Last week, I wrapped up a difficult multiple-month project and was shocked that that I was not relieved, not invigorated, not ready to take a break, but rather tired; and in a very odd way.
A long, physically demanding project should tire the body, which is then restored by sleeping, eating and drinking, and inactivity. A difficult, mentally demanding project should tire the mind, requiring a restorative vacation, mental respite, and diversion. What I experienced at the end of this project was a tiredness of soul.
How do you rest the soul? And what tires it out in the first place?
The longshoreman philosopher Eric Hoffer famously wrote, “Our greatest weariness comes from work not done.” After a few days of pondering on my soul-tiredness, I think that Hoffer has my diagnosis: despite my months of apparent busyness, I had actually been idle.
We all know that you can be both busy and idle at the same time because we have done it—been at hard physical labor with our brains completely disengaged; and been at hard mental labor while our bodies atrophy in our comfy chairs.
Just as the body and the mind are different systems, so too is the soul—our physical and mental selves can be hard at work while our souls are idle.
So what is the work of the soul?
I believe it is that thing or things that each one of us was put here to do. It is “the music” that Oliver Wendell Holmes worries stays inside too many of us until our death. It is the potential that you have to be a great writer, musician, philanthropist, mother, entrepreneur, leader, etc.
Failing to do the work of the soul leads to weariness because, as grandma used to say, “Doing nothing is so hard because you can’t stop to rest.” It is tiring carrying the burden of unfinished work around with you, so…
Do your work.
Start. Start now. Start before you are ready. Don’t head off to the library for a month of research; don’t lock yourself in a conference room for a week drafting an elaborate plan; don’t call your mentor and tell her your plans for the future.
Just start. Right now you can start: send an email, make a phone call, write a lousy first draft of chapter 1, find a customer. Do something even if…
You don’t know what your soul’s work is.
I don’t know what your purpose is. I’m not sure I know what my purpose is, but Buddha suggests, “Your purpose in life is to find your purpose and give your whole heart and soul to it.”
That sounds like a good plan.
The best way to find your purpose is to start. Start looking. Start trying. Start doing things that interest you and hope that you will be guided. Remember that it is hard to steer a stationary object. (Click here to tweet that.)
After you start, check and see if you feel rested, that will be a good sign that you are on the right track. And if it turns out you were doing something that was not your soul’s work, at least you learned something, you tried, you moved, built something useful.
It turns out the difficult project I just finished was not the work of my soul, it was a distraction from the work of my soul. Now that I know, I can pursue my purpose by looking further.
Then perhaps I can get some rest.
Now, here’s a question for you: How did you find the work of your soul, or what are you doing to look for it? Share your experience in the comments below.