Finding Your Purpose: How Leaders Define Why They Exist

0:03Welcome to Leadership DNA, a podcast for those who aspire to be a better leader. Alongside Arturo Gomez, I'm Rob Cressy. Today's topic, well-defined purpose. Arturo, what is a well-defined purpose? Rob, it has to be why we exist. If we were a food item, it would be our recipe. If we were an assembly project, it would be the directions. It is exactly the reason why we were put on this earth.

0:37And for me, it's probably the thing that I have thought about the most over the last two years, almost to the point that now it's at an obsession point, that I so firmly believe what that reality means for me, that it actually is shaping the things that I decide to do literally on a daily basis. I absolutely love that. And I want to actually dig deeper for a second about how you said it's almost an obsession because the thing that immediately popped into my head is, that's great. Of course, not the word obsession, but for me, I see a level of commitment in this. And when you're so certain on something, maybe we use certainty instead of obsession, but when you're so certain on something, you're so all in on something, your actions can't help but follow the belief that you have in the certainty in yourself, in what you're doing. And so often in leadership or in life, so many people are without a rudder, or maybe they're not going exactly where they are.

1:47But man, you bring that laser focus to who you are and what you believe in the action that comes behind it. Holy smokes, Batman, you've got something. So can you explain a little bit more about that from your standpoint? Yeah, I mean, I, you know, I think the reason I say obsession is because it really is something that is, you know, coming into mind throughout the day, literally every day now. And so, you know, we all, I think, are searching for and yearning for purpose, for some type of clarity, for some type of sign to tell us that we're at least on the right path.

2:22And it's a very weighted question. It's a complete, some people, you know, certainly some people that I've asked, it almost throws them off course. Immediately when I asked them, I said, you know, do you, do you really understand what your purpose is? Like, what is your purpose here on earth? Like that's, that is, that is the question that I'm, that I'm looking at.

2:47And that's the obsession around what type of clarity and what type of direction it certainly has given me. And, and, and like I said, there's a lot of people that I've asked, most people actually are not able to actually answer that question. And I think that people are very focused on passions. Passions certainly are a close relative in our, in our kind of these satellites that revolve around, you know, this core, which is, which is purpose. But passions are very different from purpose. And the, and the question that I actually ask people is, you know, whether you're religious or not, this is just an example.

3:27It's if you're standing in front of God and God asks you, why are you here? Why do you exist? What is your answer? And so, you know, I think, I think in the reason, the reason I love this podcast and the reason I love that we're talking about it is because that I do think that everybody has a purpose.

3:48Everybody was put here for some reason or another. And, and that is, I think, a very important question that we should all seek to answer. Because, you know, as I've, as I've read, and as I've heard that as we progress through life, and as we near those end of days, I don't want to be too morbid, but that we all search and we all ask the question of, you know, what was this all for?

4:18And what was this all about? And if you can intercept that earlier in your life and really live a life that is complete and in line with something that you firmly believe is the right answer to why you're here. I think, I mean, there's, there's just happiness abound in that whole concept, you know? So you touched on something. Let's talk about age. You said the earlier someone figures out what their purpose is, the better. So when did you figure out your purpose? And is your purpose something that can change and evolve as you get older?

4:56Sure. I think, you know, I do believe that there is some malleability to this, to this concept or to each purpose. I mean, it took me, it took me all of 44 years of my life to really feel like I've actually nailed it down. I mean, and I'll tell you, I'll tell you that I've actually been searching for this answer probably as early as six, seven years old. And I'm, and I'm not, I'm not kidding. I, I think I told you the story, but it's, you know, it's just an odd story that I was riding my bike down the street one day and I was riding home.

5:36It was time for dinner. And I literally almost got, I mean, this is some people are going to think I'm crazy, but I literally almost felt like I was thrown off my bike and something just kind of overcame me. And, and with this concept that, Hey, you were put here on this earth for a very specific reason. This is five or six years old.

