Something that’s come up a lot lately with some of my clients and with my most recent group of angel students has been the subject of purpose.  More specifically life purpose.  It’s funny how when you attach the four letter word LIFE to the word PURPOSE it becomes a much bigger, more pressing issue.  Suddenly we feel our heart beat a little faster, our chest tightens and our gut churns for a second if we get asked “So what’s your life purpose?”  There’s a frantic need to know the answer to that question and we make it out to be such a big deal.  The truth is if we look at it a little differently, look at it as our DHARMA, give it a little bit of a spiritual makeover, things shift a bit.

The fact is finding your dharma is really not as difficult as we make it out to be.

What do I mean by dharma?

 

No, not that Dharma.  But OMG wasn’t that the cutest show?!?
{OK that could totally just be me.}

Dharma means a few different things depending on where you look for a definition.  Buddhism and Hinduism have meanings for the word that are somewhat similar and boil down to “that which maintains order in the universe”.  In Buddhism it refers more specifically to the laws of how karam keeps order; since these laws come from the teachings of the Buddha the word dharma in Buddhism refers to the Buddha’s teachings.  In a more broad eastern sense, dharma meaning “purpose” comes from the Vedic philosophy and from the Vedanta {from the Hindu Vedas, Vedanta meaning “end of the Vedas”}.

Dharma is the reason you’re here.  It’s your purpose but it’s more than just what you do in the world.  Your dharma encompasses your special gifts and talents that you came to earth with which you are destined to share with the world.  Your dharma isn’t just for you, it’s what you do in service to humanity.

Everyone has something special and unique about them; even if their gift is similar to someone else it’s still different and unique in some way because it’s their own.   That means for all the people in the world there are billions of special gifts and energies with goals and dreams attached to them just waiting to be lived and fulfilled.  Billions of dharmas waiting to serve humanity!

Your dharma evolves and becomes more refined as you have life experiences.  You’ll also find that as you go through life you come into new ways to express and live your dharma.  It’s a fluid concept and not nearly as rigid as we make life purpose out to be.

Unlike the idea of life purpose, dharma doesn’t have to do with your career path, although it can if you want it to.  In some cases your dhamra can easily become a career path while for others their dharma is something that becomes part of their life in another sense.

We should live our dharma 24/7.  This is what makes dharma so much greater than simply “life purpose”, it becomes something deeper and more spiritual and more integrated into our lives.

Finding your dharma is not a difficult process but it requires your deep honesty and a willingness to dig.  You need to be clear, honest, and sincere while asking yourself a few questions and digging into what you really feel in your soul is your truth.  Finding your dharma requires you to bring together logical thought and your spiritual/emotional energies.  It’s not about one or the other, but a union of all aspects of the self.

 

Finding Your Dharma

1.  Take a deep breath.
You’re gonna need it!  Breathe in deeply and let go of any attachment to the answers or outcomes you find in your quest.  Know that you may find an answer here that has never occurred to you before.  Be OK with this, accept this, and open up to the answer.

2. Ask yourself “What am I good at?”
Think about what people come to you for help with.  What types of advice do people ask you for?  What tasks do people come to you for help with?  When you do help, what things do you get the best results with?  What do YOU think you’re good at when it comes to helping and serving others?

3. Ask yourself “What do I love to do?”
What can you do for hours on end without knowing time has passed?  What do you lose yourself in?  What would you do all day every day if you had the option?  What truly makes your soul light up?

4. Ask yourself “Who do I want to help?”
Do you already know the kinds of people that you love to help and that you are good working with?  Do you know the problems that these people have in the world?  What do you want to solve or are already skilled at solving?

5.  Ask yourself “Who serves the people I wish to serve?”
When you look at the kind of people you wish to help and the things you’re already good at and love to do, who is similar?  This can be someone you know personally or someone out in the world or in a field you have interest in.  It can be a historical figure or someone in the present.  Look at them and their work and find inspiration from them.

6. Create Your Intention
Looking at the answers to these questions, where do you see intersections?  Where do things naturally match up?  When you find things that come together into a single intention, begin to form a short list of 2 or 3 intentions that you think may be your dharam.  Only pick things that you really feel deep in your soul, in your gut, are your truth.

7. Start Meditating
Go into meditation with your intentions and explore them.  Meditate deeply on them alone or go into a journey and visit with your guides, power animals, angels, etc.  Ask for guidance and confirmation.  You may need to do this process {even the whole process} a few times.  Be open to this.

8. Carry Out Your Intention
Once you have found your dharma, set your intention daily to live it in some way. Find the core of your dharma, the one thing that is key, and make sure that throughout your days you are making it a part of your life and that you are putting it out into the world and sharing it with the Universe.

 

Here’s the thing about this process…it’s not the end.  You will find answers here but they will always feel a little shaky. That’s because your dharma isn’t found on the meditation pillow, it’s found in the world.  The path to living your dharma starts with this process but to really find it, to truly live it, you have to keep working at it.  You may find answers in this process and get into the world with it and realize you’re not truly in your dhamra.  No problem!  Go back to the meditation pillow and dig some more.

[Tweet “Finding your dharma means truly finding yourself. It’s a journey that never ends. “]

Since this post got SO long, I’m going to share my story I wanted to tell in a post tomorrow.  Stay tuned tomorrow for a story about a client of mind who discovered that shoe shopping was her dharma.  Yes ladies, I’m serious.  🙂