but learning to listen to the signals of the heart and what your heart is telling you. We tend to lead with our minds and lead with our brains and listen. I’m a big fan of that too. I mean, the water element speaks of the mind and we talk so much about that on the show. But if we can’t tap into our emotions, if we can’t tap into our feelings, it’s like there’s an entire part of our machinery that’s not working. It’s like we’re selling ourselves short. But it’s so important. And I heard this on a show recently on a video that I was watching and they talk about how life like when we talk about mastering the elements, we talk about all of this work and focused on purpose. Today people can get the idea that it means that you’re just going to go through life like this. You’re going to be so centered, you’re just going to kind of flatline, kind of walking through life, not bothered by stuff. And the speaker said, no, that’s not how life is. He says, Life is like a heartbeat. When you see a heartbeat on one of those machines, it’s going up and it’s going down. It’s going up and it’s going down in a predictable fashion. But there are lots of ups and downs. The only time we’re going to experience a flatline in our lives is when we’re dead. We don’t want that. But the ability to tap into our intuition when life is up and tap into our intuition and to our feelings when life is down and to be able to use those as signals to indicate what are some things that we could get passionate about, that we are passionate about. Because I would say this even when you get angry, often if we get angry, really angry about something, it’s because we’re passionate about it. But often all we get hung up on is the negative emotion and we don’t go deeper to say, well, wait a minute, this really matters to me and is this something that I’m supposed to do something with?

Rob Dale [00:13:19]:

Yeah, angry is not necessarily a bad emotion. I think as well, certainly as you start to tune into those emotions and you try to figure out what am I passionate about, one of the questions you want to ask with those emotions and with how you get kind of how you react is is this an expression of my authentic self? Or is this an avoidance? Is this something I’m doing to avoid the true who I am? And so we might get really angry at something because we’re trying to hide how we really are feeling or what we are really kind of thinking, or we may be angry because we’re passionate. I know for me, one of my core values, I’ve used different language, but it’s stemmed out of this notion of fairness, not that everything in life is fair, but that people should be treated fairly. And I do find myself I get riled up when I see somebody who is being treated unfairly, a subculture that’s being treated unfairly. And so I can be passionate about that. And much of my passion and much of my purpose is to rise up and to defend the rights of those who maybe don’t have a voice.

Eric Deschamps [00:14:25]:

Right? And so you’re tapping into what is a difficult emotion or what is often classified as a negative emotion that’s happening to you in a moment that perhaps is not your best moment, and yet it’s trying to speak to you, it’s trying to signal something to you. But I think the problem is we spend so much of our lives, we talk about listening to our hearts, listening to our intuition, getting in touch with what the heart is saying. But we spend so much time numbing the heart. We spend so much time avoiding, we spend so much time distracting ourselves because we’re uncomfortable with being uncomfortable, we’re uncomfortable with discomfort. We want to avoid it at all costs. And yet it’s in the hard moments of life. I think they are the greatest teachers, they are the greatest instructors because again, they help us cut through the noise. But until we tap into this energy of the heart, we’re going to struggle there. When we talk about this and I said it on a previous episode not long ago, I think it was the show with Steve, when we talk about doing that work and pushing through pain, to listening to our heart as we push through pain, it’s not about reliving the pain. It’s not about rehashing the past. It’s not about regretting past mistakes. It’s about redeeming the pain. It’s about reclaiming your past and recycling every mistake, every bad moment as it makes sense to in order to fuel that journey and to educate you again about what are the things that really matter to you. Your purpose will be found in the things that matter to you. And often where we bump into that quite frequently and we’re not looking for it. There is in the hard moments of life, it’s easy to listen to the heart when life’s going well. Right? But I think it’s in those hard moments that it matters most.

Rob Dale [00:16:16]:

Yeah. The book I’m reading right now has a little section that talks about trauma. And it says, trauma is sometimes a secret. We keep from ourselves. And he goes on to say, often we keep our ordinary everyday trauma a secret from ourselves in pedestrian ways, like drinking, drugs, distractions, all of those things. So we’re avoiding it because we don’t want to face it. And yet, in facing it, we often will find our passion.

Eric Deschamps [00:16:43]:

Exactly. We’ll find all kinds of things.

