Mel Robbins lost her younger brother and felt purposeless. She says the first step back is noticing small moments of kindness in your day. Volunteering, which 30-40% of Americans do, is another concrete way to rebuild purpose when you're exhausted.
For the person listening, give some examples of how you might flip your mindset to this moment and today. And what would be an example of flipping from feeling purposelessness to saying, okay, I know I'm tired, but I'm going to be more purposeful for the rest of the day. What would that look like?
Yeah, you know, I mean, I had a very poignant experience of that, you know, which is when I lost my younger brother. I am a hardworking person like a lot of people listening and had a lot of purpose. And then somehow the grief kind of dislocated me and I felt just profoundly exhausted and without this sense of inspiration that he provided me and purposeless is how it felt. And I think that what you really need to do is you need to just kind of pause and reflect and think about what are the moments of purpose in this day. And for me, what was clear is I have a commitment to orienting with kindness to other people. You know, that's not a radical idea. Almost every great ethical tradition thinks that's where we should begin, you know, from Confucianism to the Abrahamic traditions to, uh, contemporary philosophy. It's like practice kindness, practice it, you know, when you're walking through a city, practice it when you're, you know, helping somebody get across the street, practice it in your daily work life. And then, you know, you— 30 to 40% of Americans volunteer. It's really good when you're really exhausted to return to this great tradition of our culture. Like, who can I volunteer for right now? And so those little moments, those little small steps of purposefulness really matter.
Oprah Winfrey: How to Find Your Unique Purpose, Authentic Power, and Calling in Life
