3 things I discovered about vocation in 2023
Before rushing into 2024, let’s take a look at what we explored and learned about vocation in 2023.
We started the year looking at how a scientifically-minded journaling exercise called Future Authoring changed my life and helped start me on this journey of investigating vocation. You can also listen to this one on audio, and try the exercise yourself.
Next we started our first of four book reviews for the year with Mastery by Robert Greene. We also looked at Bob Goff’s Undistracted, Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl and, my favourite, Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman. Check out the rest of my reviews on this page here.
Of course a huge part of my year was becoming a father in July. By far the two most popular posts this year were the times I wrote about how parenthood connected with purpose. First in this thinkling about why you should Keep Your Baby Names Secret, and then later on Purpose, Parenting and Prominence I shared the following:
“It was while learning the everyday ins and outs of caring for Ethan and Hannah that reminded me of the simple truth that purpose is not about prominence. We don’t have to lead extraordinary or unique lives in order to experience them as meaningful, purposeful and fulfilling.”
Last year also saw the Five Lies series, five posts exploring the lies that keep us from our calling. These are designed to dispel the many myths surrounding the topic:
Also of note is that I started a new Thoughts on Purpose Weekly format, designed to help share useful links and resources. I’d really appreciate your thoughts on whether this works for you:
But what did I learn?
Well, in what was a very full year, here are the 3 key things that I discovered about vocation in 2023:
1. Vocation is for everyone
In a year where I was concerned that I might outgrow my interest in helping others find their vocation, or simply not have enough time once our first child arrived, I am happy to say that I was wrong about this. It’s more relevant than ever. What does a parent long for more than a happy life for their child? And what better way is there than setting an example and finding a deep sense of purpose for myself?
I have been encouraged and surprised by the responses to my writing this year, which seemed to come at just the right time and from people in all walks of life. From those completely happy in their vocation, to those who’ve recently lost their jobs.
I’ve been encouraged to keep writing, even as it becomes more difficult to find the time. After all, it seems to be true what Viktor Frankl says that we are each continually “questioned by life”, so let’s explore the answers together? We’d be silly not to.
Have you got a juicy question that you’re mulling over? Why not ask it in the comments because I’d love to try and answer it in a future post:
2. Vocation is necessary, but it’s not everything
For me, the simple realisation—that vocation is necessary, but not everything—fixed some particularly chewy concerns I had.
It’s like with the flourishing of plants: yes, water is indispensable and necessary to the growth of plants, but it’s not everything. They also need nutrients and sunlight to fully thrive.
So it is with purpose. It isn’t everything, and we should resist this desire to make finding our calling our ‘one thing’ that will solve all our problems. But, I also see all around me, that there is a particular cultural dynamic which is leaving us starved for direction and a sense of being used for a greater purpose — a sense of calling.
So if, like me, you are feeling drawn to find greater purpose in your life and work; then we can say “yes!” to our calling, “yes!” to more meaningful work, “yes!” to exercising our unique gifts, while also “yes!” to maintaining health, finances and relationships.
You can hear my thoughts laid out in this piece here, one of our most popular of the year.
3. Vocation is a very Christian concept
Now that we’re into our second year of Thoughts on Purpose, I have been surprised to find that nearly all of the resources I am finding for teaching and guidance on the subject are explicitly Christian.
Being a Christian myself, I began thinking that this was just a cultural bubble that I was in. But after two years now, I’m beginning to accept the fact that the concept of vocation not only finds it’s roots in Christianity, but that the broadly eastern religions (Buddhism and Hinduism for example) either lack a similar idea or are even antagonistic towards it, due to a whole host of theological and cultural factors.
The one outlier I have found so far is the idea of Dharma in Hinduism, made charmingly accessible by Jay Shetty here, but unfortunately the Caste system can’t exactly be said to be responsible for encouraging people to follow their purpose throughout the centuries.
I would love to be proven wrong, so please do send me whatever thoughts or links you have. I am particularly interested in other religions or philosophies outside my sphere.
So, if this blog is starting to sound pretty Christian, it’s not for a lack of open-mindedness. I’ll be delving more directly into the theological beliefs behind vocation this year, so atheists out there, hold onto your hats!
Coming in 2024
How can we win the war between self-acceptance and self-improvement?
Book reviews of Stolen Focus by Johann Hari, Finding your element by Ken Robinson, Designing your Life and more.
More tools for discovering your passion like the Enneagram and the Sparketypes Assessment.
Can we apply design-thinking to our whole lives?
I’m looking forward to it, and I hope you are too.
Godspeed,
TMo.