Rob Dale [00:16:44]:

All kinds of things. Absolutely.

Eric Deschamps [00:16:45]:

Including our passion. Right. The next thing I would say is that ease into it. The first principle is learn to listen to your heart more. Right. Learn to get in tune with yourself. The other is ease into it. Often we make this work of finding our purpose. It’s like another project. And it often doesn’t emerge that way because it does require reflective work. It requires a willingness to get still and eliminate the distractions and get quiet with ourselves. And we’ve talked about this so many times on the show that, again, it fights our nature. It seems that in our culture, and it’s in our very nature to want to avoid getting quiet. And so we create there’s a lot of noise that we’re dealing with on a day to day basis in terms of distractions. But it’s amazing how even when those distractions are at present, we create more.

Rob Dale [00:17:38]:

Well, and you’re a great inspiration of this for me, because, again, if you’re listening and you’re kind of hearing go, oh, that’s easy for you guys to say. No, you don’t understand. So let me tell you something about Eric, okay? Eric is the eric is you ready to edit, right? Eric is the kind of guy that will come to you and say, hey, Rob, I got a great idea. And then he is out the door, putting the idea into motion before you even have a chance to breathe. And within an hour, he’s like, boom.

Eric Deschamps [00:18:08]:

No idea what you’re talking about.

Rob Dale [00:18:09]:

And so for you, Eric, to be somebody who says to ease into it, obviously comes out of a lesson on your own, to be still and just lean in on what the purpose is and what are you learning and what are you hearing. And you often because you will share with me by text, through messaging. I don’t know why every time everybody says by text, they have to do this, right? Just a side note. You don’t have to actually demonstrate. We all knew we’d say, or I’ll call you, right? But by text, you’ll send me a note and say, I’m reflecting this morning. And here’s something that came out of my reflections. There is that notion of the pause, the stillness, the voice being in the wind, right in the whisper, listening to the whisper, all of listening to the whispers around us. Finding your purpose is I love how our tone we went from intense when we’re talking passion. And that was finding your passion. Finding your purpose is a process that you have to eat. I love that language.

Eric Deschamps [00:19:15]:

Of easy.

Rob Dale [00:19:16]:

You’re easing into it. Yeah, because taking that moment absolutely.

Eric Deschamps [00:19:20]:

Because I think again, and I can only speak out of my personal journey, but also I speak into so many leaders, as have you over the years. And folks oftentimes when they hear this notion or hear the topic about purpose finding your why, all of a sudden they get angry or they get frustrated because they haven’t figured it out. And because they haven’t figured it out, that’s just more ammunition for their inner critic to say, see, if you were a better person, you’d figure that out and you’d be living a life that’s more intentional or more deliberate. And easing into it is a very opposite energy of that. It’s the opposite energy of striving and pushing. And we use the language on the show, hustling your way through it or muscling your way through it. It’s not like that. It’s about actually learning to ease, learning to relax into it, learning to just quiet all those voices internally. And there’s all kinds of ways you can do that. We talk about a lot of that on the show, about rituals and things like meditation and things like exercise and things like nature. That for the two of us, I know, are very meaningful ways of easing. Matter of fact, I think I sent you talk about sending a text over the weekend about a new idea. I was out walking the dog and I went for it was like an hour and a half walk and the beautiful sunshine that we were experiencing on the weekend. And as I was just easing, I was just enjoying the walk, enjoying nature, all this creativity began to flow about the future of the podcast and ideas and the rest of it. I think when you ease, literally, you’re quieting your own voice and you’re quieting all the other voices and now you can actually hear. And this is where, when I said the phrase only came to me as we were getting ready to start the show. But purpose is trying to find you. I think the universe is knocking at the door of our hearts on a daily basis. It’s speaking to us constantly. The question becomes, are we listening?

Rob Dale [00:21:17]:

Are we putting ourselves into an environment or into a state where we can listen?

Eric Deschamps [00:21:22]:

Right.

