Once in my life when I was really confused and I was most surely not filled up with real joy. My whole life had “turned out” just as I’d believed it would. I graduated school, I got a job and a nice place to live. I had friends, family, along with a long-term relationship. When I looked to my future, it was filled with brilliant, comfortable days. The part that I hadn’t planned on was how disorienting it was to complete my goals. Once achieved, I didn’t know what to do after that.

I began to feel unsatisfied and I couldn’t pinpoint why. I tried all sorts of remedies: I switched from walking to jogging, I aquired candles to create a appartment “nest”, I tried reading diverse books, yoga, and so on and on. As the days stacked up on each other, my turmoil mounted, as well as my days started to be hazier. My sense of time warped, each day seeming longer and more directionless as compared to the last. I thought about how I would actually find authentic happiness again. My sparkly future was today lack-luster. I had made the big mistake of thinking that my life had “turned out”, rather than spotting that we all keep growing and challenge ourselves daily. Life is growth and human beings are a part of life. Life doesn’t stay stagnant nor do we.

One balmy day at the seashore, my entire perspective suddenly flipped and my life started in a new direction. As I walked by a lone female walking in the fine sand, a bolt of energy ran through me and I heard a voice say to me, “What if you could help people get beyond the thoughts and feelings that cause all of them pain?” That question shattered the existing lens through which I viewed life. I now saw that I was to put my life to good use for other people. Despite the hot sunshine on my skin, I got a chill, simply because I knew that I was back on my particular path to authentic happiness.

I saw that I had achieved objectives to get my own special, fundamental needs met: an education, a job, and a residence. But, whenever my life purpose flipped, it consequently switched my goals, also. For the first time, I observed that getting my own survival needs achieved was not how to appraise the quality of my well being. I recognized, down deep, the difference between generating value (money) and creating value which could lead to money. I knew that developing value was to be the emphasis of my next set of goals; it will bring an end to the months of uncertainty and confusion and I would find real happiness again.

It didn’t mean that all I’d done before that instant was in useless, because, for me, learning how to earn money was a totally necessary prerequisite pertaining to learning how to create value. Everything before that moment was done that helped me to to achieve goals that I didn’t even realize I had. My mind was reawakened, my lurking doubts were banished, and I was revived with my brand-new purpose – I felt authentic happiness once once more.