There's a good possibility that your purpose in life is to discover your purpose in life.  There is undoubtedly a different quality to the life of those engaged in this quest than the lives of those who simply show up day after day.  The irony, then, is that you may spend your life looking for something you will never find--and that's the purpose of your being here in the first place.  If you never find your purpose in life, you will have been successful, but if you never look for it, you will have failed.

     It was along these lines, I think, that Albert Schwietzer addressed a graduating medical school class in Paris.  He said (my paraphrase) "I do not know which among you will be happy, but I do know that it will be those who seek and find ways of serving."  And I'm told he stressed the "seeking" over the serving.  There is something about taking responsibility for your purpose that is superior to going along with someone else's image of your purpose--allthewhile avoiding an obsession with "I'll do it my way."
 
 
 

Written 7/10/95
(c)  1999  Earl Babbie