Rob Dale [00:21:23]:

One of the best books, a great book I read a number of probably about a year ago now, was a book, all that just really was it’s The Wim HOF method, but it was all around breathing. And he talks about all the research around that. But I remember and I read it because I was in a session with Sherry, certainly very influential in both our lives, a psychologist, and she had caught me in the middle of denying that I was bothered by something. She asked me, just very in her Southern drawl type way, she asked me if I noticed how I was breathing and I was short breath, I was anxious and I was breathing such and that led me on a journey of learning about breathing. And I’ll say this, some of the most important messages I have received them when I’m taking the moment to pause.

Eric Deschamps [00:22:16]:

In my breathing, right, it’s again, that art of stillness, right? And it’s something that is difficult for many of us that have been raised on a performance mentality, that my productivity is what determines my worth. It’s hard for us to see the value in slowing down. But I can tell you that no great idea that ever came to humankind came in a moment of busyness. They come to us often in moments of stillness. So learning to listen to your heart and how it’s informing you, especially as you push through pain about things that may matter to you, that you may be passionate about and may become part of your purpose. Learning, then. To ease into it, not make it the next project or the next checklist. Or checkbox. Right. That you have to tick the next one is as you’re listening to those things, as you’re easing your way into it and you’re starting to get some signs and some signals that this may be something you’re passionate about. If you stay in your current context constantly, if you don’t push yourself out of your comfort zone, to some degree, it’ll be hard to discover whether or not you’re really passionate about something, whether or not this could be something that could be an important part of your why. So the third principle is learn to put yourself in new situations and new contexts. In other words, get comfortable being uncomfortable. Get comfortable stepping out and trying something new, understanding that it may not work and that failure may ensue. And then that’s okay. I think we’re so afraid of failing, we’re so afraid of trying something new. And the fact that we may look foolish. We’ve heard so much about fear in the last several episodes. It’s amazing. The last two get we had Steve on, we had Anastasia, they both spoke about fear as sort of that primary response. When you decide to leave the nest of your comfort zone and take a step and try something, that the first thing you’re going to run into is fear. Right. But learning to put yourself in those contexts, it’s the only place where now you can actually test, is this important to me, but understand that when you do that it’s going to be uncomfortable.

Rob Dale [00:24:16]:

Yeah. Let me share a story. The first time I went offroading and so I bought the Jeep. I’d wanted the Jeep for years and years. I didn’t buy one, lots of different reasons. But anyway, I finally went out and bought my Jeep gladiator and wanted to go offroading. And so my first thought was we have a mutual friend of ours, Jean, who I knew.

Eric Deschamps [00:24:38]:

He.

Rob Dale [00:24:43]:

Wanted to reach out to him okay, John, when can we go off roading? I want you to go with me. I wanted some safe, somebody connected to it, and he wasn’t available, and he was busy with some stuff, and I just wanted to get out there. And again, I’m an introvert. Meet new people, try new things, all of this stuff, and maybe you’re listening, maybe relate to me. It’s like, hell no, right?

Eric Deschamps [00:25:06]:

And yet, hell no, I won’t go.

Rob Dale [00:25:08]:

And I bought this gladiator for the purpose of I wanted to go offroading, and I wasn’t. And I remember reaching out I joined one of the Facebook groups and reaching out to a guy in the group who was he had just posted saying, I’m going to go offroading this week and who wants to join? So I was like and I reached out to him and said, yeah, I’ll go with you, Bo. I go out with Bo. And he’s got a bunch of other people there and had the time of my life and absolutely loved offroading and getting out there and experiencing that and all the challenge. And I remember sharing some videos with you and with Trevor and talking about how much I was enjoying this and everything like that, and I still enjoy it. I don’t get out as often. I have a bunch of things that I enjoy doing along with that. But it was a moment that if I had not taken that again, it was so uncomfortable to make that step, to take that step, to get out there and try something different, so grateful that I did it.

Eric Deschamps [00:26:04]:

Yeah. So really what it comes down to is if you’re going to find your why, you have to be willing to try try. You have to be willing to take that step. It’s going to feel weird, it’s going to feel uncomfortable, it’s going to feel unfamiliar. But your purpose, if your purpose was in your comfort zone, you would have found it already. Right? You’d already know what it is, but if you’re struggling to find it, it’s somewhere beyond your comfort zone. So you have to understand that that’s going to be something that you just are going to push through. And I think an important question to ask yourself when you’re reflecting on this notion of trying something new, putting yourself in new context, is to ask yourself, is my world more open or is it closed? Is my world fearful or is it full of faith, full of possibility? Because the reality is we’re going to push through fear. But having a mindset or a worldview that’s more open, right, to possibility, and that is more full of faith than fear will make that much easier.

