111: Purpose is Not Something You Find (Part 2)

Download your free guide to Finding Purpose Beyond Parenthood: Getting Through Grief and Triggers to a Life of Meaning and Joy!

Last week I talked about how purpose is not something you "find".  It's also not a singular mission.  It's not a destination.  And it doesn't have to be big.  

Once you begin to practice all the things that I outlined that will bring you a sense of meaning and purpose, you may find that you are still struggling.  It might mean that there is something standing in the way. 

Identifying your personal obstacles is the first step.  In this episode I share:

• 4 possible obstacles that may be standing in the way of your purpose
• 3 counterintuitive ways to remove them
• what do do next to solidify your purpose

If you are an action taker and want to discover more about how to live your purpose-filled life, download my free PDF guide,  Finding Purpose Beyond Parenthood: Getting Through Grief and Triggers to a Life of Meaning and Joy!

Where to find Sheri:
Instagram: @sherijohnsoncoaching
Website: sherijohnson.ca

If you are a childless woman looking to up-level her life in a major way, join the Love Your Beautiful, Unconventional Life Retreat, coming up at the end of February 2025.  Book a Retreat Call with Sheri here if you have questions or want to know more!

Where to find Sheri:
Instagram: @sherijohnsoncoaching
Website: sherijohnson.ca

Transcript

In last week’s episode, I talked about the societal conditioning that leads women, and sometimes others, to believe our most important purpose, if not sole purpose, is raising children.   And this, in turn, leads childless women, all those people to feel a sense of loss, maybe a lack of meaning, a lack of purpose, and or fulfillment.

And maybe even a sense of dread for the future that just seems vast and empty ahead of ahead of you.

In the last episode, I also gave the first couple of steps to aligning with your purpose. And I want to continue that conversation with myself on this solo episode and delve into what might be blocking you from living purposefully.

You can take the steps that I outlined in the last episode towards living that way, but you also need to remove anything that's standing in the way of it.

One of those things might be self-worth. So I want to share how self-worth plays a role here in potentially keeping you from finding purpose and tapping into that inner voice that I talked about in the last episode and maybe even allowing yourself to even explore what you find inspiring.

So if you missed last week's episode, go back and listen to that first because that is a critical first step to

kind of catching on to what I'm talking about here. And stay tuned to find out the next step and the possibly a big obstacle to finding more purpose in your life that you're going to need to quash if you want that sense of meaning and fulfillment.

Welcome back, welcome if you're new. I hope you listened to that last episode which is part one of finding purpose beyond parenthood.

What I want to talk about today is self-worth and I want to stop you here just in case you're someone who is saying my self-worth is fine, I have high self-esteem, I'm confident most of the people that I talk to are confident.

They have level of self-esteem and yet there's a little piece of their self-worth that they've given away. And so I want to talk about that and how specifically having that missing piece that self-worth can kill your efforts to align with purpose if it's if your self-worth is low in that area.

It will keep you from living your best life. It's going to keep you from following your passions, everything. So let's dive in and find out how to know if your self-worth is in the way and what to do about it.

So first, you were born within an eight cents of your own value, your own worth, your own loveability. We all are.

We are born with that. And then we're exposed to the world. We become influenced by all these outside pressures.

They might be societal, parental, religious, your friends. other influencers in our lives, teachers, parents, friends, there's so many outside influences that we're exposed to in the world.

And then we internalize new beliefs about our worth that we learn. And with a lot of this is developed in childhood, by the way, before our brains are developed well enough to distinguish the difference, our brains just see one through such a narrow lens that we take things at face value and we make them mean things about us that the people around us have, you know, don't necessarily mean to make it mean anything.

And yet we internalize these beliefs about ourselves based on the way that we view the world from our small little childhood brains.

One of those beliefs that really I find gets highlighted as childless women is that our worth is dependent on having kids.

And in the last episode, I also talked a bit about the societal pressures on women that we feel, all of these pressures that show us that this is how you become valuable and worthy in the world is by having kids.

And many childless women, most of my clients have talked about this. They don't necessarily know how to recognize it, but once we start talking about it, they realize, yes, they have experienced significant social pressures and judgments related to this motherhood status.

even if you have not been exposed, like our parents are such a huge influence on us. And even if your parents were, you know, they didn't,

place a lot of value like they kind of, maybe they didn't influence you in this way, maybe they didn't put that pressure on you to have kids and get married and do all the things.

Even if you didn't have parents like that, we are all exposed to ideals of what the perfect family looks like.