6:00And I remember telling my mom that day. And I remember, you know, many subsequent conversations that I've had with my mother over the years about that. And she remembers it vividly because I was so like adamant that something had just occurred. And, and so I think that I spent my entire, you know, literally life leading up into this point, really trying to better understand who I was identifying my passions. Cause those have changed.

6:27There's things that I loved when I was younger that I think that I've grown out of there's things that certainly have stuck with me throughout my life. But I think, listen, if, if you're able to pinpoint what that purpose is, and you really feel adamant that it really has that it is identifying you in various ways, it doesn't, to me, it doesn't matter what time of your life it comes.

6:51I think it's just important that it comes. And I think that it's not, it's not something that you, certainly it wasn't something for me that just popped into my mind or that just kind of was presented on a, on a platter. I had to, I had to work at it. I had to actually push myself, you know, and I, you know, maybe brought this up in a, in a previous podcast, but I went on this week long Lululemon retreat and was, you know, fortunate enough to actually have been, you know, invited to this thing. And I carved some time in my schedule, which was actually rare because typically in the past I was, you know, taking a full week off with, and they didn't even tell you where you were going.

7:32You just literally were getting on a plane and you were sent a ticket and you knew that you were going to California. So anyways, you go there for this week and they really strip you down. They strip you down and, you know, emotionally there's a time, you know, we're doing yoga three times a day. They're pushing on you to leave your devices and your phones and stuff in your room. And so that you're kind of detached. So you really had this meditative week.

7:58And, and it wasn't until actually I left that retreat that I came to this realization that there was, that there was something that I had identified as my purpose. And so now fast forward, you know, two years later and it really has taken all of the year and a half, two years of kind of marinating on this concept and really taking time through throughout this year, through the pandemic, which again, afforded me time and an opportunity to be meditative and kind of reflective on this whole concept.

8:34That, you know, that, you know, I'm, I'm walking into this year and this actually started a few months ago, but now feeling very confident that nothing really can derail the purpose. This, my purpose isn't aligned with a business objective. It's aligned really with, again, with clear things that have, that I've identified through my passions and into the things that bring me real happiness.

9:01And then also identified the, my ability to actually bring other people real happiness. And so that's it. So let's get very tactical here because I believe there's so much value in this for everyone, both with the people who currently have their purpose well-defined as well as people who might be looking for it. So let's start with this. What is each of our purposes?

9:27Because now once we give that example, we can build off of it, how we got there, what it means to us that we can add some context. So let's start with that. Arturo, what is your purpose? For me, it's, it's, um, and this actually has a morphed a little bit, but it's to empower, inspire, and bring happiness to myself and those around me.

9:48And, um, I, throughout my entire life, I've, I've found that the happiest, my happiest moments when was, when I was putting smiles on people's faces. And I think a lot of people can, you know, can probably say the same thing. We like make people happy. I mean, generally, but, um, the decisions that I made throughout my early adulthood and throughout my professional entrepreneurial career really have all been around mentoring, empowering, and happiness. You know, through, through hospitality, I was actually able to kind of fill those, fill those gaps in terms of what my soul and what my spirit needed.

10:32But, um, I now know that the, that the things that I do, the businesses that I'll be involved with, the actions that I take have to be qualified by that statement. If, if I'm not empowering somebody, whether it's myself or somebody around me or inspiring myself or somebody around me or making somebody happy or my, or myself, um, then it's, it's out of bounds.

10:59I need to make a decision then on, do I want to spend time doing X, Y, and Z if it no longer fits my purpose? And I think, and when I actually try to tie that statement and that belief to these business objectives and goals that I, you know, that I have, um, cause I think those are two different things. They're very much in line, you know, they're very much, they can, I can, and this isn't like, oh, let's see how we can attach this dot to that dot.

11:29Uh, they're truly in line with the things that I actually believe that I was, you know, set here to do. So. I love it. And it very much resonates with me because I think we're very much aligned in how we think and operate. So for me, my purpose is to be a positive force for good that leads others to what's possible. And this is something that has had to evolve in me.