Rob Dale [00:27:08]:

Yeah, absolutely. Trade your limitations for possibility.

Eric Deschamps [00:27:12]:

Exactly right. And that’s not just like trite sort of positive psychology. The reality is mindset is everything. And if in my world, if my internal world sees everything outside of what I know and have experienced. As something to be feared, as something to be retreated from, protected from. If my world is hostile instead of friendly and warm, if my world is closed instead of open, then it’s going to be that much harder to take those important steps of putting myself in context where I can start spreading my wings, so to speak, and trying new things that I haven’t tried before.

Rob Dale [00:27:50]:

Okay, let me summarize right now we’re talking about here’s some of those principles, best practices to finding your life’s purpose, your reason, all of that. Listen to your heart, ease into it. Put yourself into new situations. Allow yourself to experience some things. And then I think a fourth one is find people who are doing those things and follow them, right? Connect to them. Learn to become a learner. In our old language, we would have said become a disciple. And really that’s what a disciple is, is a learner of others and become a learner of those who are perhaps doing some of the things that you are seeing played out, that are becoming passionate. The people that you admire, how do they do it and learn from them. That’s part of why we’re bringing on different guests is we want people to have a different sense than just ours of those that are living, that have found their purpose.

Eric Deschamps [00:28:50]:

Well, back to your story about going offroading. Had you not reached out to Jean, had you not connected with some of those other folks in that world? And since then, I’ve connected to that world as well. And I remember my first few times going out, how scary it was. And yet because of their presence, because of their guidance, because of their expertise, that I could then lean on, it made that entry, thank you. Much less. Of course, you are a huge part of that. But surrounding yourself or shadowing people that are doing those things that you’re considering doing, learning from them, and sometimes there will be people in your immediate circle. We think of mentors or we think of people that can be a positive force in our lives. Sometimes they are in our immediate circle or not that far off from our immediate circle, and we may be able to actually shadow them and get to know them and have them influence us directly. I know I’ve had folks who have been mentors from afar. A book, a podcast, a speaker that I heard. And their words penetrated my heart in a really powerful way and they influenced me in a pretty significant direction. The thing is here, like, think about social media for a moment, how much doom scrolling takes place or meaningless scrolling takes place. Listen through the earlier steps that we mentioned. You’re beginning to think, maybe this is something I want to try or something that I’m passionate about. How about you unfollow a bunch of those useless, mind numbing channels that do nothing for you and go looking for people that are doing the things that you love and start just paying attention to that, just leaning into it. That’s one way of doing some research, is turning sort of mind numbing social media activity into research and homework to discovering your why.

Rob Dale [00:30:36]:

It is amazing how often we miss the opportunity to be mentored by someone just because we’re too embarrassed or shy to ask right. To be able and you go back to where the first time you went off roading, which of course, I was there and I had an opportunity to be a part of that. And I will never forget as long as I live, I won’t forget the.

Eric Deschamps [00:30:58]:

Fact that I made that first obstacle on my first try. You didn’t.

Rob Dale [00:31:02]:

Yes. Okay. Thank you. We weren’t really going to I was about to say that’s what you’re going to say, isn’t it? I was going to say something similar to that. I was going to leave out the part about the fact that I got stuck. I was going to point out though, is that you did make that. And not only did you make it, but I will never forget the absolute joy, the exuberance of pride that you had when you crested the cliff, the hill, and when you got up the gatekeeper and when you got up to the top of that without the again. Because the gladiator is different than a Jeep Wrangler in its shape. But when you crested that thing, I felt it, I experienced it from you. And so often we have people in our lives who would absolutely love to help shape you, to mentor you, and the joy they get to feel as they watch you come into your purpose is something that it’s a gift and a blessing. And yet we’re too afraid and we’re too shy to go up to someone and say, I so admire you and what you’re about. I want to learn from you.