This of course is changing now and last while I feel like even especially over the last five years where there's so many other other ideals, families that are showing up in movies, advertising, media, all of that.

But if you're in your 30s or older, you would have been exposed to a lot of advertising, media, marketing, all of that touted the nuclear family as the thing to strive for.

And I would argue that it really still is. There's some changes happening, but underneath of it, is still a lot of if you start looking for a language or articles around childlessness, you will find all kinds of pronatalist views that are still touting this nuclear family as the perfect ideal strive for.

You really can't avoid it. And so that becomes an internalized belief. And it leaves people who don't fall into that ideal feeling inadequate, lack of belonging, and maybe sense of being an outsider.

And I'm not just talking about women without kids, men without kids, anyone without kids. This is, this extends, you know, for example, well into the LGBTQ community.

where you will find many different forms of families, and it's not quote-unquote normal, it's, I don't believe that, but the media will still not necessarily portray that as, as ideal.

So, what happens to us as childless women or to anyone else who doesn't follow the norm, follow the status quo, we will automatically amp up other ways to increase our worth, to show that we are adequate and valuable and worthy in some other way.

We've forgotten that we hold that value innately and we'll look for external validation for it. Here's an example. Western culture glorifies the busy mom.

You probably know this. And if you haven't, I would draw your attention to how often have you heard a mother introduce herself on a podcast or a show or just in conversation, just refer to themselves, refer to herself as, I'm a busy mom of two.

There's always this, I'm a busy mom. I'm a busy mom of two beautiful children. I'm a busy mom of three beautiful girls.

And so childless women, if they can't have the mom part, they will share his hack, make sure that they are busy.

And of course, this isn't everybody. So you might be someone who was able to cut through this. I certainly was not.

It's taking a lot of time to let this go. And it certainly was not conscious. I was in my late 30s when I had my first miscarriage and I think that's when it started.

Work suddenly got very, very busy and I just sucked it up and did it. I felt like I don't have kids so I can take on the extra load.

It wasn't that work got any busier. I took on more work. I also started my business. I also joined a board as a volunteer board member.

I also was, you know, keeping up my busy social life, trying to make that as busy as possible. I was so packed, was thought that that was what made me important.

And, busy meant important, but it doesn't actually mean that. It does not make us worthy. The quantity of things that you do, productivity, the things that you produce, the number of things, that doesn't create your value.

That's like saying the value of a book is based on the number of pages it has rather than the depth and the meaning of the story.

You don't gain value. You don't gain worth by doing more things, by adding more pages to your book of life.

It's about the depth and meaning of your story. So, do you see how being busy can actually keep you from your purpose?

There's a couple ways, really. If you're so busy keeping yourself busy, you will never have the time to hear.

or try the things that make you happy, the things that make you feel meaning. We'll never have the time to hear the soul nudges, that intuition I talked about in the last episode.

Being busy is loud, it buries your intuition. And you'll tell yourself that you can't slow down because that will make you feel less important.

So you keep going, fast paced, more done. And you can't slow down long enough to hear your intuition. So that is one way that your self-worth can get in the way of your purpose.

Here's another one. I'm gonna start with a question. Do you ever feel guilty when you do something for yourself?

Does that feel selfish to you? Or maybe you feel guilty? for spending money on yourself, this was me, when I spend too much money on myself, especially, or maybe you feel guilty saying no to the things that you don't want to do, so you end up saying yes to things that you don't want to do, that guilt, or that feeling that doing things or buying things for yourself is selfish, or maybe it makes you feel that you don't deserve it, or that you have to earn it, those are all signs of low self-worth in this area, at least of your life.

If it makes you feel guilty to spend time or money or energy on yourself, then you won't do those things.

You will avoid feeling that guilt. Nobody likes to feel guilty. That's a negative, uncomfortable feeling that we will avoid, and if you avoid feeling guilty, then you're also going to avoid doing what you're true.

self wants, you'll avoid buying yourself what you truly want because you'll feel guilty for doing that. So it's really going to make you berry or set aside those soul-nighters, you'll ignore them in favor of what you're expected to do, or supposed to do, or what you're being asked to do.

If you are aware that you're a people pleaser, you call yourself a people pleaser, you will be familiar with this intimately.

You do what pleases others instead of yourself. And I would argue here's something to chew on. I would argue that, you know, in the name of people, we tell ourselves that we're doing this because we're good people, because we're nice, because we want to be kind to others, we don't want to disappoint.

others and so that makes us a good person. But I would argue that pleasing others also allows you to avoid that feeling of guilt when you say no.