12:00And for me, as I've mentioned previously in the podcast, the, I feel like I've lived different lives. I've got the corporate version of Rob, which I lived for, I don't know, 32 plus years. And then there's the entrepreneurial Rob who said, I'm building the world in my image and I'm going to make this happen. And that's when I really started to become a student of the game of personal development and success and leadership and mindset and, uh, high performance. And that's what I've mentioned previously, when we talked about the positivity side of things, when I realized negativity wasn't going to serve me or help me get to where I want to go. I was like, all right, I'm the leader of team good vibes because that's going to help me accomplish that.

12:47So when I break down the, I'm a positive force for good, it very much originates from my own understanding of what I needed to become to accomplish the things that I wanted to accomplish. And then the next part of it, uh, that leads others to what's possible. So for me, I was starting at zero dream was to work in sports and be creative. So started Bacon Sports where a sports blog don't know what we're doing, but we're just going on this dream.

13:16We're building, building. And through all of this became this maturation of, I would continually do things that I didn't know was possible. And then I would impress and surprise myself being like, wow, I can't believe I just did that. And then other people were like, wow, you're doing all of these other things. And while it was not for external validation, what I realized is in building the world in my image, it gave me an opportunity to lead and inspire others to do the same.

13:46However, they wanted to define it. You don't need to live the life that I am or do the things the way that I am doing, but I want to show you what is possible. And the way that I'm going to do that is by leading a life of positivity in good. So by being so purpose driven in my own world, that's why I do all of the things that I do. That's why you and I are doing this podcast right now, Arturo, because you have happiness and I have goodness for the world.

14:11And we're inspiring others how to be better leaders and how you can better lead yourself, how you can better lead your team. So for me, I'm going to be living this on a daily basis. So I'm the example to show you of what's possible. Doesn't mean you need to do it, but I'm an example. And the more that you can find inspiration around of, wow, Rob did this. I can do this. You know what? I'm gonna take a little nugget from Arturo, a little nugget from Rob. I'm going to make this my own. So for me, that's where my purpose comes from.

14:41By the way, I love it. And as somebody who's gotten to know you quite well over the last year, we've known each other for longer than that, but I would say much better over the course of this year. I think that that is, I can say that that's truth. I can say that from the outside looking in and see all the things that you're involved with, the things that you talk about, the things that your eyes light up about, that your purpose is truly aligned with your actions. And so that's awesome. And I wanted to just circle back and say that, because you asked questions, is a purpose something that has flexibility and can it change over time? I do believe it can. And I think I mentioned that. I do think that there is some flexibility, malleability in terms of what it is. I do think, though, that there's always going to be this core.

15:36And this core is this fundamental belief that I think that we can get to, some of us, sooner than later. And there's possibilities of layers on it. There is no bad thing about adding more goodness and positivity to something that you've identified as who you are and who you are to be. And I think, you know, this isn't, we're not, you know, I'm not saying that people have to, that you're really going to change. The thing, the changes that I've seen in myself is really about time allocation, focus and clarity. And, and that's, that's it. It's, it's, I think that I'm still same person that I've been, you know, for my entire life.

16:23I think that I have a little bit more, like I said, clarity, like I can see further down the road than I could have, you know, five years ago, six years ago. And so, you know, there's various things that come into your life that are going to shape this idea of purpose. But I do think that it's such a great exercise that people can put themselves through in terms of, you know, you get, you should really answer that question and not just your passions, but go deeper, go further. Because it will bring, it's going to de-stress you when somebody has these answers that I think that we're all seeking throughout, throughout life.

17:08It's, I mean, that's the, that's the philosophical kind of quintessential question. What is the meaning of life? And it really is not, what is the meaning of life? It's like, to me, it's the interpretation is what is the meaning of my life? What is my purpose? And so, um, big weighty topic, but I think it, um, has so many implications for ourselves. It has implications on humanity. It has implications just abound.

