THE POWER OF PURPOSE
Usually in life, it’s not the hard work that burns us out. It’s the meaningless work. When what we’re doing matters, it fuels in each of us a higher level of effort and a deeper level of commitment. That’s why it’s so important to stay connected to your purpose, to remember why you’re here, and to recognize the difference your work is making.
No story highlights the power of purpose more than the story of Sisyphus from Greek mythology. Sisyphus was a cunning and deceitful king who was punished by the gods for his unethical behavior. His sentence? A lifetime of meaningless work. Over and over again for all eternity, Sisyphus was tasked with pushing a giant boulder up a hill, all the way up almost to its peak, only for it to roll back to its starting point again, where the painful process began again. Even if you didn’t know exactly who it was or exactly what he was doing, maybe you’ve seen this agonizing image before.
Of all the punishments the Greek gods could have administered, this is the one they deemed most miserable. Was it the physical labor that bothered Sisyphus? Maybe a little. But really it was the futility of his labor that served as the ultimate torture. At the end of the day, despite all the effort he could muster, that boulder was in the exact same place - there at the bottom of the hill - as it was when he started. And being forced to accept that reality, each and every day, that his work was ultimately meaningless? That his effort was irrelevant and that all that straining and striving didn’t make a difference? That was the greatest punishment of all.
I’m confident you won’t be pushing a giant boulder up a hill all day today, but I do think it’s possible you may be able to relate to the plight of this ancient mythological character. It may feel like today is gonna be another day full of straining and striving, for what feels like little or even nothing in return. You may be looking around, wondering to yourself, is my work making a difference? Does what I’m doing today matter? Those are important questions - maybe some of the most important, in fact - that each of us here are responsible for answering.
So let me challenge you to be intentional in answering those questions. That might mean ensuring that today you are making progress on the individual goals and aspirations you have for yourself. The big, important things you’re pursuing in life demand that today you do the work, put in the reps, and keep getting better. That improvement work probably isn’t easy, but at the end of the day, it's evidence that what you did today was meaningful and significant.
It’s also important to recognize that a great way to make today matter for yourself is to focus on making a difference for someone else. I think the Greek gods knew that one essential element of meaningless work is solitude. That’s why Sisyphus was sentenced to work on his own, because giving him someone to work alongside, to support, and to encourage would have automatically elevated his reason for being there. The same is true for you. Forgetting about yourself and your own pursuit, and focusing instead on supporting and encouraging someone else with theirs is an important and powerful way to make a difference. At the end of the day, maybe that’s the evidence - not what you’ve done to benefit yourself, but what you've done to benefit someone else - that validates the value of this day.
Either way, what today ultimately provides for each of us is an opportunity to tap into the power of purpose. When what we’re doing matters, it fuels in us a higher level of effort and a deeper level of commitment. It drives us to show up and do the difficult but important things success requires us to do. And it moves us a little closer to the kind of people winning requires us to be.