Eric Deschamps [00:32:15]:

Yeah, it’s powerful. I love that you use that because it’s so true. Often we will not reach out to people in our circle out of fear of being a bother or being a burden. I mean, the being a burden script was one of my top five for so long that never wanted to inconvenience anybody. But look at it this way. Perhaps rather than being a bother, you could be a tremendous blessing for the very reasons that you just explained that them being part of this discovery, whether it’s discovering I mean, we’re talking about offroading, and I wouldn’t say that offroading is our purpose in life.

Rob Dale [00:32:48]:

No.

Eric Deschamps [00:32:48]:

But it certainly is a passion and a joy of ours. But the stories are parallel in that finding your purpose is often the same way. There are people that would absolutely delight in being part of that journey and being part of that process.

Rob Dale [00:33:02]:

And let me give you one more example around this, because I think this is so important and we so miss the opportunities to do this. Wendy and I, not recently now, but a number of months ago we were on a cruise together and this event pops up on the cruise events near the last day, the second last day or third last day. And it’s a seminar on how to find happiness. And so Wendy says, well, I’d like to go to this seminar. My first thought was I don’t really we’re on a cruise ship and we’re going to go sit on a seminar about finding happiness. Anyway, I was like, yeah, I’d love to go because I could tell she was passionate about it. I want to enjoy this. So we go watch it. Great presentation. The lady was really powerful story, really fascinating story of how she found happiness in the midst of incredible tragedy. At the end of the seminar, we stand up. I turn around and start walking out and all of a sudden I realize Wendy’s not with Pete because she’s up at the front having a conversation with the presenter. Wow. And all of a sudden they’re connecting on social media. The presenter has only one copy. She’s written a book, one copy she wants Wendy to have. They’ve connected at this all because Wendy was not afraid to just go up and say, you just influenced me. You just had an impact to me. I want to know more about you.

Eric Deschamps [00:34:27]:

Yeah, I think that’s so powerful. And this is why the power of community, the power of people in our lives, listen, if purpose is trying to find you, so is your tribe. And I think those things go together, man. I think when you begin to get some signals and some signs and this is why we say ease into it because it’s not like it’s going to be crystal clear to you right out of the gate. It’s not like I’m going to start listening to my heart and all of a sudden the blueprint of my life is just going to drop into my spirit. No, it’s not like that. But you’ll start to see hints and signs and pointers and I would say they’ve been there all along, but this is about getting more in tune with them. You start listening to your heart, right? You start easing into it. You start putting yourself in a new context and situations. You start surrounding yourself with people that are tied to those things. And I would say the last principle that we want to share today before we get into some real practical questions that we can give to our listeners is then decide, is this right for me? Does this fit for me? It’s okay if it doesn’t again.

Rob Dale [00:35:28]:

And it’s not a waste of time.

Eric Deschamps [00:35:29]:

It’s not a waste of time because think about this, everything you give some energy and time to to investigate if it turns out, nope, not for me. You’ve just made the choices. You’ve taken one choice off the list, right? Sometimes it is a process of elimination. So it’s okay if it’s not for you. This is not about then feeling guilty or obligated. Well, this person invested into me, right? I’ve invested time and energy into this. I’ve put it out there perhaps and talked to people. So now I feel a sense I have to do this. There’s a big difference between accountability and obligation. Those two things couldn’t be more different. And obligation is often coming from a place of fear, guilt, shame. What are they going to think of me if I don’t continue down this path? Listen, if you try, if you give it a sincere effort, you follow these steps and you kind of get present of something and try it and it doesn’t work, it’s okay. It’s okay to say, this isn’t for me.

Rob Dale [00:36:25]:

And that’s why starting with that radical self acceptance is so critical to this, right? Because if you don’t start there, you will fall into the fear, obligation, guilt kind of mess, and that will be what drives you. But if you have a radical self acceptance, if you absolutely know who you are, it is a lot easier to walk away from something after you’ve tried and say, yes, that’s not it. Good for you. I think that’s awesome for you. That’s not it for me. I’m going to try something else. It’s a lot easier to do that when you first accepted yourself and then.