17:38And so, um, you know, got to get to it. And if you haven't figured it out, that's okay. Um, you know, everybody's on their own path and on their own journey. It's just, it is something that you do need to make that stop and you do need to ask those questions and you do need to get directions. So, so let's actually, you've mentioned the word path three times, once at the beginning and then twice now.

18:04And I wanted to ask you to you earlier, but now it's perfect because you had said to know if you're on the right path. And then just now you said, Hey, I can see the path further right now. And now we've got path as it relates to your journey. And I think one of the very beneficial things about this purpose is it can be tough sometimes to know, am I on the air quotes right path as if there's, um, a right or a wrong way to do things or to do our life. And, and certainly the path for an entrepreneur or a purpose-driven individual, or as a leader, it's oftentimes undefined and, or it is designed by us.

18:47And one of the things that I've matured into and learned is being the architect of my own path, which certainly being purpose-driven helps us do that. But then how do you know if you're on the right path? And I believe the way that you know is by going back to your purpose in what the purpose ends up doing is becomes this rock, this foundation inside of you.

19:12And I would actually visualize a fortress inside your stomach. And I'm, I'm very big into visualization. And certainly when you can attach feelings and emotions into some of these things. So you think about this fortress of who you are and inside of you is your purpose. So now as you're going through life and in business, you sit there and say, does this align?

19:37And sometimes when something doesn't go the right way or the way that you expect it to go, or the way that you want it to go. And you're like, man, am I doing the right thing right now? Am I on the right path? What do you do? You go back and you look inside and am I aligned to your purpose? And I think there's a lot of self-reflection or self-auditing that we can all do for ourselves where you say, all right, I need to get real with myself.

20:05Am I doing things aligned to my own purpose? And I think a lot of times we may realize that we may go astray by allowing shiny objects or other things to lead us somewhere. But we can always go back to our due north. And that due north is something that sits inside of you. And you say, you know what? Even though the thing didn't go the way that I want right now, I still know who I am.

20:32I still know I'm a positive force for good that leads others to what's possible. It is not outcome-based. And this is an extremely difficult thing to deal with or understand knowing that so many of us are outcome-based. But it's also why being able to place more emphasis on effort and action than outcome will lead you to a much happier or purpose-driven life because you're not relying on the thing happening.

21:02You're more relying on you doing the thing and the results. You can't control what you can't control. Right. Yeah. I mean, I think to kind of recap that a little bit, I mean, the last statement in terms of you can't control what you can't control, that's something that we all need to live by. And so there's going to be things that arise in your life and things that occur that, again, that are completely out of your control. And that's just that.

21:30It has no bearing on your purpose, has no bearing on anything that you've done. It's just something that's happened. I do think, though, that people will get more efficient in making decisions about where they spend their time, what they do, when they have more time, when they've had more time to digest their purpose. So, again, this kind of realization that I've come to occurred about two years ago.

21:59It'll almost be, I think, three years coming up here in June. But it's taken time for me to digest it and to really understand it. And just like with anything else, we don't just automatically pick up directions to a new toy or directions to something and automatically have mastery of it. It's like this is something that, again, it's like, okay, this feels really great. I can jump into this. But we're still, I think, attached to passions and we're still, you know, it's the decisions that we make throughout life that help bring clarity towards purpose. It's like, damn, I just spent a year and a half of my life with this person or on this project or, you know, doing X, Y, and Z.

22:51And it was to no avail. Like nothing came of it. Actually, bad things happened from it. So we learn through these processes, these mistakes, and these areas where we can learn throughout our experiences in life. I do think that once you get a firm hold of your purpose and it feels like it's clearly cemented into this fortress that you start making decisions that are a lot more efficient for your life. And that's not to say you're never going to make a bad decision. But if you know, for me, again, it's, I now look at things and I, you know, compartmentalize it.

23:35I say, am I going to be able to empower, inspire, or bring happiness either to myself or the people around me in doing this? And, you know, you can't, not everything you're going to do, like I have to go to Home Depot later. Okay. I guess it's going to bring me happiness because it's going to take something off my task list. But, you know, not everything you do in life is going to be surrounding this thing.