So chew on that for a little bit. That was kind of a mind-blower to me, that revelation. The other piece is earning, so and this is related.

I grew up with the idea that I had to earn my way through the world, even as a child in order to do what I really felt like doing, like swimming or playing with my friends.

I had to do my chores first, even as a very young child. I wasn't allowed to rest or play until all the work was done first.

And I internalized that belief that I had to earn my plan. play my rest. I had to earn what I wanted to do by doing the work first, doing my chores, doing whatever.

And even as a teenager and as an adult, I started to feel guilty if I wanted to rest first and then work, even if my body was so tired.

My intuition would tell me to just take a nap and I couldn't. I hadn't yet deserved it. I hadn't yet earned it.

So I didn't deserve it yet. And we'll do this with food. You know, you go to a party and you really like to have a piece of cake, but you won't allow yourself until you've done enough exercise or eaten only salads for the rest of the day or maybe the week.

And only then can you have the piece of cake without feeling guilty to your pet aunt. And that may or may not be you, but I'm sure you can imagine someone who is like

that. So if you have to earn your way to what your soul nudges you to do, what your intuition is telling you to do, you might be earning for the rest of your life.

You won't honor the timing of opportunities that come your way. You won't feel deserving if they come too easily.

You'll want to do something to earn those. Your brain will tell you that you can't get things easily. You have to work for them.

That's also really deeply ingrained in our society. have to work hard to get where you want to go. You have to work hard to earn money.

harder you work, the more you earn. And that actually isn't true. I'm sure you all know someone who works like crazy and earns a basic salary.

then you also know people who work hard very little and earn a ton of money. So that logic just doesn't flow through.

Okay, number so that's the second one. I've got four here for you. So the second one is really if you feel guilty or if you feel like you have to earn things, you don't deserve what you truly want, you have to people please.

That's a sign that you're putting, you're placing your worth on external validation instead of your own innate worth and that's going to keep you from following your intuition and following what makes you feel aligned and purposeful.

A third way that self-worth can get in the way of your purpose if it's low is through fear of rejection or criticism.

When you have low self-worth, you will care a lot about what other people think. And by the way, most of us care.

We do care and that's okay. It's not all just self-worth. We care about the people we love. We care about disappointing people.

That's okay. It's when we put too much weight on other people's opinions of us or what we want to do.

When we believe that they determine our worth, that's when it becomes a problem. That's when you will shut down your own ideas, your own goals, your own dreams, because of what someone else thinks of them.

And something similar can happen when we look for external validation for what we want. So, let's say they you have a business idea that feels really aligned and really meaningful.

If you debit yourself and you're worth, you might gather all kinds of opinions from other people as to what they think of your idea.

Sometimes though you asked the wrong people, you know, the people who know nothing about that particular niche or business model.

I don't ask a coffee shop owner to give you validation for your online course idea. Or, you know, don't ask a dad whether he thinks my idea to help childless women is a good idea.

Because those are people who aren't going to, they're not in your niche, they're not going to necessarily be able to give you a good opinion.

And yet, if we look up to someone, if we see them as knowledgeable or successful, we might set aside our own intuition.

in favor of what they think instead of what we believe is right for us, what feels inflow, what feels aligned, what feels meaningful.

So that's the third way that you're self-worth can get into the way if you fear rejection or criticism, you're always looking for what other people think instead of what you think, what your intuition tells you.

And the last one that I want to talk about today is self-sabotage. This usually happens subconsciously on the surface you want something, you think you want it, but under the surface you feel you don't feel of it or worthy of it.

And so your subconscious mind will do things or not do things to make sure that it doesn't happen. this all the time in business.

I also see it in my clients personal lives. And I'll tell you, I have a confession for you. I often wondered whether I sabotaged my own efforts to get pregnant.

It's only in hindsight that I thought this way. I looked back and looked at all the things that I didn't do or that I did do.

For instance, my naturopath told me to cut out gluten. And I didn't. Why not? I don't know. I can't even really put my finger on it.

It felt like too much work, maybe. And then later, my neighbor told me that she got pregnant when she cut out gluten.

And then I felt guilty. Why didn't I? I don't know. Maybe that was self sabotage. And then some of the other things that I started to think about.

But whenever I started ovulating, my husband and I would get in an argument and then we'd no longer feel like being intimate or for couple of months in a row was traveling right on ovulation days.

Did I, you know, I started to wonder, did I actually plan it that way like subconsciously? And after couple of years, I started to wonder whether maybe I didn't really want this or maybe I didn't feel like I deserved it.