Eric Deschamps [00:37:04]:

Are being accepted by others. If you’re loving yourself and you’re giving yourself that sense of worthiness, that it’s okay for me to get it wrong. As I am going through this process and you’ve surrounded yourself with people that are connecting to you based on the more authentic version of you as opposed to the false you, then they’re going to continue to be supportive as well. I’d be hard pressed to believe that a true community of people that love each other for who they are and are supporting each other on the journey would reject somebody because something didn’t work out and they chose to go a different direction. It’s got to fit for you, and if it does fit for you, keep investigating you’re onto something.

Rob Dale [00:37:44]:

All right, let’s rapid fire. How do we do this? We want to craft this. We’ve seen these again, some of the suggestions there maybe let’s talk about what are some of the questions that we want to include that one can ask themselves to start to clear some of the fog away from figuring out what their purpose is?

Eric Deschamps [00:38:04]:

Absolutely. Let’s jump into them. And we’re going to make all of these available as a downloadable PDF in the show notes. So you’re going to be able to download these. We’ve created a document where there’s space for you to write some stuff in so you can start using it like a worksheet. Let’s start with your strengths. One of the most important places to start when you’re trying to discover your why is to figure out what you’re good at. Right. So a couple of questions related to that. Are my top three strengths? What are they? If you were to just get present with yourself and say, what are the three things that I’m really good at? Right. And then a follow up question to that are, what are strengths that other people have commented on, that I’ve heard more frequently than others? What do I think about that? What do other people think about that? Getting clear about what you’re good at is a great place to start when you’re trying to reflect on what you’re pursuing.

Rob Dale [00:38:53]:

Yeah. Another question to ask is, what truly makes me happy? And we talk a lot about this in the Living richly Blueprint. What are the things that enrich my life? What are the things that deplete my life? Are there certain activities? What are they that make when I’m doing those activities, I feel alive, I feel fulfilled, I feel satisfied. And then focusing in on jotting them down, creating a list of what are the things that really bring me energy rather than deplete my energy.

Eric Deschamps [00:39:20]:

Right. That’s like the whole second part of the four x four model is what makes me truly happy. Right. And then sort of going a little bit deeper, even on that question is, what of the activities that I’ve listed here that make me happy? What three activities do I want to devote more time to? Like, when I look at that, when I get present, say I’d like to spend more time doing these. Another great question is, what do I do that I consider truly special, unique, or important? What do I do that I consider truly special, unique, or important? Now, this one and the strengths one, for some people can be really hard. Right. Because they don’t see themselves as having many great strengths. They don’t believe they’re bringing anything really special, unique, or important to the world. And this is where you may involve people that you trust in your life who may be able to answer these with you. I know there have been a point in my life I remember when Jim Harrington, who’s going to be our guest on the next two shows, asked me to write 20 affirmations about myself, and I couldn’t write more than three. I was hard pressed to come up with three. So any of these questions can be asked in self reflection on your own, where you’re struggling. I would say enlist the help of the people around you to give you another perspective.

Rob Dale [00:40:37]:

Yeah, absolutely. And I think, again, community matters, and you want to ask those questions to the right people as well. I think it’s about asking yourself, what do I truly value? What are my most important values? What are those top five four values that I have? What is my compass, in other words? And again, we have a lot of questions that we use to be able to determine what our values are. One of the best things that you introduced me to was the values deck. That’s great visual exercise, great visual exercise. We’ll make sure there’s a link for that. But the values deck is an opportunity to be able to figure out again what are those things that I value and then how am I implementing and utilizing these values in my day to day life?

Eric Deschamps [00:41:20]:

100%. Another great question to ask yourself is what do I want to be known and remembered for? And when you consider that question, think accomplishments, think actions, characteristics, behaviors. I mean, almost imagine yourself being honored at your retirement party and the three people that know you the best in the whole wide world have been invited to say a few words in your honor. What would make you so happy to hear them say? Right. The things that they would choose to highlight. These are things that would deeply resonate with you and make you feel like you had lived a really purposeful life. What do you want to be known and remember for? Powerful question.