23:59I think you need to treat the major decisions that you're making, you know, about where you're spending your time, who you're spending your time with, and the things that you're pursuing should probably be linked to this idea or question of who you are in this world. So let's get extremely tactical. So we've given so many ideas in ways to do this, but I want to be extremely specific.

24:27You want to create your purpose, Rob and Arturo. How do we do this? So number one intention, you need to be intentional about this. You need to sit there and say, you know what? I want to create, discover, lead into my purpose. I don't know what word I want to use there because it's a very intimate thing for you, but you want to be intentional about it.

24:54And then number two, I'm going to say, start writing things down. Just free associate. Have no judgment whatsoever. Set a timer for 30 minutes. Go somewhere. I don't care if you go to a Starbucks or get a coffee or just you and a notebook or you and a computer and just give it to the title at my purpose and just see what flows and what words and sentences come.

25:20And don't feel that you have to do this and to create the perfect sentence, because I believe this is a process. As we've both talked about, I didn't land on this the first time. This has been years in the making of doing this. So you write it down and then maybe you put it down after 30 minutes and you come back a day later, an hour later. I don't care when. And you look at it again and you're like, man, what resonated with me right here?

25:47And you're like, huh, I wonder if I could shorten this a little bit or add some brevity. Because I think what I like so much about what you say, Arturo, aside from the place of good is it's very succinct. You can very easily go up to either one of us and be like, hey, what's your guys' purpose? Boom. Right away, we're going to be able to say it. It's going to say something about us. You don't want to have this long, drawn out story because you're adding too much. Our stuff is not complex. It's extremely simple, despite the fact that it's so deep.

26:17So I'm curious from your perspective, Arturo, tactically, what would you recommend someone does to create their purpose? Well, I think it's a real introspective exercise, right? It's identifying things that we truly are passionate about, things that we've been drawn to. Because you really have to, you have to, again, and when you're trying to get to the core, you're peeling back layers.

26:43And so the layers around the core are surrounded by passion. And so when you find things that you've gravitated towards in your life, whether it's charity work, making people happy, being a creative, whatever those things are, they really are going to be able to, I think, introduce the concept of purpose. I actually still have the exercises and kind of the playbook that we used at this Lululemon retreat. I don't think it's, I didn't sign anything saying that I couldn't share it. And I'm sure that Lululemon is a brand that certainly would, I think, encourage people's pursuit of finding this question. So I'm going to share that. We're going to create some type of shareable white paper and we'll get this out to everybody.

27:37But it really is a couple of things that I looked at it this morning, a couple of things that are in there. And again, it's isolating and finding the things that you're passionate about. It's also one of the last parts of the exercise leading up to you actually writing a purpose statement is doing a toast. So you're toasting from three different perspectives. One is a toast to yourself.

28:06Actually, I have it here in front of me. I don't want to butcher it. So I'm going to actually pull this out real quick and I'm going to actually cite it so that we have it. And it's right here. So you're going to do three toasts. One is to the toast to what you know you have always been. So I toast to myself who's always been a caring, thoughtful person.

28:36Your natural talents and gifts. And then who you are for other people. So for this one, you've got to move beyond titles, example, mother, brother, manager, professional athlete, etc. And shift into qualities you embody. Okay. And so the idea was that you are to create these toasts from these three different perspectives. And so you're almost looking at it as like how you interpret yourself, how you believe other people interpret you. And so it forced. And I'm looking at writing in here that we did actually on that day. And there's all the elements of my final purpose are in that book, which is actually fun to be able to go back and look at.

29:25So I would say, I mean, there is some reflective journal writing type exercises that you can do. And it really will take you committing a day, two days. I mean, this was a full week. You know, this is a full week of detachment. It was like, you know, you're not looking at your phone every two seconds. You're not on email. You're actually in meditation. You're doing yoga. And I know it's hard for a lot of people to actually take that amount of time.

