What is Mine to Do? Part 2
May 27, 2026
What Is Mine to Do? Part 2
How do we know what our specific purpose is? Some of us know it from childhood, others by the teen years, and others in young adulthood. It can be a struggle to find… especially when the ego has its ideas of what our purpose needs to be. I recall being in graduate school and dissatisfied with my course of studies. It was interesting, but it did not touch me at the deepest level.
One day, early in graduate school, I found myself unable to go on with my clinical placement at the mental hospital. It was not what I signed on for. I was intimidated by the patients and felt unsafe in the unit I had been placed in— the Unit for the Criminally Insane. I just did not have the gift of working with that specific population. With this turn of events, I began to question my call to help those with emotional issues and mental disorders. But something deep within made me keep trying.
Finally, after a great deal of red tape, my assignment was changed from the criminally insane unit at the state mental hospital to the children’s cottage at another hospital. That is when I recognized my higher purpose: to help bring healing to those who were wounded and hurting, as best I could. In that formative experience at twenty-one, through struggle, pain, and self-doubt, I learned who my wounded would be: children, their families, and the wounded child within each adult who carries deep emotional pain. This is where I would devote my life’s work and continue growing as a human being… as a soul.
I think about what aspect of the Divine is the healing of wounds… the wounds of the wounded and the weak and weary… the misunderstood, those without advocacy, even from themselves. Well, we only have to go to our Enneagram’s Holy Idea to get a good start. Mine is to express Holy Strength and Holy Faith. Not the strength within our ego or the faith in our own mental structures, but Divine Strength and Divine Faith. This strength and faith do not come from our will, but from our will aligned with Divine will.
Then I go to my Virtue found on the Enneagram and find that it is courage. Yes, I am to express Divine courage. Then, to my Essential Aspect on the Enneagram which reveals that I am created to express Divine Living Daylight. My Idealized Aspect on the Enneagram is Will, which is not the ego’s will but alignment of our will with the will of the Divine. This gives more strength. Will ensures the right intention behind my expression. My soul child finds all these qualities very familiar. It makes incredible sense that, when we were living primarily in soul, as a soul child, these qualities were how we moved in the world— how we perceived the world. So, even though we were small children, we saw the world through these lenses. When we remember and reembody these qualities at our core, we are transformed.
Our life purpose never stops, even after the loss or change of our role. Our purpose, even during transitions, retirements, or other types of retooling, is still constant. Here is the thing: Expressing our purpose is not dependent upon a particular role. I could have been a healer of wounds without being a psychologist. I know a healer of wounds who is the CEO of a large organization. I know another healer of wounds and nurturer who is a financial advisor. I know many people who have retired and still express their life’s purpose even without the job they had all their lives. Soul purposes do not always correspond with job descriptions. I am so lucky to know a wonderfully skilled physician and a fantastic nurse who are married and both retired. Even though they are no longer professional healers, they continue to heal and nurture everyone in their lives. I know an electrician who had the knack of bringing joy to all he knew. Creating joy was his Divine purpose. After retirement, he continued to spread joy to neighbors, friends, and people at the place he volunteered.
Purpose is multilayered, but the core purpose is a spiritual one for everyone. We are all parts of the Divine, and as such, ours is to express the aspect we were created to be.
Spiritual practice: What is your purpose and the specific areas in which your purpose is expressed, lived, and worked out? You might want to trace your life’s work and your earliest interests to see a pattern of involvement. A pattern that reveals an underlying theme about what you have been drawn to as the juice of your life, the nectar of your being. Look at what you have done and are doing. If you distilled it down to an aspect of the Divine, what would it be? Begin by consulting your Holy Idea. What are its words? Do you live out the meaning of these words in your everyday life and purpose? Look at your Virtue, Essential Aspect, and your Idealized Aspect. Do they add further dimensions to the basic expression of your purpose? Are these familiar to the “you” we call our soul child? Are these qualities of your soul, integral to your life’s purpose?
Self-inquiry: In your everyday situation, what roles and functions do you use to express your purpose?
Prayer
Dear God, For this purpose, I am truly grateful. Amen
