Purpose

"So that's my purpose then?" I ask, "Loving the skin I'm in?"

"Who said anything about purpose?" she reacts as if she's been slapped, recoiling back and then tilting her head a little as she looks as me like I am crazy.

"My dear," she says carefully, "I was speaking of pleasure. I was speaking of enjoyment. I was speaking of going through your day without the existential dread of immediate regret when you find that you've done something almost unforgivable, in your eyes at least, and none of that has anything to do with higher meaning.

"All I was trying to do was to get you to open your eyes to enjoy the little things. Try to get you to not wind up going down a path where you hate yourself in the end or find yourself in some kind of hollow emptiness. Because make no mistake every moment you find yourself tugged between the two extremes is a moment that you're drifting, so finding some peace in your own sense of self is the only way that you will find contentment.

"Do not, however, mistake contentment for purpose. Contentment is peace, it's a part of the process. Contentment is acceptance and all of the rest of it, but it is not purpose. It is not meaning. It has nothing to do with the higher order."

I am frustrated now, balling up my fists and acting almost petulant as I insistently hold out for more.

"I want purpose though."

"You can't get it just like that."

"True or false," I challenge her, "Without peace and purpose there will be no true happiness? I need both to find myself, to find some deeper meaning.

"If all I have is peace of mind, then I'm not progressing. I need something to do, something to accomplish, to find an actual grounding through which to build up my life."

It made sense to me, which was somehow odd. Dreams are almost always loosely defined and wonky, drifting through muck that holds you back and drags you down. To have some kind of revelation in it was almost unknown to me.

Not that dreams couldn't lead to revelations, but more that those revelations only came upon reflection. The dream didn't provide them, you had to find through through interpretation.

"Those are pillars of a good life," she nods, agreeing with me, "Important pillars. Fundamental. Solid foundation, peace and acceptance with yourself and then purpose, some higher order and goal that you work towards."

"So what is my purpose then?" I ask, and staring deep into her I narrow my gaze and speak honest and true, "I know you know what it is."

"I won't deny it," she gives in, a thin lipped smile and a gentle inclination, "I know what your purpose is. I know what would make you content. Or at the very least I know what greater role you fill, shall we say."

"I'm here for a reason," I go on, "I'm here to do something."

By looking into her eyes there are a few things of which I am certain, disconcerting though they may be.

There is such a thing as objective meaning in life. There is a goal that we are put here to accomplish and if we do not do so, well then we leave the world a worse place than it was when we came in.

And while this can make it seem like our lives are not our own, that is not necessarily the case. We are free to do what we will. To follow our task and succeed or fail. To ignore it entirely even, turning our back on it.

We are free to do as we will, but that in no way does that mean that we are free from the consequences of it. And I know this, just as I know that she knows it. Just as I know that Baba knows my purpose and my place.

Just as I know that they have been set out for me long before I was ever born.

Just as I know that, even though she knows, she did not have a hand in granting this to me.

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