Of course, I won't really ever know, but our brains will really do some wondrous things all in an effort to achieve what the subconscious wants without us ever being aware of it.

And by the way, I should also add that I am not saying all of this to get you to look back over your, you know, your period of trying to get pregnant or

your life, and suddenly think, oh, I've self-sabotaged myself. This is just my experience in an area where I really, I wondered about it.

And I just started to read at the time how the subconscious mind can work against you. And I really started to think about it in that context.

So this isn't about laying blame on yourself. I don't blame myself for that. I did the best that I could with the information that I had at the time.

And at this point, I don't regret anything. And I hope you won't either. So that is self-sabotage. Let's go back to the business example, because that might actually be a better one.

I did this all through my business. I self-sabotaged myself. would, you know, and think I'm doing all this work.

I'm busy doing all these things, but I wasn't doing the things that felt scary. I feared rejection. I feared criticism.

All of those things really got in the way and so I self-sabotaged my efforts. wouldn't do the things that I knew were going to actually help my business grow and move forward.

So what happens when you change this, when you practice self-worth, when you awaken or build your self-worth? You will begin to also awaken your own intuition and also feel like you can trust it.

So you're going to start to feel more confident doing the things that feel aligned for you. The things that I talked about on the last episode, the

the intuition of soul nudges, you will feel worthy and deserving of following those nudges, of getting what you want, of receiving what you want without having to earn it, even if they don't make a lot of sense to other people.

It also means you're going to start living more authentically. This is huge. You will start doing the things that feel that feel right and authentic to you.

You'll say the things that feel more authentic to you. You will follow what you really desire, despite what anyone else thinks about it.

So this is really, I can't stress how important this is for getting to purpose beyond parenthood. It's so important.

So really what you need to be doing instead. of kind of allowing that self-worth to get in the way is embracing non-conformity.

So instead of doing what other people think you should do, instead of buying into the ideal family, instead of doing what other people think is a good idea for you, instead of trying to fit into societal molds, embrace your unique path and choices that are going to lead you to greater fulfillment.

And this also involves proudly owning your childless status, child-free status, even, and finding purpose in really diverse aspects of life.

And then the second thing I would say is self-compassion, practicing self-compassion, giving yourself grace. This doesn't all happen overnight.

So if you're rolling your eyes at yourself, if you beat yourself up, if you're feeling less than start by just noticing that, that's almost always the first step that I recommend.

Notice, be present, almost observe yourself from outside of yourself and see if you can become aware of how you're treating yourself.

Talk to yourself as though you're talking to a younger version of yourself, gently with encouragement. And the third thing I would say is that you need to accept your childless path fully.

just mentioned this. And that includes your childless status. So that's going to help you build a strong foundation of self-worth.

This internal validation of your identity as a child-free woman, a child-free person. That is key to living in alignment with your soul.

I did an episode on this very topic, it actually takes a little bit of time to explain. So I would encourage you to go back and listen to episode number 73.

It's called letting go of your childless identity is crucial for embracing your future. So that episode is going to help you to uncover where you might be holding on to your own judgment of your childless status.

So those three things that I just mentioned, not not conforming, embracing your own unique path, not caring what other people say about it, accepting your path, having compassion for yourself.

can sit here and tell you that's how you're going to remove the obstacles, the self-worth obstacle that is going to allow you to align with your purpose every single day.

But it's so much easier said than done. You know, just wake up one day and think, I don't care what anybody thinks of me and I'm going to do exactly what feels right.

you might be able to intellectualize those concepts, but actually practicing the self-worth that really allows you to embody those concepts.

That takes a lot more than a podcast episode. So if you are an action taker, and you wanna take the next step towards removing the obstacles that are standing in the way of your purpose, that self-worth obstacle, I invite you to download my free PDF guide.

It's called Find Your Purpose Beyond Parenthood, Getting Through Grief and Triggers to Life of Meaning and Joy. So that is there for you for free.

It's in the show notes. You can find it at SherryJohnson.ca slash purpose. And that is all for today's episode.

If you found it valuable, or you maybe had an aha moment, I would love it if you gave the podcast a five-star rating or review.

or give it a follow or a subscribe, share this episode with someone else who might need an offer moment.

And I would be forever grateful if you did that. So that is it for today's episode. I would love to know what you think, send me a DM on Instagram, send me an email.

I would love to hear that or leave me a review. Thank you so much. I'll see you on next week's episode.

Bye for now.