The End Accomplishment of the Purpose is Paramount (BeFirst Course 143)

Okay, thanks for coming back. Again, I hope you're finding value in these lectures, these comments, these topics that I've personally found a lot of joy in sharing. So we talked about having your goals, but breaking it down to the component parts. So now let's talk about the end, the accomplishment of the purpose is paramount, okay? But don't forget where you came from and where you want to go, where you want to go. Sometimes in the minutia of all the plans that we make and all of the goals that we have and all of the planning that we are doing, we start to lose sight of where we actually are trying to accomplish, what we are actually trying to accomplish. How often do we begin something that ends up changing somewhere in the middle? Whether that point is exactly in the middle or somewhere to one side of the line. So many forces and influences are out there, so many pressures to conform, to adjust, to give way, to support, to amend, to accept, etc. That we are pushed and pulled in a multitude of directions. Re-centering on purpose, revisiting our overarching mission or vision is crucial to staying on the pathway. Okay, let's talk about re-centering, revisiting. Without periodically checking in and adjusting our trajectory, we will probably end up somewhere we did not intend. Much like how the pilot of an aircraft is constantly making small adjustments as the flight continues, so we should routinely reach out to our compass and map in resetting our direction as we go forward. It's critical that we establish a protocol or process for this re-centering so that it happens as frequently as is necessary, while taking into account that certain stressful situations could require additional refocusing attention. These processes should be as simple as a recurring weekly appointment with yourself, or a reconnection with your higher power. For many of us, this reconnection happens on Sundays, or in a weekly meeting where we reconnect with the divine in our lives. Anyway, re-centering on our ultimate purpose periodically is absolutely essential to maintaining a productive direction in our lives. So let's expound on that just a little bit. Let's use a green color today. So don't forget where you came from and where you want to go. So one of my favorite books is a Dr. Seuss book, Oh, the Places You'll Go. And one of my favorite lines in that book is, you have brains in your head and feet in your shoes. And I love it. You have brains in your head and feet in your shoes, and you're ready to go. We're going to do things. We're going to go do them. But it's important that we use that brain that's in our head, because sometimes we start using the brain that's in our head. We establish some context. We establish some rules. And then we start working through these rules, but then we forget in the middle somewhere, and we move around. We talked about the kite needing a firm foundation. We talked about underpinnings having strategic rivets to these principles and ideals that you hold dear and will not, what's the word, will not alter, you will not fall down from or move away from. It's important that we have those foundational principles in our lives and that we revisit those things periodically. One of my favorite general conference talks, for those of you who don't know general conference, our church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has a twice-a-year general conference where we get to hear talks from leaders in the church. These are ladies and gentlemen who are called and serve for a period of time, and then they generally will give us talks. There's invitations periodically for them to give talks or speeches at the general conference, which we watch usually online, although you can attend in person if you're in the Salt Lake City area. So one of my favorite general conference talks is a talk that Dieter F. Uchtdorf gave, the talk that he gave, where he talked about an airline pilot, which he is and retired from flying big airplanes. If you leave from San Francisco and you're headed toward Australia, and if you have a one-degree alteration in your course map, meaning if you're flying and you're one degree off, just one degree instead of 90 or 45 or 22.5, one degree, a flight that long will yield a very different destination with one degree. So constantly, like we've mentioned here, we have to be recentering ourselves, refocusing, adjusting, like I've mentioned, the map and the compass, so that we know that our map represents reality, what we see, and it's oriented correctly. Compass and map. It makes me think about Dora the Explorer. I won't sing the song, but you can probably hear it in your head if you're as old as me. So we routinely reach out to our compass and our map so that we know that we have a vision of what's accurate, and we've plotted points, individual specific points, as we've talked about in previous sections, but that that map, overlaid over reality, is oriented correctly with the help of our compass. Our compass knows north, south, east, and west, right? But we have to make sure that our compass and our map are working together instead of against each other, and that we know how to use them with those brains in our heads so that we can keep our map aligned with reality and move forward in that process we're working on. So how we do that as individual, it's unique to all of us. But for me, it's always been focusing on my faith from a religious standpoint, connecting with my higher power, with my divine nature at church, going to worship, and recentering myself and recommitting with my Savior, Jesus Christ. Again, I don't want to be persuasive in a religious way in this particular context. So let me just say this. The opportunity exists for each of us to refocus and recenter ourselves. And there is an abundance of data out there in the world that individuals who have a higher power and espouse to divine nature, if you will, but each of us has a divine nature, tend to live happier lives. That's not to say you can't be happy otherwise, but individuals who have a belief in something higher than themselves with principles and beliefs, essentially, that guide our thoughts and decisions, these individuals tend to have a happier life long term. So focus on your divine. Focus on your higher power periodically to recenter yourself and make sure that you're looking at where you want to go. Focus on that outcome periodically, recenter and refocus. Realign your map with your compass. Get a little bit of divinity in you. Feel a little bit of the Spirit, many people would say. But recenter yourself. It has to happen, and it needs to happen probably more frequently than we do. For some of us, we reconnect daily, whether we're listening to a spiritual podcast or reading sacred scripture or praying on a daily or multiple times a day basis. These things help us recenter, refocus, and bring our lives back into alignment with our long term goals and outcomes. Okay, thank you so much again for hanging in there. Again, share these with family and friends. If you're enjoying this discussion topic, I would encourage you to share the principles and concepts. Send them to this lecture series. Allow them an opportunity to hopefully find them as valuable as you have. And again, focus on two or three key principles, maybe one key principle that we've talked about. Write it down somehow, type it in your phone, whatever, and then utilize it. Evaluate periodically. Spend a day, spend an hour, spend a week thinking about it. Put it into action and move forward, becoming a better version of yourself. Okay, in the next lecture, we're going to talk about how purpose in accomplishment often comes in fits and spurts and stumbles. Fits and spurts, that's a fun topic. Purposeful, maybe I should have spelled that differently. But we'll talk about this in the next lecture. Thanks so much. Hang in there. We'll see you in the next lecture.