29:54I'd say there's probably never a better time in history than what we're going through now. You know, it doesn't look like things are going to change in the next six months. So if you're a work from home person, if you're a mother, if you're whoever you are, I think that there's some stillness in the universe right now that you can take some time and give yourself that little bit of reflection to get a better and deeper understanding of why you're here. And, you know, it's actually this whole podcast is super timely because it's an exercise I'm going to go through with my wife. You know, it's, you know, there's questions that she has that I think that, you know, being a mother over the last, you know, four years, it's you kind of get pulled into this completely selfless type of persona where everything you have and everything you give is for this other human. And there's moments in pieces of your identity that that gets stripped down. And so, you know, as you know, we've just had our second child about a year ago.

31:09And so the smoke is starting to clear and we're starting to see, you know, how how this thing is going to unfold and trying to, you know, trying to help her further identify, you know, where where she might, you know, be professionally beyond this. Right. She spent 10, you know, 10, 11, 12 years in the highest levels of PR and that she's not sure that that's where she wants to go. And so we're going to kind of work through this exercise over the next week.

31:39And and hopefully we can kind of pull some things out of it and really identify something that gives, you know, her a better understanding of what what that purpose is. One of the greatest gifts that you can give yourself is time. We all oftentimes believe I don't have enough time. Well, that's actually just a fallacy because we have unlimited time until we die. It's just a matter of how we decide to fill it and how we're going to use that time.

32:08And if you want to create more time, you don't just find it. You create it. You say, all right, I want to go and spend some time intentionally on creating my purpose. All right. Well, that probably just means you're going to watch one hour less of Netflix or something else that doesn't serve you as much. This is where it comes down to. There's always plenty of time. You just have to say, I'm prioritizing this more than one other thing.

32:31And the last thing that I'm going to leave with in terms of how you can really live and feel your purpose is I read my purpose every single morning as part of my morning routine. It's part of my boot sequence, just like gratitude in affirmations and meditation and journaling and these things you and I, Arturo, talk about all the time. As part of that, how do I be someone who is always a positive force for good that leads others to what's possible? Constant intention.

33:01Boom. That awareness is there every single morning. He reminds me, boom, Rob, you know who you are. Go kick ass today. I'm like, thank you very much. Rinse and repeat every single day of my life over and over again. And you can't help but build that fortress inside of you. Yeah, it's such a wonderful process. And the end result is I think I'm trying to convince anybody who's listening that it will be 100% time well served in trying to actually go through this process to define it. It's such an enlightening thing to come to this realization.

33:41It's almost like you've seen and found something out about yourself that you potentially, you never knew the depth of it or the reality to it. But I think we've all seen glimpses of it because, again, you know, our behavior, our experiences, and our passions really are kind of intertwined in where our purpose lies. But it's time well spent. It is.

34:09So, Arturo, now let's get to the action item or takeaway. What do you have for everybody? I mean, the action item is going to be, you know, kind of what we discussed in terms of, you know, setting up a time, whether it's a Saturday afternoon, whether it's a Saturday Sunday, whether it's a week long, whether it's a month long, however long it takes. And again, I think everybody needs to understand that this is there is no race. Everybody's journey is a little different. You may get the answer. You may not.

34:37But you're certainly going to find some progress in actually writing these things down. Once we send out this white paper, people can – I'd like for people to actually take a moment to go through this exercise. And you're going to need somebody else to do it with because it's – that's part of where the honesty comes in. It's – you have to be in front of somebody. And I was surrounded by pretty much complete strangers.

35:03I mean, these people didn't really know me, but there was quite a bit of opportunity or certainly it was, you know, the concept of honesty when you're sitting in front of somebody else at least was strong in me. But I'd love to hear what people thought of the exercise. I'd love to, you know, have people go through it and see if they've, you know, they've gotten, you know, one step closer to answering this question that I think is the question that we should all answer. And my action item is sort of the next level of this is I want you to send Arturo and I what your purpose is. If you've already got it, fantastic. Send it to us. We would love to support you in that.

35:47Or if you're someone who creates your purpose because of this podcast, even better. Send it to us.

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