Purpose

It goes without question that a person needs a purpose. I was explaining to my kids just yesterday that everything on this planet has a job (and they will be no exception, but that’s a different tangent). The importance of purpose can’t, to my mind, be over-expressed. Purpose gives us drive. It helps us understand why we have to do painful things. Tiring things. Things we wouldn’t do if we absolutely didn’t have to.

I would jump in front of a speeding car for my children. Not so much for, say, a bag of groceries, unless that bag was all there was between my kids and starving. As you can see, my kids, my family, is a huge sense of purpose for me. Higher even than my devotion to readers. To the law. To myself.

There are times, though, that a person’s sense of purpose can cause problems. Like when you have the sense but you no longer understand it. Like protecting a friend who is no longer a friend or has hurt you deeply. Or when there are too many important purposes and all of them need you. Or simply fighting battles that aren’t your own anymore. Or fighting battles that never seem to end. Weariness is Purpose’s enemy. And lord, sometimes we get so weary…

I’m not entirely sure where I’m going with this, but I woke up this morning with such a sense of purpose. There are things that need doing, but just not enough hours, not enough of ME, in the day to do it all. I’ve been sad since the marathon bombings. Things like that hurt my soul, knowing there’s so much pain that I can do nothing about. I probably take too much on, in that respect, but I hate the thought that people hurt each other so easily. There should be someone out there trying to make things better, even in the tiniest of ways, all the time. Sometimes a stranger offering a smile can make me feel so much better. Call me Pollyanna–though most everyone will laugh at you because I’m mean as a snake–but I’ve always had the policy that if I see something compliment worthy, I mention it. Even to people I don’t know and will never see again. You never know if that person needs it.

So I’m going to head back to my to-do list for today. Put my purposes in order, if you will, and do what I can to live up to what I was made to do. Hopefully, that’s to make at least one person today feel better.

Wishing all of you good purpose today,

Dee

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