Rob Dale [00:41:58]:

Yeah. One more question would be what impact do I want to have? Now, often when we ask that question, you have two responses. Some people, I want to change the world. And then other people go, man, I just want to have an impact on my family. I just want to have an impact on my kids, I want to have an impact on my friends. Good. One isn’t greater than the other. They’re just getting clear. Just be clear, right. It’s going to come out of values I look at and go, the impact I want to have aligns with the values that I have and the more I align my impact with the values and my goal is to make an impact. Now, like you, we’re passionate about the living richly and we hope this is a movement that impacts people from around the world.

Eric Deschamps [00:42:43]:

Right.

Rob Dale [00:42:44]:

That’s our goal. But at the end of the day, what really truly matters to me is that I am living my best life so that it impacts my partner, it impacts my kids, it impacts my family, impacts my friends.

Eric Deschamps [00:42:58]:

Right.

Rob Dale [00:42:58]:

And then the rest is wonderful to know that I’m able to do it.

Eric Deschamps [00:43:01]:

And when you think about impact, we’re talking about legacy, we’re talking about influence. Right. And you’ll see in the worksheet that you’ll be able to download, our listeners will be able to download. It’s going to ask you to reflect on what impact do I want to have on my family and loved ones, on my work with colleagues and clients. So it brings the work aspect in on my industry, perhaps. Perhaps you’re in an industry and you have a passion to make a difference there. On broader issues, these might be initiatives outside of work. Think community, think social issues, think environmental issues like what impact perhaps do you want to have there? And then how large will the impact be? Will it be how far is the reach? Is it local? Is it national? Is it international? Getting present to these questions and beginning to reflect on them again will help bring up some important information. These will all be clues to helping you figure out your purpose. And let me say this last thing about purpose before we wrap up. Not only is purpose trying to find you, but purpose doesn’t necessarily stay the same. Your whole life. You will go through seasons and chapters of your life where the purpose may shift and evolve. And that’s perfectly okay. Just as you evolve, that’s going to evolve with you.

Rob Dale [00:44:05]:

So true. And that’s why we don’t want to put our identity in our purpose, but we want our purpose to flow out of our identity.

Eric Deschamps [00:44:14]:

Exactly.

Rob Dale [00:44:14]:

It’s so important that I know we’re stressing that and we continue to go back to it. It’s because we both fell into the trap of identity coming out of purpose.

Eric Deschamps [00:44:24]:

Did we ever?

Rob Dale [00:44:25]:

When the purpose falls apart and we’re left, we fall apart. Right. You fall apart. And so you want to be able to the sequence matters there. Live this out. What I so appreciate about we use the word intentional intentionally, which is journey. This is a journey that we’re on, a journey of finding purpose, of living out that purpose, of shifting that purpose, whatever that might be. And it all stems out of who we are, 100%.

Eric Deschamps [00:44:57]:

So we’re going to make all of this available on the website, folks, we encourage you, as we do every show, to go to Livingrichley Me Act where you will find links to the show notes and the episodes for this episode and all the other ones that we’ve done so far, 31 episodes. Now, this is crazy. This could actually go somewhere, right? It’s got legs. But you’re also going to find tools and resources there that can support you in your journey. That’s livingrichley me backslash act.

Rob Dale [00:45:29]:

Yeah. And of course, we also want to encourage you. We’ve mentioned it. We’re certainly leaning into it. One of the things that we’re real excited about is we have created kind of a model that we can use in coaching people that walks them through a bit of a blueprint, that takes you through some of these stages of figuring out this stuff, what matters most. And so if you’re maybe listening, you’re thinking, I’m ready to take that step and perhaps engage in some coaching around how I find my purpose, how I live that out, how I develop, how I understand that, self acceptance, all of those things. I know the email address. For those of you that are watching by video, the email address will be on the screen, but info at Livingrichley Me and we will be happy to provide you more information on that and be able to connect you with the right person.

Eric Deschamps [00:46:19]:

And as always, like, share, subscribe, leave a review that helps get the word out, and we thank you ahead of time for that.

Rob Dale [00:46:25]:

Yeah, thank you so much for taking some time to listen to our episode today. I know that this is something that we are very passionate about, and I have no doubt that for many of you, you’re passionate about it as well. Again, if you’re listening to these in sequence, we can’t wait for episode next week where we have one of the greatest influencers or mentors to the living, richly model is going to be a part of our show next week, so make sure you tune in, mam.